MUMBAI: Contract Advertising has announced the appointment of Sagar Mahabaleshwarkar as its chief creative officer. With over three decades of experience across leading advertising agencies in India and abroad, Mahabaleshwarkar is a highly feted creative professional with multiple domestic and international awards under his belt. In his long and successful career, he has left his mark on brands like Samsung, Adidas, Grants, Apollo Munich and Jet Airways.
Contract Advertising CEO Raji Ramaswamy said, “I am delighted to welcome Sagar Mahabaleshwarkar as the chief creative officer responsible for guiding the creative output of Contract in the digital age. He is a seasoned new age creative leader who has the finest art and design sensibilities. He has worked on some of the biggest brands in the country across both traditional and new media platforms and excelled in every one of them. He has a deep understanding of digital and technology with a strong belief that the future lies in the meeting of the two. He has built strong integrated teams in his earlier roles and we are confident that he will take the agency to the next level as an integrated agency of the future with big ambitions”.
On his appointment, Mahabaleshwarkar said, “The vision of Contract and the direction that JWT group is taking globally, is to make brands agile and to make brands purposeful. That’s a dynamic shift which is challenging and forward looking. Having worked on a winning note in a highly competitive, tech-first consumer business for the last three years, I am confident the shift is in the right direction.”
J Walter Thompson chairman and group CEO Tarun Rai said, “We have been in discussions with Sagar for the last few months. And I am very happy that we have him on board, finally. Sagar is an industry stalwart who has built his reputation over the years across many agencies in India and abroad. He is the ideal creative leader to take Contract to the next level and make it a creative powerhouse.”
"I would like to thank Ashish Chakravarty for providing Contract with the creative leadership and support and in getting us to where we are today. I would also like to wish him the very best for the future,” Ramaswamy added.
Contract's erstwhile CCO, Ashish Chakravarty, is moving to McCann Worldgroup.
MUMBAI: For the first time in their history, adidas has consolidated its global media business.
As part of the brand’s drive behind their 2020 ‘Creating the New’ strategy, adidas will align all areas and territories and have appointed WPP’s MediaCom to execute the holistic approach from September 2018.
After a competitive and multi layered pitch process MediaCom were selected as the agency to help adidas and Reebok continue the momentum behind both brands and deliver a winning media approach. The combined brief will be executed across all platforms with a focus on innovation aligned to the brand’s strategic business plan; ‘Creating the New’.
The strategy for adidas has been concentrated on three strategic choices; Speed, Cities, and Open Source. These have all been channeled through a core belief – “Through sport, we have the power to change lives”. This new brief will align to these areas of focus with faster media implementation than ever before, a laser focus on the capital cities of culture and commerce as well as a world class digital ecosystem, and then a continued drive behind an open source approach to fuel innovation.
The areas of responsibility for the agency teams across the world will include full funnel media planning, integrated media consultancy and buying, consumer insight and measurement. The two hubs for the global business will be London for adidas and New York City for Reebok with MediaCom staff also positioned around key focus locations for the brands across the world.
adidas senior vice president for marketing Jocelyn Robiot says, “Through our partnership, we look forward to innovating ways of reaching and connecting to our consumers across the trend-leading cities whose influence on global culture is the key to unlocking desirability and demand.”
Reebok VP of marketing Melanie Boulden adds, “After a vigorous pitch process, MediaCom stood out as an excellent strategic media partner for our brand. We feel that they are the right partner to help us achieve our goals and mission for 2020 and beyond. We are pleased to be working with them and look forward to kicking off our partnership.”
MediaCom Worldwide COO Toby Jenner mentions, “We are delighted to have been selected by one of the world’s most ambitious and iconic brands as their partner. Our teams around the world can’t wait to get cracking. adidas is a business of great people and brands with enormous e-commerce opportunities moving forward. We’re looking forward to developing brilliantly creative and highly effective campaigns, which combine their brand heat and e-commerce, alongside their other agency partners.”
MUMBAI: Affordability is every Indian’s first thought when purchasing anything. However, quality sports shoes tend to be high priced and the likes of Nike Air or Adidas Superstar are beyond the reach of normal people’s budgets.
