Aditya’s Blog

I am Thinking...

Audi trying to 'Break the Spell'

via youtube.com

This is one of the most well made car commercials I have seen in recent times. I love the way it is attacking all the marquee and established manufacturers at the same time. This ad is made for the US market where Audi appears to be the underdog; and everyone loves the underdog.

Audi is trying to position itself as the rebel which offers all the choices that their competitors are offering under one brand and without the stereotype. It basically is telling people that you are doing nothing but conforming to stereotypes if you drive the other cars; and this would reflect directly in the statement you are trying to make about yourself. As I said in my last post, it is all about making a statement.

This commercial is an excellent example of how one can throw an open challenge to the established players in a cluttered market and try to change the thinking of the consumers to force them to choose your brand.

Finally, I love the way the R8 pulls up in the street for the kid to drool at. I just wish it was not silver! ;)

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Filed under  //   ads   Advertising   Cars   Marketing Gyan  
Posted February 17, 2010
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Dead end for the first ever Indian dream

I love cars! I love them beyond everything. It does not really matter whether they are Ferraris or Mahindras. I just love the idea of a car. It is so much more than a ton of steel, plastic and glass over 4 wheels! It is just a romantic experience for a car lover to own any car.

Indians got the first taste of this experience in a big way in 1983 when the Maruti-800 was launched.


Picture Outlookindia

The one pictured above was the first model of the legendary car. It was small, good looking, utilitarian and did the job. Most of the other cars were the bulky Ambassadors by Hindustan Motors. The 800 was the perfect Indian car. 

Then came the upgrade in design. 


Picture Car Picutres World

My family had this one. The thing about 800s is, that it was the most common first car. It was the cheapest, most practical, most economical to run and not really ugly; basically a proper value for money buy. Which is the most important quality that any Indian looks for, in anything, in everything. 

Then came another major upgrade in design for this workhorse.


Picture via Indiacar

This was to keep up with all the major launches from the likes of Hyundai and Tata. 

Somewhere around this time Maruti also launched the Alto. This was basically to hedge against the people who were growing out of their first cars (which more often than not were 800s) and moving on to other manufacturers.


Picture Rushlane

This was not only more contemporary in terms of design, it was also more powerful, better equipped and a little more car for the little more money you paid. Once this was launched, rumour mills started working that this was the replacement to the over worked 800.

The 800 was never just a car, except maybe now. It was a dream. It was an aspiration for the Indian middle class. Let us not getting into an economics lesson and analyse why it did well for so long, others will do that. This car is a part of our culture and history now as Suzuki plans to phase it out in India. One of the major reason for doing this of course is that the dream of the Indian has evolved now. 

At the same time it is also time for those who could not even dream of an 800 to start dreaming. 


Picture SpeakIndia

But this is not the space to talk about it. Today I reserve a permanent parking space for the first Indian dream. 

I love this car! The original design the most. It was epic!

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Filed under  //   Cars   India   Me  
Posted February 13, 2010
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Creative ads on stairs

I have often posted about creative advertisements from across the internet. Here is one more. This time they are showing off their creativity on stairs!

My favorite is the Jeep ad.

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Filed under  //   ads   Cars   Pictures  
Posted December 20, 2009
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Marketing the Porsche Panamera

So, what if you are one of the iconic brands of all time having produced products that have become objects of craving and all of a sudden you make something that seems quite hard to sell.

Now imagine this brand to be Porsche. Yup, even they can come out with a stinker of a car which is not exactly a dream to sell. The car I am talking about is the Porsche Panamera. It is by far the ugliest looking sports car I have ever seen! And it will take a considerable amount of booze for any designer to beat that in the ugly scale in the future.

So what does Porsche do? They turn to the marketing department and plead! The marketing department then try to figure out a way to make people feel that the Panamera IS actually a Porsche and it has been made the way it is, for a reason. So in comes its positioning as the first thoroughbred four-seater sports car.

The next step is to drill this positioning statement - Four, uncompromised - into the customer's head. And for this purpose, they have come out with an absolutely brilliant creative!

What do you have as your resource if you are Porsche? What will convince the customer about this being a Porsche? Maybe showing a FEW of the older path-breaking Porshces will do the trick? Just to be on the safer side, lets say, we show ALL of the 50 Porsche models ever made - together! Sounds great!

