The cute little Amul girl – the mascot used by Amul has turned 50 this year. Mascots are spokes creatures, they are considered best branding elements which help consumers in brand recalling thus helping the company in their branding exercise. The mascots are often based on people, animals, or objects, mascots enable the target audience to better identify, remember, and understand a company and products. The Amul girl is a hand-drawn cartoon of a young girl dressed in fashionable attire with blue hair and a half pony tied up. Brand Amul has grown with their mascot. I think to a great extent the advertisements used by Amul have helped the brand to grow. Their ads are humorous, the Amul girl has a take on all happening in India from capturing the spirit of India in different seasons, festivals and events.

The ads have captivating slogans using parodies and satirical messages. The outdoor advertisements, the billboards are placed at busy traffic junctions which no one can miss. The mascot was born in 1966. The butter had been in the market for 10 years prior to the designing of the mascot. The mascot was designed by Eustace Fernandes and Sylvester daCunha. The Amul girl was created to give a fight to rival brand – the Polson butter. Polson butter used to have a cute little girl as their mascot. In 1966, Varghese Kurien, the head of Amul hired Advertising and Sales Promotion (ASP) prior to which their agency was FCB Ulka.

Dr. Kurien, then chairman of the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation Ltd. (GCMMF) suggested a mischievous little girl as a mascot with two requirements: it had to be easy to draw and memorable as most of the advertising would be outdoor media which required hand painting in those days and the hoardings had to be changed frequently. Kurien gave free hand to daCunha and Fernandes to make Amul ads. The first ad was released in March 1966 when the horse racing trend was catching up in India. It was fashionable to go to turf clubs. The rich and famous wouls go for horse racing. In the first ad, the Amul girl was seen riding a horse with the word ‘Thoroughbread’ as the punchline. The mascot, since then, has been commenting on many events of national and political importance including the 1976, emergency in India.

The Amul ad banners tell you what is current in India.  What is hot? The parody in the ads have become sharper and faster with time. The Amul girl now wear skimpy clothes, her dressing also revels the fashion trends, and the liberated Indian society. The billboard of Amul in true sense conveys how India thinks, how India functions as a nation. Brand Amul has one of the longest-running advertisement campaigns in India. Amul girl is sharp witted, unapologetic, and feisty. She has a say on everything: from the weather, entertainment, sports, commodities, sports, business, politics, environment – you name the occasion, she has a viewpoint on it. She has become a perpetual part of the Indians. Her sense of humor has always been admired. The brattish mascot gets away with some nasty, tongue-in-cheek comments.

In 2001, Amul ran an ad campaign criticizing the Indian Airlines strike, at that point Indian Airlines threatened to stop offering Amul Butter on their flights unless the ads were pulled. Another ad during the Ganesh festival which said, Ganpati Bappa More Ghya (Ganpati Bappa take more). The Shiv Sena party said that if the ad wasn’t removed, they would extinguish Amul’s office. In 2011, the ad campaign came up with ‘Maine kyaa khaya’. It was themed on Commonwealth games scam   against Suresh Kalmadi, the ad agency ran into trouble. Kalmadi’s party workers in Pune actually pulled down the hoarding. When the Satyam Computer Scandal took place in 2009, the Amul billboard was worded as ‘Satyam Sharam Scadalam’, there were some other spoofy posters as well. The Staym board sent threatening letters to the agency with dire consequences to be faced. Another controversy was related to Jagmohan Dalmiya, former chief of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, where the Amul ad depicted him through the three righteous monkeys who don’t hear evil, don’t speak evil and don’t see evil. The tagline was “Dalmiya mein kuchh kala hai?”

Whether it be Kim Kardashian’s denial of participation in the Indian version of Big Brother, or the stringent Union Budget, you get little bits of insight into what’s making the headlines that moment. During 1991 Amul ad showed then finance minister, Manmohan Singh, perilously walking the tightrope; it was the time India signed in to become part of the WTO.