Enter the latest entrant to try to make the impossible possible – D:FY (read: defy). Launched by fitness enthusiasts Prashant Desai and Rajiv Mehta, who are marathon runners themselves, it aims to make great sports gear accessible to the Indian makes with great technology and breath-taking looks.
For Desai and Mehta, the idea for D:FY seeded with a personal need to buy quality sports products at an affordable price as running was becoming expensive for them. “As runners, we had to buy products by global brands that are heavily priced which has always pinched us. There are enough brands available in the market but they don’t give enough quality products and technologies required to run well,” says Desai.
The company competes directly with Indian brands in the same category such as Action, Power, and Red Tape but aspires to compete with international brands including Sketchers, Nike, Adidas, Puma and Reebok in a year’s time. On this, Pradeep says, “We definitely aspire to compete with bigger players in the market. If you compare a product of D:FY’s which is priced at Rs 5500 with a competitor’s Rs 5500 product, ours is definitely way better in terms of technology. But most people compare apples to oranges whereas they should compare apples to apples.”
Backed by FMCG mogul Kishore Biyani along with Farhan Akhtar and ex-cricketer Anil Kumble, the company has Indian cricketer Hardik Pandya and actor Nidhi Agerwal as brand ambassadors.
The company wants to target a mass audience and hence has decided to price it at a sweet spot. D:FY footwear range targets Indian fitness sensibilities — walk, gym and multi-sport that starts from Rs 2200 whereas apparels start from as low as Rs 799.
Marketing the product efficiently is equally essential to ensure brand awareness and recall and this is where most companies get it wrong. Since digital is available at a much cheaper rate than television D:FY wants to advertise heavily on digital and BTL. It wants to reach consumers at as many touchpoints as possible but will refrain using television at the moment as it comes at an exorbitant cost.
The company is set to invest Rs 10 crore for advertising during the first year of its operations. An optimistic entrepreneur, Mehta says that they are extremely aggressive about their capital spending and will invest in outdoor, digital, BTL, radio and maybe in-cinema advertising along with influencer marketing.
The co-owners don’t want to be just another online brand but will look at ramping up the offline presence by opening stores where consumers can touch and feel the product before buying them.
D:FY is planning an aggressive physical presence with 22 store launches across nine cities of Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Surat, Vadodara, Mohali, Bareily and Hubli by the end of September and plans to take this to 100 stores by 2022.
Online sales are equally important for any brand and especially if you are just starting out. Usually, brands partner with multiple e-commerce websites to sell the products which help them in reaching out to a large set of audience. But D:FY has tied up exclusively with Amazon to sell the merchandise which kind of narrow downs the scope of reaching a mass audience that shops online.
While the products will be available across all channels, the company does not want to sell the products at a discounted rate as it believes the price-point is pretty much justified.
Though major sales for the brand will come in from metros and mini metros, the co-founders want to reach the rural consumer as well. It will also face a stiff competition from local players that sell sports shoes for as low as Rs 200 and apparel at a mere Rs 100-200.
Where most manufacturers – national and international – are looking at shifting their manufacturing units to India in order to promote the government’s Make In India initiative, the duo wants to continue manufacturing the sports products in China. They will, however, bring the apparel manufacturing business to India which is also manufactured in China.
For 2020, the company has set huge targets where it will become more aggressive in terms of marketing and advertising the products, with an increased number of stores and SKUs. The sports brand targets to have revenue worth Rs 60 by the end of its first year’s operations.
The store has all the feels you get when you walk into a Nike or Adidas outlet. It will, however, be interesting to see if D:FY can create a niche for itself in an already cluttered market where Indians still prefer buying international products for the sake of quality.
MUMBAI: Dentsu Aegis Network’s flagship media agency Carat, has partnered with the network’s OOH agency Posterscope, to launch a massive campaign for FIFA World cup 2018. The idea was to create buzz and excitement around FIFA and to own conversations around the World cup for Adidas in a cricket dominated country.
