The first consumer revolution dates back to 18th century when people, who till then had just owned necessities for survival, began to acquire small luxuries due to the sudden increase in wages as a result of the expansion of economies in North-Western Europe. The more people spent, the stronger the economy grew with industries popping up everywhere. However, this led to people obsessing over absurd commodities such as tall wigs that could only be accessed by another person if he stood up on a chair, embroidered handbags and silk lined slippers. Shopping for pleasure rather than necessity became the vogue. The obsession reached such heights that philosophers preached that a state could either have intellectual and high-minded individual but be poor or have idle consumers of materialism and be extremely rich. Needless to say that materialism won in the long run.
Fast forward to 21st century where nations are entirely built on consumerism, people have started associating their emotions of pride, happiness, sadness, jealousy, etc and the concept of success to materialism. Tons of articles have been published stating how consumerism and materialism are directly linked to depression, anxiety and overall a less fulfilled life. Dr Anna Leybina while discussing consumerism and its effect on happiness, mentioned something very important.
Research shows that spending on someone else, brings happiness and people are generally happier when they spend on others.
On hearing this, what immediately popped up in my mind were Coca-Cola’s taglines – “Taste the feeling” and “Open Happiness”. It was then that I realised that even though consumerism is the reason why life and relationships have become complex these days, it is also the means of reconnecting human beings by promoting emotions through the products. In other words, certain brands marketed their products as a means of helping their customer form a deep meaningful relationship with each other by repeatedly showcasing the same emotion in different settings.
To make sure I was not the only one who had been unknowingly associating emotions to certain products, I sent out a survey where 120 people participated. All participants are from the Indian sub-continent. The age group being 17-25 years. Instead of asking the participants to associate the brand with the emotion, I asked them to associate the emotion with a brand. The list contained competitors in a given industry and an option which stated “none of the above”.
1. Maggi Noodles (India)
India is the fourth largest consumer of instant noodles in the world. Maggi noodles have a lot of varieties in India such as Hot Heads, Special Masala, Oats Maggi etc but what I am specifically talking about is the classic Masala Maggi. Ongoing through the commercials aired in India over the years for Masala Maggi, I observed that the recurring theme that has been portrayed is the mother-child relationship. It has been portrayed through different settings – from mothers using Maggi to reward the honesty of her son, to a mother comparing the speciality of Maggi to the child’s speciality, to mothers teaching their hostel bound children or young adults moving out of her parent’s house how to cook Maggi. Few of the advertisements also showed the relevance of Maggi in the hostel life. While a mother-child relationship is being marketed, the emotions essentially being associated with Maggi are nostalgia, safety and warmth. The comfort food that has always been your constant. The survey also confirmed the success of marketing.
Yippee noodles do have certain advertisements centred on mothers and children. However, they do not bring forward the relationship between the two but emphasise more on the characteristics of the noodles – long, non-sticky and safe. Hence it does not promote any emotion of human relationship.
2. Coca- Cola (Global)
Coca- Cola advertisements are known for selling “happiness”. In my opinion, it sells “happiness” by portraying memories created through friendships. Their advertisements have a few elements in common such as casual clothing, groups of people and the most important of them all – cheek to cheek smile while holding a bottle of coke. When you put these three together, a familiar picture of young adults making memories while chilling with Coke can be visualised. The consistency in this theme is what makes it so popular among the youth.
Now one may argue saying that Coca-Cola is the oldest brand and therefore it was already popular. Since the participants of this survey are from India, I decided to find the edge Coca-Cola had over Pepsi. According to Business Standard :
“PepsiCo started rolling out its colas in June 1990. Within two to three years, it sold over 20 million cases a year, though a much smaller brand compared with Parle. In 1991, India faced a balance of payments crisis and went in for economic restructuring, as suggested by the International Monetary Fund. Multinationals were suddenly welcome, and Coca-Cola arrived in 1993 without the welter of restrictions imposed on PepsiCo. Chauhan, who realised his time was up, sold his brands, and a 70 per cent share of the market, to Coca-Cola. The cola war had begun.”