All through the years, the charming Amul girl billboard has been kept animated by three men: helmed by Rahul DaCunha, copywriter Manish Jhaveri and illustrator Jayant Rane. Jhaveri has maintained the language quality with a unique style of vocabulary, with lots of puns and a colloquial flavor. He also brought in a new mix of regional and informal vocabulary that is loved by the public. Rane has been painting the Amul ads meticulously by hand for thirty years. All three men ensures that Amul girl’s trademark features blue hair, chubby cheeks, wide eyes, no nose and long eyelashes  are not altered even while adding celebrity twists. The endowed trio have perfected the art of choosing an apt theme for the Amul girl ad which are smartly release it at the perfect moment. Most of their campaigns are specifically targeted in the regions they impact the most. While they choose the hotly trending topics from the newspapers, they get the public point of view from social media. The trio believes in keeping themselves updated with the public perception. The Amul dairy ad campaigns continue to endure public expectations with close to 6000 billboard hoardings being exhibited across India.

Though Amul girl turned fifty this year, age has not gnarled her. She looks genial and chirpier.   The ‘Utterly Butterly’ Girl continues to convey the taste of India peering from the billboards. With her age, her wit and her sense of humor has been growing. She continues her satirical commenting on everything with more ferocity. In fact, people who don’t keep updated with newspapers, get the gist of what’s happening in the nation by looking at the billboard.

To celebrate the Amul Girl’s golden jubilee anniversary, DaCunha Communications has released a coffee table book Titled ‘Amul’s India’, that tells the story of an evolving India as seen from the Amul girl’s eyes. The bold and beautiful girl is truly voice of India. She has seen the good, the bad and some odds through her journey. the book captures a selection of the brand’s most popular advertisements as well as articles by different celebrities who feature in the hoardings, including megastar Amitabh Bachchan, film stars Shah Rukh Khan, Anbeer Kapoor, Deepika Padukone, cricketers Sunil Gavaskar and Rahul Dravid, commentator Harsha Bhogle, tennis star Sania Mirza, veteran filmmaker Shyam Benegal (whose daughter Pia Benegal lent her voice for the ‘Utterly Butterly’ ad jingle), news anchors Arnab Goswami and Barkha Dutt and author Shobhaa De.

She continues to be truly the most admired icon of India.

In globalized markets successful innovation has become a key driver for revenue growth, competitive margins and, in some cases, even for survival of the business. The ability to bring innovation to market swiftly, efficiently and ahead of competitors is becoming ever more significant. An efficient product launch requires incorporating great workable strategies and coordination among multiple functional areas, including product design, procurement, planning, manufacturing process, sales and marketing. In addition, as organizations increasingly leverage core capabilities of other companies, innovation has to be delivered through virtual networks, working with partners in a collaborative environment to bring product and services to market faster, smarter and cheaper. Today’s markets are swiftly altering leaving no room to even think. Cannibalization is a glaring reality and it’s better to accept and survive with it. The CEO of Apple Inc, Tim Cook says “Better to eat your own than have your own eaten by others”. That’s Apple’s philosophy on product cannibalization.

Market cannibalization refers to a situation where a new product “eats” up the sales and demand of an existing product. This can negatively affect both the sales volume and market share of the existing product. Market cannibalization occurs when a new product encroaches on the existing market for the older product, rather than expanding the company’s market base. Rather than attracting a new segment of the market and increasing market share, the new product appeals to the company’s current market, resulting in reduced sales and market share for the existing product.

Creative destruction cannot be avoided. When Joseph Schumpeter coined this term in 1942, he was damn sure that the future is all about impatient, over competitive ‘destructive creation’.  Though, Schumpeter’s idea of creative destruction was as the renewing of society through cycle of innovations, which would lead into higher levels of economic development and welfare. He also mentioned then that creative destruction would create discomfort and loss to the existing players while newcomers would benefit and increase value creation for broader society.