The core objective of the campaign was to build awareness about TelStar – The official Football that is being used in FIFA world cup and to celebrate the pure joy of Football as well as its fans. The one-month-long campaign is aimed at reaching out to people who are enthusiastic about football – both players and fans – across various age groups.
Based on the client brief, the agency developed an interactive innovation on a unipole with the communication of Adidas. The innovation showcased a rope hanging by the unipole to generate curiosity among the passer-by. As the video explains, one person tug was not enough to pull the rope so it needed a combined team effort to pull the rope. As the rope was pulled, the “O” in the ‘GOAL’ moved up and a TelStar football dropped from there for them to play.
Adding a layer of efficacy to the campaign, a well thought-out media plan was designed by the Posterscope team. Based on their deep understanding on the requirement of the brief and with the help of the primary research (OCS), patented analytical tools (OOHZONE) and accumulated understanding, the team zeroed down on a specific location in Delhi for the innovation. It was done on outer Ring Road at IP Park towards ISBT. The location of the unipole was specifically chosen, so that it covers the high volume traffic on Ring Road.
Adidas India, Sr. Marketing Director, Sean Van Wyk said, “The love for football is growing massively in India with each passing year and we wanted to kick-start the celebration of the World Cup in an impactful way. The idea of this innovative billboard was to celebrate and reward the spirit of coming together as a team. The pure joy on their faces to kick the official World Cup football around the field was an amazing sight! Sport really does have the power to change lives.”
Carat India, CEO, Rajni Menon said, “This is yet another example of media convergence in planning where a superb activation on outdoors is working in tandem with digital. The objective was to drive innovation at local level with a scaled outreach to a larger online audience. It was a great way to celebrate the growing euphoria around FIFA in a way that brings out the pure joy of football.”
Posterscope (North), Assistant Vice President, Aditya Goel commented, “We wanted to fuel the passion of the fans before the Kick Off of the FIFA 2018 and the thought was to bring the pure Joy of Football among all age groups in the neighbourhood. This idea is an amalgamation of emotions like joy, happiness, team work and hunger; the ingredients needed for a team to win. We are glad that the client liked our thought which shaped up in this innovation
This campaign was promoted on digital platforms and became an instant hit with 1.3 Mn views in a very short span of time.
This resulted in the flawless execution of the campaign and all timelines were maintained without any compromise in quality. The innovation led to creating extensive and significant buzz around the product. This in-turn has led to the desired exposure of the brand launch in the Indian market.
MUMBAI: In a recent development at Ogilvy India, Abhik Santara and VR Rajesh have been handed over the responsibilities of Mumbai office as head and managing partner, respectively. As part of their responsibilities, they will also oversee the growth of the Kolkata office.
The move is in the direction of Ogilvy India to drive aggressive internal transformation to stay at the top of the game. Ogilvy India CEO Kunal Jeswani says, “Abhik Santara and VR Rajesh are the new captains at Ogilvy Mumbai. With these appointments, Ogilvy Mumbai now has a stellar business, creative and strategic leadership team in place. They, along with the Mumbai EXCO, will drive our transformation agenda together, leading India’s best modern marketing communications agency office to new heights.”
Santara started his career in Delhi and worked with JWT before moving on to lead offices for Rediffusion Y&R and the Lowe Lintas Group. He managed a range of brands in his time with these companies, including Nokia, Pepsi, Airtel, Adidas, Dabur and LG. He leads the business relationships across Unilever Beverages, Bajaj Auto and Marico and, along with the Mumbai EXCO, will now focus on driving this office forward.
Rajesh was rejected by Ogilvy three times before he was finally taken on by the company 15 years ago. In his long career with Ogilvy, VR has worked across a range of clients and brands including Asian Paints, Tata Sky, ITC, Unilever Beverages and Star Plus. He has also helped energise and grow the Kolkata office in a tough market environment. Many of the clients in Kolkata – Bandhan Bank, ITC Kwiknic, Greenply, MP Birla and Yatra – have also felt his great passion and influence. He will partner Abhik to lead Ogilvy Mumbai.
