New Delhi, April 10: Picture this: you open this mysterious package wrappedin satin and ribbons, only to find your caricature, neatly framed, staringup at you. The good news: it's a personalised invitation from the MULchairman Jagdish Khattar to experience the Baleno. The bad news: if you arenot on the list, it means you are not one of the top 1,000 movers andshakers of India."Since opinion leaders, celebrities and CEOs receive hundreds of mailersdaily, we decided to reach out to them in an innovative way," says generalmanager (marketing) Arun Malhotra. "We decided to send this personalisedmail pack -- including a pen-and-ink sketch of the CEO in a special frame -- which they would simply love to put on their tables."
MUL's hidden agenda: to convey that the Baleno is truly an icon of class,sophistication and individuality. Adds Malhotra: "Though we may sell only 40cars this way, we'd have at least got the Baleno talked about in the rightcircles."
The two-month-long exercise began in January 2000. MUL's marketing teamworked with creative agency Lintas to check addresses and designations andsourced photos of leading industrialists, CEOs and film personalities frommagazines. The list is endless: industrialist Ratan Tata; media moghulSubhash Chandra; chief election mommissioner MS Gill; thespian Dev Anand;film star Sonali Bendre; Godrej Soaps CEO Adi Godrej; Godrej Boyce CEOJamshed Godrej; Sony TV CEO Kunal Dasgupta; Walt Disney India head PratikBasu; Marico chief Harish Mariawalla; Contract Advertising head Ram Sehgal;and Exide chairman SB Ganguly, all are on the Baleno's road map.
After the scrutiny, in the first week of March 2000 MUL started dispatcing alimited number of mailers -- around two-dozen at a time -- in coordinationwith MUL's regional managers, so that the invitation could be supported bytest drives of the Baleno.
Copyright © 2000 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.