Holi is known as Dolyatra in Bengali culture and like all other festivals, this one is also celebrated with pomp and show. But as we humans are evolving in this Kalyug(hope you get the joke) we are slowly killing the essence of our culture and festivals. According to the Hindu mythology and stories told in Bengal,
“Dolyatra popularizes the tale of Radha and her lover, Krishna. Krishna, as a boy would drench girls with water and colours as a sport. Soon, other boys in his village started participating and somehow, it became a tradition to throw colours and water on each other on this special day. As Krishna grew, the game came to signify the colourful and eventful love story of Radha and Krishna.”
Everything remains the same from colours to groups roaming around the streets to share their joy with friends and strangers. But some take an opportunity to hide behind the colors and the common saying “Bura Na Mano Holi Hai” to achieve their perverted desires. This has been a common trend for ages and hence women are not allowed to play the festival of colours or if they are then they prefer to do so in known circles. But such incidents are rampant in known and trusted circles.
This common and simple insight is fbb’s Holi campaign for this year. The video encourages women to speak up and emphasises on “Bura na khelo, Holi hai.” The video ends with a strong message and asking customers to come to the fbb stores to collect stickers. I am a bit confused with the whole sticker thing and why do I need to go to a store to get a sticker in a digital age? However, the campaign has got the influencers lined up on social media to speak about the movement so that it helps the campaign to reach its engagement goal.
Now with the key insight gone remaining brands are left with save the water initiative or the family angle. This year's save water route has been taken by LivPure and Goldmedal Electricals. “Over 150 lakh litres of water gets wasted every Holi,” according to the Goldmedal Electricals. The video with hard-hitting visuals and lines at the end are potent enough to request people to celebrate Holi responsibly.
MP Birla Cement, Indian Oil and Surf Excel have adopted the route to showcase the traditions and culture. Surf Excel has played safe after its Twitter backlash in 2019 when it wanted to be a progressive brand by bringing two communities together. The intent was good but the execution was clueless. So this year it has gone back highlighting the feud between 2 brothers and how a child brings them close on Holi. Does the melodrama route work? If nothing #RangAchheHain rhymes with #DaagAcheeHain
KS Chakravarthy (Chax), chief creative officer, Tidal7 Brand and Digital, mentions that he likes the film and its tone. He adds, “One of the challenges in managing a campaign as iconic as Daag Achhe Hain is the temptation to churn out films on a fixed calendar, whether you have a good script or not.”
Now that is the growing problem with moment marketing? We have sold digital that one needs to create fast and in numbers. But in this madness quality has long left such campaigns and this has been a common problem highlighted during the recent Women’s Day campaigns. Brands churning videos on age-old insights by spinning the same wheel.
In Facebook’s case, the so-called 360 degree massive Asia Pacific campaign (PR pitch) didn’t realise that a sister agency part of the same network had almost done a similar campaign with OnePlus in Diwali 2018. Shame indeed for Facebook rolling out an Asia Pacific campaign in India for the first time.
More Together, the global campaign illustrates how the Groups tab on the Facebook app helps people from different backgrounds come together over a shared interest. To highlight this insight, the brand took Holi as a backdrop. Ketan, a young man who loves Holi is in Romania where people have no clue about the festival. So Ketan’s friends from India get in touch with his Romanian friends and ask them to give Ketan the Holi feel. I guess Romanian people are cool who took the arduous task to give Ketan the Holi feel.
Just like in 2018 the young guy finds laddoos in Amsterdam. The smartphone company highlighted its growing community that is growing across cities and countries. It was still believable.
Anyways, something that caught my eyes was Nykaa’s campaign #ColourMeFree. Balanced perfectly between Women’s Day and Holi is a rap song sung by rapper and hip-hop queen Deepa Unnikrishnan aka Dee MC. The video takes on our society that looks down upon a darker skin especially if it is a girl and gives more love to the fair skin.
The music video is worth listening for its words, music and voice. Glad a brand got the message and the rap video right.
That’s all I have for this year Holi. Hope you had a safe and healthy one if you celebrated. (I don’t play Holi so I slept, slept and watched Baaghi3 on the big screen. Don’t ask me anything about the movie ;) Holi has few takers in Bengaluru and this year even the Coronavirus played its role.)