MUMBAI: Adidas has launched a digital campaign with its digital agency Isobar. Titled #ItsOnYou, the core objective is to expand the brand’s community of runners, especially targeting women non-runners. While most brands are striving to garner new audience through strong communication, which is driven by motivation and persuasion; Adidas came up with a digital film with a counterintuitive concept. Instead of giving reasons to women to run, the brand rode on the belief that no one can make someone run unless they want to.
The goal of the film was to make women realise that no external motivation can drive them, nor can any excuse hold them back.
The campaign will be further propelled via a 360 degree initiative, digital and on-ground branding.
Adidas business unit head Sunil Gupta says, “The campaign echoes an urban dilemma of the clash between the excuse and the tiny voice within, that knows the hollowness of the excuse. Through the film, we set out to showcase some of the thoughts people might have at the moment of truth, that metaphorical wake-up call which may spur us into action or lull us into accepting another excuse. Through real people and their very real stories, we hope the message reaches women across strata, geographies and professions that their run, their energy is in their own hands. The team at Isobar captured this thought beautifully,” he adds.
Isobar India national creative director Anish Varghese mentions, “In today’s busy lifestyle, it’s getting easier for people to find excuses whether it’s to run or not to run. This is an attempt to make people realise that no matter what excuse you choose, nothing in the world can make you run. There will be many things which will pull you back, but in the end, the onus is on you to get up and go for that run.”
MUMBAI: KidZania has tied up with adidas for an exciting and fun-learning “#adidiasbyme” activity this summer at KidZania in Delhi NCR & Mumbai.
KidZania is a global indoor theme park that inspires, educates & empowers children, helping them understand & manage their world better, and with adidas is a leading sportswear innovator.
Every kid is unique, has their own style, and a story to tell. Kids can now be the Chief Shoe Designer – where kids get to create one of the best model of adidas shoe by designing their own patterns, choosing colours and even customizing the shoe with their name; and build their own shoe-story at KidZania.
KidZania invites all young Creators, engineers, makers, dreaming designers and innovators to reinvent footwear design. The #adidasbyme initiative will run across the summer vacation period at KidZania in Delhi NCR & Mumbai.
Visit KidZania Delhi NCR & KidZania Mumbai, unleash your creativity by painting and customizing your own shoe at the #adidasbyme event and submit your entries. The winner gets his/her shoe creation turn into reality by adidas and also wins gift vouchers from adidas & KidZania. The winning shoe will also be displayed at KidZania and at select adidas stores.
What’s more – Kids across India can also be a part of this campaign. They can simply visit KidZania India website to participate and submit their entries.
KidZania India CMO Viraj Jit Singh said, “KidZania empowers children with life skills through real-life role-plays experiences that introduces them to different industries and the world of work. The experience at KidZania ignites curiosity and imagination. This essence of the KidZania experience comes alive with our unique partnership with adidas India for the #adidasbyme initiative where children get a chance explore their creativity and design their own shoe. adidas connects the experience to the real world by manufacturing the shoe designed by and for one lucky winner.
adidas India senior marketing director Sean van Wyk said, “Young athletes are the best source of creativity and this activity will give kids a chance to design & reinvent their favourite shoe. adidas understands the power of open-source and we strive to unleash creativity through the #adidasbyme contest. We want the kids to see themselves as the Creators and bring the winning designs to life.”
#adidasbyme KidZania event dates:
· KidZania Mumbai: Started, till June 13th 2017
· KidZania Delhi NCR: Started, till June 30th 2017
MUMBAI: Adidas is all set to blow away cricket fans with the launch of its latest digital campaign titled #III, cricket’s shortest hashtag – #III, aiming to make the hashtag synonymous with cricket. Interestingly, the three “I’s” in the “#III” not only look like the three stumps of cricket but also give a visual representation of the trademark three stripes of adidas. The idea behind the campaign is to keep hashtags concise and crisp, in line with the tenets of social media. The campaign is being led by adidas athletes Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant and each ‘I’ in the #III, represents each one of them. As part of the campaign all three athletes will come together as the adidas #III squad, to become cricket’s first 3D superhero squad who are here not merely to play the game but to entertain audiences at extraordinary levels.
