During our lifetime managing brands, we always found advertising development to be exciting and stimulating. That’s why we get pumped up when we see great new campaigns, much like kids in a toy shop. The recent ad for Brooke Bond tea caught our attention and we couldn’t resist the temptation of sharing our thoughts on this one.
Tea in India is not just an ordinary beverage. It is what millions of Indians start their day with and consume endlessly from dawn to dusk, almost inventing occasions to knock back another cuppa. Tea is much more than just a way to warm up or cool down. It is a social lubricant, a community affair, and a way to break the monotony of one’s day.
In the recent past, tea’s position as the pre-eminent go to beverage has been challenged by a plethora of choices including carbonated beverages, juices, smoothies, bottled waters, flavoured milk, protein shakes, energy drinks, mocktails and home-made drinks using traditional Indian ingredients.
With the advent of the internet and social media, tea has shifted away from being the epicentre of social interactions. As WhatsApp, Instagram and Snap Chat replace face to face conversation, the role of tea as a platform and backdrop for human interaction has been
somewhat diminished.
It is this thought that the new Brooke Bond tea campaign builds from, to weave a magical tribute to the waning glory of tea and seeks to revive it. In fact, the ad starts by cleverly posing this question – Who says that you need the internet for social networking? (When of
course, there is tea).
Communication Objectives: The ad sets out to celebrate the ubiquitousness of tea in our lives and renew interest in tea drinking. It uses the analogy of our internet-based lives to cleverly embed tea into every waking hour of the day.
Target Audience: While every adult is fair game for a cup of tea, the use of the digital driven context of our social lives subtly pitches tea to a consumer who still prefers a good face to face conversation and is socially engaged in the physical sense.
Proposition: Simply put, the ad is telling us that we can’t live life without tea and that tea is an outperformer on any modern metric of digital communication. So, we have a home maker who “invites” her neighbours for tea and they quickly “accept”. Or a tea vendor who gets 1000 to 2000 “likes” aka “customers”. How on a rainy day a young hostel student’s tea is “trending” and the easy “sharing” and “reposting” of tea among friends and colleagues. The ad ends with the signoff line “India ka favourite social network”.
Creative Idea: The entire campaign has been rooted in familiar everyday settings that are endearing because of their simplicity. It moves seamlessly from one daily event to another depicting us enjoying the simple pleasures of life, with tea as the backdrop in each instance.
Brand Integration: Interestingly, the name Brooke Bond shows up only in the last frames of the ad, so one could argue that this campaign will benefit all tea brands, not just Brooke Bond Red Label. While Brooke Bond will certainly grow if the category expands, we are inclined to believe that the ad could have started with the brand positioning itself as the original and authentic social lubricant, long before the internet took over our lives. This
might have had a stronger impact on business.
Cut Through & Memorability: Vignettes from our unique Indian society such as community housing, roadside eating, hostel living and long-distance train travel that brings strangers together make this ad a pleasure to watch. It has the feel of an Incredible India campaign as we marvel at some of what makes our country a special experience. That tea remains centre stage in every vignette is taken for granted.
Campaign or one off: Life in India has so many dimensions that a campaign about tea as the fulcrum of all social interaction allows for endless versions and an unlimited number of executions. Maybe the Brand Management team and the ad agency have already visualized the sequels to come. We will wait patiently for round 2 of this campaign.
With the utmost respect for the huge Marketing brain power that drives Unilever’s portfolio of winners, we would award an 8 on 10 to this ad. Our only issue, for which we have deducted marks, is the opportunity missed to better integrate the brand into the ad and make Brooke Bond synonymous with tea. In some parts of the country, Brooke Bond and Red Label are probably already generic for tea.
Passing judgement on one of the finest FMCG brand marketers is something we do with the utmost humility and respect. Unilever remains one of the original Marketing gurus and we are always learning from the masters. Pardon us, this is just us being the Professor of Marketing and completing the discussion in class.
Adios.