According to The Mercury News (2010):
“Pepsi got here sooner, and got to India just as it was starting to engage with the West, and with Western products,” said Lalita Desai, a linguist at Kolkata’s Jadavpur University who studies how English words enter Indian languages. “And with no real international competition, ‘Pepsi’ became this catch-all for anything that was bottled, fizzy and from abroad.”
“Saying ‘Pepsi’ connotes getting a soft drink,” said Kiran Bhushi, an anthropologist at Indira Gandhi National Open University whose research is focused on consumption patterns of India’s middle class and has consulted for both companies.” ”
Even in 2010, Pepsi retained its popularity. However, Economics Times in 2017 reported –
“PepsiCo’s India lost its fizz even as its largest rival Coca-Cola posted double-digit growth amid health-conscious consumers cutting down on sugary aerated drinks.”
Turns out, it was PepsiCo who had the upper hand initially. One may have heard from many individuals that there is no difference in the taste between the two. So, with PepsiCo already gaining acceptance in the Indian community and many not finding any difference between the two, how did Coke end up as the preferred drink for the youth?
By being consistent with a theme.
Coke advertisements also had multiple contents spread to different areas in life but the consistency of Coca-Cola being equivalent to forming friendships rolled out in India in 2009 with “Coke ke saath Dost free” (meaning with coke you get a friend free) starring Gautam Gambhir. This campaign was aggressively followed. In an advertisement of 2013 starring Kalki Koechlin and Imran Khan, it depicted how Kalki on seeing a poster of coca-cola pretended to hold an invisible bottle of the same and offer it to Imran Khan as a means of breaking the ice. It not only worked but Imran took out a real bottle of coke to offer it to her later, unaware that her invisible bottle was inspired by Coke in the first place. Therefore coke suddenly became synonymous with making friends among the youth.
3. Nescafe (India)
There is absolutely no way that coffee reminds you of your dates or gossips with your friends. It reminds you of unfinished assignments, exam stress, sleepless nights or early mornings. It is more so in recent years because the current pop culture romanticises late night hustles with cups of coffees by your side.
Nescafe was the first to give to the world its first commercial instant coffee. It was also the first brand of instant coffee to enter India. So does being the oldest brand bring you more popularity? Nescafe not only fought its way into a market dominated by tea but also paved the way for its competitors. Nescafe had initiated a series of ad campaigns featuring Deepika Padukone and Purab Kohli in a setting where both are neighbours with the taglines “The Bold Taste of Nescafe” and “Switch on the best in you” to popularise the consumption of coffee. It soon started featuring Vir Das in the same ad campaign with the tagline “It’s time you started” and popularising small sachets with “My first cup”. Karan Johar joined in later introducing how easy it is to make cold coffee at home using Nescafe.
The first Nescafe plant in India was set up in 1961 and Bru set up its first in 1968. It is one of the toughest competitors of Nescafe and even pushed it to the second position in 2008. But a lot has changed since then. Nescafe rolled out its #StayStarted campaign in 2014 with the tagline “It all starts with a Nescafe”. The first advertisement featured a stuttering comedian, the second one featured a cartoonist who received a pink slip and the third one featured a radio jockey who was unable to get phone calls from his listeners. In all the three ads, they stuck to their profession even when the time was tough and soon modified their ways to achieve success. However, when no one was laughing, listening or calling (in the 3 respective ads), they all felt lost, Nescafe is what kept them going. The radio jockey ad was inspired by the real-life story of Rishi Rawat and immediately became viral. Nescafe was able to understand that young adults were eventually breaking free from jobs that society deemed appropriate and was moving towards professions which captured their heart even though it meant to struggle and patience. In the bigger picture maybe #StayStarted is inspired by Nescafe’s journey itself. From being the odd one out in a tea dominated market to slowly becoming everyone’s favourite brand of coffee, Nescafe has lived up to its philosophy.