The #III Squad (or the cricket squad) of Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant will regale audiences on field with their explosive performances and off-field with fictional storytelling around the game. These three superheroes will live two lives – one with fantastical superpowers and the other with cricketing powers.
“As the world’s leading sports brand, we decided to establish the world’s shortest hashtag that represents the game – #III. We also realized that it was time to bring back the excitement to the cricket season and hence decided to push our athletes to go beyond just being sportsmen. Today audiences are seeking entertainment in the sport of cricket and we felt that the time was right to showcase Rohit, KL and Rishabh as the explosive players and entertainers that they are. What better than their superhero avatars to showcase their super abilities.” said adidas India director – Heartbeat Sports & Outdoor Business Unit Dhanashree Sowani.
During the upcoming cricket season, the #III squad will give epic live commentary through GIFs and cinemagraphs on social media especially during matches. The superhero avatars will also be placed at prominent malls and adidas stores in New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. adidas will also giveaway limited edition merchandise to winners of online contests that will be run on the adidas cricket social media handles.
MUMBAI: Adidas has unveiled a global campaign underlining the brand’s aggressive pursuit for creativity to push the boundaries of sport.
The new campaign, titled “Unleash Your Creativity,” is told through a female athlete’s lens and stars supermodel Karlie Kloss, fitness influencer Hannah Bronfman, fitness instructor and best-selling author Robin Arzon, WNBA All-Star Candace Parker and USWNT soccer star Becky Sauerbrunn, among others.
“Like this campaign, creativity enables me to accomplish more and follow my passions. It is inspiring to work alongside this incredible group of women and help each other achieve our personal goals,” said Karlie Kloss.
“Unleash Your Creativity” builds upon the brand’s belief that hard work only gets you so far. The campaign includes a multi-athlete TV spot and short film series that brings to life authentic stories of 15 female athletes around the globe who use creativity to defy conventions, reinvent routine, create their own path and inspire others to make a difference in sport.
Karlie Kloss’ film highlights how she uses her imagination to make a difference in the world while Candace Parker shows how she uses creativity to shape her style of play and elevate her game. Dancer and fitness influencer Ally Love inspires women to unleash their own creativity daily from her motivational spin classes to charging up an arena as host of the Brooklyn Nets. Ruqsana Begum is a British and European Kick-Boxing champion who blazed a trail for Muslim women to access sport. Running coach Jessie Zapo found a way to open her sport to a new generation of runners. USWNT Captain Becky Sauerbrunn uses her creativity in soccer to challenge her opponents on the field and win championships.
“Hard work is a given. We believe that athletes who tap into their creativity have a powerful edge,” said Adidas senior director of global brand communications Lia Stierwalt. “This new film series continues the ‘Here to Create’ conversation that we began in 2016 reinforcing the brand’s point of view that engaging an athlete’s imagination to unleash their creativity will take them further than their mind or body ever could.”
MUMBAI: Adidas India has announced its collaboration with Saiyami Kher. A rising name in Bollywood and widely known for her involvement in sport & fitness, Saiyami joins a host of world-class athletes in representing the three stripes.
Adidas Running business unit head Sunil Gupta, said, “An athlete at heart, Saiyami embodies the Adidas brand in every sense. She brings authenticity and motivation to every young woman & genuinely believes that empowerment must begin with one’s self. We believe that this message is the single-most important take away for the young women who look up to her and wish to kick-start their own journey to fitness and betterment through Running.”
“2017 is an exciting year for Adidas focusing on women in sport and we have a lot in store with Saiyami – she’s a big part of things to come,” he said.
Delighted about her relationship with Adidas, Kher said: “For me, Adidas represents a passion for sport; it embodies heritage whilst constantly innovating to further the athletes out there. I think it’s important to encourage women to push themselves to carve out their own paths and I look forward to doing that with adidas. My first love is sport and it’s an honour to be a part of something that will hopefully inspire other women in our country to run and embrace fitness passionately.”
Adidas India and Saiyami are all set to kick-off this relationship with a global launch in San-Francisco, USA, later this week.
Join the adidas Energy Running movement by following @adidasrunning on Twitter and @adidasrunningIN on Facebook.