Organizations now not only need to integrate internally, but also externally with suppliers and customers, creating end-to-end supply chain processes and capabilities which differentiate on product and customer requirements. Successful innovation is of tremendous benefit to the organization while launching a new product. If the company can launch the product early in the market, it leads to the chance to acquire greater market share in introduction and growing phase of product life cycle management. Product launching time is also very important for success of product. Customer psychologies, customer need, number of competitors in the market, price driven by the market are most critical and important parameters for success of products. And, cannibalization is however accepted by organizations either internally or externally.

Market cannibalization can have a negative effect on a company’s bottom line, forcing an existing product’s life to end prematurely because sales shifted to the new product, rather than tapping into a new market as intended. At times, market cannibalism is used as a strategy if the company wants to increase its market share, and hopes that the introduction of the new product will harm its competitors more than it will harm itself; for example, when Apple introduced the more feature-rich iPhone and iPods that ate up sales for its lower-end iPods, including the Nano, Shuffle and Classic series. In marketing strategy, cannibalization refers to a decrease in sales volume, sales revenue, or market share of one product as a result of the introduction of a new product by the same producer. While this may seem innately negative, in the context of a carefully planned strategy, it can be effective, by ultimately growing the market share, or to please the consumers by meeting their demands. Cannibalization is a key consideration in product portfolio analysis. For example, when Apple introduced the iPad, it killed the market of the original Macintosh.

Another instance of cannibalization is when a retailer discounts a particular product. The tendency of consumers is to buy the discounted product rather than competing products with higher prices. When the promotion event is over and prices return to normal, however, the effect will tend to disappear. This temporary change in consumer behavior can be described as cannibalization. Though, in business this concept is known by different names in sales and marketing. What is happening in e-commerce? Some companies intentionally cannibalize their retail sales through lower prices on their online product offerings. More consumers than usual may buy the discounted products, especially if they’d previously been secured to the retail prices. Even though their in-store sales might decline, the company may see overall gains. The game of ‘volume’ leads to increase in sales with help of e-commerce.

Cannibalization happens even when companies – particularly retail companies, open shops too close to each other, in effect, competing for the same customers; e.g Nike or Bata having many outlets in an area for shoe markets. Cannibalization becomes an important issue in marketing strategy when an organization aims to carry out brand extension. Hindustan Lever’s Lifebuoy soap’s brand extensions are Lifebuoy Plus, Lifebuoy liquid and Lifebuoy Gold, since these brands have been positioned at different segments. Similarly, Amul butter, Amul ghee, Amul cheese, Amul chas and Amul chocolates are various brand extensions of regular Amul Brand. Companies make brand extensions in the anticipation that they can earn on the equity of the successful brands. Normally, when a brand extension is carried out from one sub-category; e.g. Marlboro Gold cigarette to another sub-category such as Marlboro Light, there is a possible occurrence of a part of the former’s sales being taken away by the latter. However, the strategic intent of such an extension is to capture a larger market share of a different market segments.

Kodak is best known for photographic film products. Its famous USP is “Kodak moment”. During most of the 20th century Kodak held a dominant position in photographic film, and in 1976, had a 90% market share of photographic film sales in the United States. Kodak was synonymous with the film. Do you know that Kodak had to struggle financially in the late 90s, as a result of the steady decline in sales of photographic film due to market transitioning to digital photography? But, despite having invented the core technology in film, as a turnaround strategy, Kodak focused on digital photography and digital printing. The lesson is that cannibalizing one’s own products can be a good thing, if it allows a business to prevent competitors from doing so. A good business is the one which can take flexible decisions and flexibly spin.

