Amul?s India, a coffee table book based on 50 years of Amul advertising, chronicles India?s longest-running outdoor campaign right from its very genesis
This is the story of how a little poppet in a polka-dotted frock and a matching ribbon in her ponytail became the nation?s favourite daughter, mischief-maker, and, above all, social commentator. Generations have been fed Amul butter, and generations have been feasting on Amul?s advertising campaign, which is just as endearing and sought after as, or probably even more than, it was five decades ago. Now, that?s a mighty long time in advertising where campaigns come and go, zipping through time and competing for just a glance. But it?s not about a glance in Amul?s case, it never was. We wait for the weekly dose of Amul?s charming micro-analysis of whatever it is that?s making headlines, we seek out the ads, relish the puns, afford ourselves a smile and then get on with life as we know it.
Amul?s India, a book based on 50 years of Amul advertising, collects and puts into perspective these vignettes of our age and times as it chronicles mostly smiles, with maybe a few frowns, while providing its own wry and often sly lesson in contemporary history, hoarding by hoarding.
The book tells the story of this longest-running outdoor campaign in India right from its very genesis when daCunha Communications was hired in 1966 to advertise for Amul butter. Till then, Amul, which was already in the market since a decade, was positioned as, ?processed from the purest milk under the most hygienic conditions by a dairy co-operative in Gujarat?, with the tagline, ?Purely the Best?. Sylvester Dacunha, now chairman of daCunha Communications, then turned it around on its head to ?coin a slogan that became one of the more memorable battle cries in advertising?. Thus was born ?Utterly butterly Amul!?. The rest, as they say, is history, still in the process of being recorded.
Amul?s India chronicles the journey of the campaign ?through the eyes of prominent writers, public figures and the subjects of the hoardings themselves?. And the list is stellar?Amitabh Bachchan, Shobhaa De, Sunil Gavaskar, Rahul Dravid, Harsha Bhogle, Rajdeep Sardesai, Alyque Padamsee and Sania Mirza, among others. Not to mention?and this is where all the fun is?it consists of the choicest of Amul ads over the decades. Every single page is a treat.
The Amul Girl has poked fun at and commented on almost every aspect of our social life. Politics, Bollywood, business, sports?she quite literally has spread all of it on her toast and, not to mention, toasted many on the way. In a way, we can say she?s 50, but she still remains the cute, little girl who casually walks into our minds, tickles our funny bone, and walks out with equal ease, only to return the next week. Ageless, she defies the shackles of the very time she defined for decades and still does. But it?s serious advertising without taking anything too seriously.
?The campaign has provided a non-stop running commentary on what?s happening in the country, without taking any of it, and itself, seriously. It?s a societal mirror without malice, while being cheeky, light and likeable at the same time. Here, we have given a butter brand the right to comment on everything that happens around us. But it?s a right they?ve earned,? says social commentator and MD and CEO of Futurebrands, Santosh Desai. So be it the Satyam scandal on which Amul?s ad ran, Satyam, sharam, scandalam! , Sachincredible appetite!, which was dedicated to Sachin Tendulkar?s genius, or Mere paas maska hai!, which took a potshot at the Ambani brothers? dispute, or even Incurable !ndia!, which was a parody on the line ?Incredible India? when the Commonwealth Games scam was making headlines. The little girl was right there with us, watching what we we watched, observing what we observed.
She has also ruffled more than a few feathers along the way, some of which attracted bizarre reactions as well. Sample this: during a prolonged airline strike, the ad said, ?Indian Airlines serves Amul butter?when it flies.? Indian Airlines demanded that the ad be pulled down or threatened to stop serving Amul butter. The ad stayed, with Dr Verghese Kurien, then head of Amul, backing the agency. Similarly, when Amul ran an ad on the Satyam scam, daCunha Communications received a letter from the Satyam board demanding that the agency apologise or else ?all their employees will stop using Amul products!?
Desai adds that what works wonders for the campaign and speaks volumes about it is the fact that it has never tried to force its way into the consumer?s mind. ?It?s always been a low intensity campaign. It?s advertising that the consumer goes out and seeks. Amul?s advertising speaks in a distinctive, relevant and confident voice,? he says. Desai, in the book, has written a long analytical piece decoding the campaign through its various phases. From the 1970s and ?80s, when the Amul billboard ?documents the disconnected concerns of a small group,? to the mid-Eighties to mid-Nineties decade when liberalisation and chang s being captured, to the post-liberalisation era when the portrayal of the politician as villain begins to emerge, to the 21st century, which has seen the campaign?s ?movement towards the popular…as a very significant proportion of messages draws from Bollywood and television?.
Prominent ad guru, Alyque Padamsee feels that Amul?s branding is just the right balance of advertising as well as the product. ?No matter what the Amul ad says, the branding is very clear. It?s always about Amul in some way or the other and that?s where the genius of those behind the campaign lies. They have a great campaign and a product, both of which compliment one another rather than overshadowing each other, which happens way too often with extremely successful campaigns where the product gets lost somewhere,? he says. And how has the campaign changed? ?They haven?t changed one bit in their approach and why should they? Of course there are changes here and there in terms of the subject matter and the kind of vocabulary used. For instance, they use a lot more ?Hinglish? now. But they?ve done a great job in maintaining their personality. Their technique is constant, only the subject matter changes,? he responds. Amul surely has avoided the ever so common pitfall of rebranding and repositioning itself time and again, something which ails most businesses and marketing theories.
Oh, by the way, did we mention that this book is actually a business publication and can be quite instructive for management students and brand managers? That just comes as a second thought. For, Amul?s advertising campaign goes beyond textbooks, marketing spends, obsession with branding and all the advertising jargon. It?s truly the taste of India and anyone, brand manager or not, who wants to have an utterly, butterly, delicious walk down memory lane will do good with a copy of Amul?s India. Truly a collector?s item.