Despite beautiful models, cola sales are down!

Now they had to go and prove themselves, our ad guys, which is that they are losing touch. I read in this article that cola sales are down despite advertising spends. Now as a ring-side viewer fo this interesting industry (can I take the liberty to call it that considering it is only ideas and mouse clicks they survive on?) I have been apalled by the bad quality of cola advertising.

Examples abound, here are a few:

"***** bhujaye pyas, baki sab bakwas."
"Thande ka thadka." Yes the Aamir Khan one. It rankles, yetch.
"Ghar chalte hain." With the guys leaping from a mountain on their bikes.
"P**** TV" featuring the charming Kareena and Priyanka

Now, come on guys, what's wrong? Have you lost it or have I? You used to turn out such lovely ads at one time. Don't tell me the days of Brendon Pereira, Mohammed Khan, and Brinston Miranda have been forgotten. Has the craze to go to Cannes not made you any wiser about subtlety in advertising? With ads like this you surely aren't helping the cola companies, any more than their poor fagged out uniform-walla executives.

Any one here read David Ogilvy? "A good advertisement is one which sells the product without drawing attention to itself." The sad part is they have already drawn attention to themselves, i.e., mine! For more of Ogilvy's quotes go here.

As for using curvaceous film stars for cola ads, or, any ads for that matter The Times of India recently featured an excerpt from a study in Journal of Consumer Research which states, "Only when consumers are either unable or unwilling to consider the spokesperson's credibility, they rely on the spokesperson's attractiveness. When consumers are focused on the ad and they believe their thinking to be influenced by something about the spokesperson, attractive spokespeople may be less persuasive than relatively unattractive spokespeople."

Or in short beautiful film stars aren't always effective in promoting colas. Oh, what a waste! Perhaps the millions could have been spent on deserving models.
cola|Advertising|Indian Advertising|David Ogilvy