So off they went and gathered around every Porsche they could find and made something like a teaser first.

So it sounds and looks quite exciting, the prospect of seeing the finished product. Before you go ahead and see the finished ad below, I want you to think about the problem Porsche is facing marketing this ugly car again. You know they are serious when they are putting the weight and reputation of no less than 50 cars behind just one new car. They are pretty desperate!

The concept of the family tree is quite brilliant and so is the execution. However they could have done without the gimmicky CG animation. At times the ad looks like a computer game. But overall a good strategy to market what seems like an adopted child as one of their own.

Tell me what you think!

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Filed under  //   Advertising   Cars   Marketing Gyan   videos  
Posted October 19, 2009
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Need more reasons to love Top Gear?

I don't know how many people know about this, maybe many do, but Top Gear uses almost FIFTY audio tracks on an average for ONE episode!

This goes to show the extent to which they go, just to make it that much better. A single piece of video (a car test or a task) uses almost fifteen tracks, some for just a few seconds. If there is any particular track you heard in an episode and wondered where it came from, you can check it up here - http://is.gd/Bp3m

Not that I needed this reason, but I can't help but love it even more now (if that is possible)!

I have said it a lot of times, this show is not just about cars. It is about british comedy, awesome locales, brilliant film making, superb music and while they are at it, they talk about absolutely breathtaking cars as well. Now THIS is complete entertainment!

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Filed under  //   Cars   Music   Top Gear  
Posted May 19, 2009
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Breed of Drivers!

Oh YES!! There are BREEDS of them out there!

Driving is truly an art that not many can master. And I mean MASTER! Driving takes a certain amount of commitment and finesse, which I might safely say, is not available in plenty out there.

Before we start categorizing them, let me say, I myself am a driver and a pretty good one at that, so rest assured, my comments won’t be totally senseless.

One of the most common characteristic of any driver is that he/she thinks he/she is good! Example can be seen in the previous line itself. So now let’s dissect them.

THE TURTLES – These are the people who if given a chance, would drive even a formula 1 car at not more than 40 kmph. They are the people who, forget coming in last, would surely have DNF against their name in any race. Again there are two types of turtles, one who are the detached people. They don’t care which day it is or even which year it is. They would stay out of everyone’s way and make sure no one disturbs their mission of maintaining a speed of 40. The other type too doesn’t care about the day, but they make sure everyone else also goes at 40. They would purposely drive on the right side and no amount of honking will make them budge. Their motto is drive slow and make sure everyone else does the bloody same too.

THE HARES – This would be the most obvious category after the Turtle. These people are hell bent in creating a new land speed record every time they get behind a wheel, and not even the municipal corporations earnest efforts in stopping them by digging holes doesn’t help. What I can conclude is that they have some serious digestion problems which makes them hurry so much every time. Another contrasting feature is, they have absolutely no clue which car they are driving. Everytime they have a steering wheel, they believe that it’s a Ferrari.

THE SUMO DRIVERS – Ohh yes!! They are totally a different breed. And surely the scariest! They truly believe that an automobile is meant for a person to go from point A to point B, and the straighter the road, the better. Not only do they want to get to point B, but they want to be the fastest, most hated, most cursed, most scary one in getting there. When it comes to caring about the people who use their own anatomy to do the commuting, the sumo drivers just don’t care. These innocent pedestrians are absolutely invisible, or a more plausible explanation would be, they see an X mark on every pedestrian and are hell bent in scoring by hitting the X.

THE WOMEN – These are even scarier than the SUMO drivers. It’s almost an urban legend, the curse of a woman driver. I am quite certain they have never read the back of their driving license. It says, ‘Driving is a privilege, not a right.’ But I guess, they don’t believe in this. They believe that it is their birth right to drive a car. No matter whose it is, which one it is and where it is.

I guess I will stop here. I have a suggestion; I guess you readers can add more categories to this. Please leave it in your comments. Not that I am expecting a lot of them considering the trend, but I am willing to take a chance. So until next time, walk safe!

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Filed under  //   cars   humour  
Posted December 23, 2006
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