Marketing is all about reaching out to customer the maxim “When you are in Rome, speak Roman” describes fact of marketing. Despite having multiple laundry brands such as Cheer, Daz, Dreft and Tip,  P&G successfully introduced a custom laundry brand in India called Tide Naturals. It’s a unique product that suits the needs in the Indian market. P&G makes sure that when they enter a market, they adopt marketing approach that suits the local’s taste and tradition. They adopt appropriate yet diverse strategies. They realize that if they use the same marketing vehicles and distribution arms it’s hard to bring new benefits to different customers. By introducing Tide Naturals they cannibalized their existing laundry product’s market share.

The fact is companies must come to grasp with their cannibalization concerns, because getting overly defensive can restrain powerful growth strategies. If an opportunity is large enough, somebody is going to find a way to grab it; it is therefore a smart move to seize the opportunity than the competitor does. In the long run, survival matters.

A jingle is a short tune used in advertising; it contains one or more hooks (it’s a musical idea which often is a short riff, passage or phrase) which helps promote explicitly of a product or service. Jingles are hummable, catchy little slogans. They are typically a form of sound branding. Because we can hum them, they are phrased with catchy words which can be remembered easily. Jingles live a longer life. Though they seem trifling, they are successful at getting us to remember a product, to buy the product and even make us think we need the product to be accepted or successful.

The first jingle was born in 1926 in Minneapolis, Minn. when an a cappella group played a quartet in praise of “Wheaties” – a General Mills breakfast cereal. Executives at General Mills were actually about to withdraw Wheaties from the market, but when they noticed a point in its popularity in the regions where the jingle was aired, they changed their minds. The company decided to air the jingle nationally on the radio, and sales went through the roof. Eighty years later, Wheaties is still a household staple in kitchens across the globe.

Since then, jingles have become an important part of any advertising campaign. Some jingles will never die, and they have become a part of our lives. Effective jingles have the capacity to build tremendous brand equity of a product. A successful jingle promotes a positive image, making the consumer more likely to want to purchase the product.

Music can fulfill several tasks when it is used in advertisements. The appealing and entertaining aspect of music helps making an advertisement more interesting. Captivating jingles can make the commercials attractive and engage attention of viewers. From this point of view music need not necessarily manifest any special affinity with a particular product or service in order to play an effective and useful function. The music functions more as bridge between viewer and advertisement. Another basic attribute of music is to support an advertisements structure and continuity. Music adds dramatic approach to a TV or radio commercial. The narrative of the commercial becomes more meaningful with the music. Jingles are also called ‘Singing commercials’ and they have made a self-contained genre.

Look at the lingering jingle of Nirma washing powder; it is one of the most famous jingles. It’s been years down the line but the jingle of Nirma is still jingling in the ears of Indian People. It was of no importance whether the detergent gave clothes the “Dhood si Safedi” or not. But the feisty and spirited ad made a marvel out of the brand. Think of Nirma and the picture of a little girl twirling around with her white frock cannot be forgotten. This jingle has become so familiar in our minds. Nirma took on the might of giant multinationals and wrote a new chapter in the Indian corporate history!

Jingles have the poetic and emotional appeal; it scores over logical, informational advertisements. I think this happens because music can provide a message without the customer consciously noticing it. For providing rational facts in the same time “mixtures of speech and song provide advertisers with opportunities for both logical and factual appeals. Music can therefore function as a nonverbal identifier for certain groups with different musical taste.

Do you know that in sixties and seventies companies wishing to advertise on Radio used external radio stations like Radio Ceylon and Radio Goa (then Goa was under Portuguese control). Radio Ceylon was a popular station as it aired film songs, which was banned on All India Radio (AIR) because the then Information & Broadcasting Minister Mr. Balkrishna Vishwanath Keskar – who thoroughly disapproved of film music. However, in 1965 when Ms. Indira Gandhi was Information & Broadcasting Minister under the Prime Minister Mr. Lal Bahadur Shastri, she changed things. In 1966, Ms. Indira Gandhi became the Prime Minister and she gave serious attention to the use of Radio as a mass media. In 1967, the government accepted the recommendations of an expert committee under the former Director of AIR – Krishna Chandra Sharma. And ads started broadcasting on radio which further saw a spurt in sweet and melodious radio jingles.