In both the above advertisement campaigns, Nescafe stuck with its theme. The first one being that Nescafe’s bold taste helps you bring out the best version of yourself. The second campaign’s theme was based on getting better at what you do by practising your art every day, modifying your ways to make your uniqueness your strength and being stubborn enough to not give up. The second campaign is essentially a build upon the theme of the first campaign. Therefore Nescafe is now associated with the urge of moving forward no matter what.
4. Raymond (India)
The brands given as an option in this question are not arbitrarily chosen. In the recent years, Tanishq has evolved from airing commercials which portrayed men buying jewellery for their wives/daughters/sisters to women being independent enough to gift it to themselves and other special women of their lives. Levis began making jeans from plastic bottles. On the contrary, the frequency of Raymond ads dropped in recent years. Yet, it emerged victoriously.
Raymond has two types of advertisement. One showing what Raymond represents and another showing the characteristics or variety of products the brand has. The former is the one that has left a mark on us. Raymond’s advertisements usually have a background of lavish settings which subtly conveys the message that Raymond is directly linked to prosperity. The men in the advertisement always have their acts centred on a woman who is either his wife or his daughter or mother. They also usually take place in a gathering and it has either the man’s parents or his in-laws or an elderly person in the setting. It shows how much he loves his wife (eg: flirting with his wife even after marriage and spontaneously breaking out in a dance in the middle of a mehndi ceremony; ditching the office party to visit his wife who is stuck at work etc) thereby showing a happy marriage, satisfied in-laws or proud parents, and how children are fond of him. A man who is rich, loyal and loved by all – “The Complete Man”. Raymond got associated with the feeling of perfection.
5. Nike (Global)
Nike, Reebok and Adidas are the leading sports company that we grew up with. Recently all of them have moved forward and branched out from portraying prominent sports personalities winning at their game because they used the brand’s products, to how sports empower a person. So I added one more option – “all of the above” to see if the company that was consistently portraying one specific theme of individual uniqueness would stand out or not.
The results were a tad bit disappointing as the majority chose “all of the above”. However, the second position being held by Nike confirms that their marketing policy is working. Nike has consistently used the word “greatness” in their advertisements while simultaneously associating it with individuals who refuse to give up. Nike featured an overweight boy running in one of its advertisement in 2012. The entire ad was just that – an overweight boy who kept jogging at a slow pace refusing to give up. The ad ended with its tagline “Find Your Greatness.” Nike, through its one ad, made it clear that greatness is different for everybody. It’s not a competition as much as it is about giving your best and refusing to give up because overcoming your barriers is what makes you great. The advertisement went viral. It also faced backlash for making obesity look like its coming in the way of greatness but it mostly received a positive response. The boy who was featured got so inspired himself that he vowed to change his lifestyle and become healthier. Nike’s other commercials such as “Winner Stays” features two groups of boys playing football while channeling the skills of their football idols (greatness) in their game while simultaneously ending the commercial with one of those boys scoring a goal without visualizing himself as anyone but himself. Nike successfully depicted that we are as great as our idols when we refuse to give up and how we do not need to follow anyone’s methods/style to be great at what we do in one single advertisement. Nike’s “What are girls made of” ad does not show how a girl defeats sexism by defeating a couple of boys in a game (which is usually the setting other companies use) but proceeds to show how women inspire women to be who they want to be. It shows how preconceived notions need to be broken rather than defeating boys to prove the point because it’s society as a whole that needs to change. Nike has made more such commercials which relate greatness to the sports community holistically rather than promoting winning all the time.
From the above few examples, it can be concluded that by consistently marketing a particular theme consumers will develop an emotion towards it. Customer satisfaction with regards to the product itself is the top factor but when there is a tight competition in the market, such marketing strategy can help tilt the scales to one’s favour and maybe in the long run help develop a loyal consumer base.
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