Even today the jingle “tandurasti ki raksha karta hai Lifebuoy, lifebuoy hai jahan tandurusti hai wahan” rings in our ears. Similarly ‘Utterly, Butterly, Delicious AMUL’ was another great success.

In the seventies India witnessed a lot of new agencies being set up, including the Mumbai-based Rediffusion, Trikaya Grey and Chaitra and the Chennai-based R. K. Swamy & Associates. Reliance Group setup Mudra Communications in Ahmedabad. In 1977, Doordarshan started accepting ads. It changed the life of Indian ads radically and brought a qualitative leap in making of ads. I still remember the first TV ad was a still for the Topaz brand of razor blades from the house of Malhotras and the first ad prepared for TV was of Jenson & Nicholson modeled by Dalip Tahil and Maya Alagh arguing over the color of their bedroom. This ad was created by Rediffusion. There were only 3 TV Programs on Doordarshan. I still recall we never got irritated when in between the programs ads were played. The programs were: CHITRAHAAR, PHOOL KHILE HAIN GULSHAN, GULSHAN and Sunday Evening Feature Film. And, due to TV ads, lesser known brands were marketed with ease all over the nation.

And then in early eighties the Hawkins Pressure Cooker jingle sung by Preeti Sagar (My heart is beating, Film Julie singer) the jingle words were “Hawkins ki seeti baji, khushboo hi khushboo udi, Mazedaar, lazzedaar khaana hai tayyar, aji khaana hai tayyar! Murg Musallam, Tomayyto Soup, Matar Pulao, Maaki Daal, Kheer aur Dum Aloooooo Har vyanjan swadisht banaaye, minton mein jhatpat pakaaye Hawkins! Hawkins! Hawkins Pressure Cooker! Every Indian household thought of buying the Hawkins Pressure Cooker.

Alyque Padamsee of Lintas was approached by Lever Brothers to write an ad film for HAMAM. He drafted script showing a bikini model bathing with HAMAM under a waterfall. This idea was absolutely rejected by Lever Brothers considering that Indian housewives are restricted to kitchen, and they rarely go out for a picnic or a movie. Padamsee then made a simple ad “chehre ki sundertaa ko nikharta HAMAM”. See how ads show the transformation in society, its culture and philosophy – time passed and Lever team once again told Alyque Padamsee to write another ad film for a new soap – LIRIL. Alyque took out the old and rejected script from his cupboard, changed the title from HAMAM to LIRIL and rest is the history. Within 10 years the Indian housewife was elated from her mundane surroundings to a more confident and earning woman. The Liril ad showcased the modern and liberated Indian woman to the world. It was the hottest ad in the early 80s. Which showed the LIRIL girl drenched under the falls wearing only bikini? The ad was all about waterfalls, abundant water and the girl splashing about. The background score was “la…la la la laaa..”. The la,la, la notation just went about with a hummable tune. The first Liril ad was a masterpiece of with unmatched caliber; it was a product of Alyque Padamsee’s imagination. It was shot in Kodaikanal at a waterfall a little beyond Guna caves. LIRIL brand became largest selling brand of soap in Luxury Soap Segment. Both men and women used it!

I recall this sweet little jingle of Bajaj Electricals. It seems Bajaj Electricals made a historical success by giving a fight to Philips bulbs with their jingle “Jab mein chhota baccha tha, badi shararat karta tha, meri chori pakdi jaati,…aur roshnee karta Bajaj” the attractiveness of this jingle is haunting. The ad shows a kid hiding and reading comics, then a young man sneaking in room from window and at the last shot of an old man sneaking into the fridge for some sweet.  The changeover in pitch and tone from a childish jangle to the old man’s rattle is so fascinating in this jingle.

Some of the older jingles can still bring a smile on our faces. They are inseparable from our lives. They have become iconic and like diamonds they will remain with us forever.