Addendum is a weekly column that takes a sometimes hard, sometimes casual, sometimes irreverent, yet never malicious look at some of the new or recent advertisements and comments on them.

The rather quiet little man reaches out for the Park Avenue Beer Shampoo only to be curtly told by his mousy little wife to put it right back. His plaintive “But it’s got beer!” is lost on her. And then you have this macho giant of a man (whom we saw in the earlier film as well) suddenly materialising out of nowhere, all freshly shampooed with the Beer Shampoo (we assume) and glistening in his golden costume. He has some magical musical instrument that teleports everyone around the world by just trilling into it. And then this magnificent symbol of manliness explains the benefits of beer shampoo on “man hair” to the little lady. And, of course, as with all dreams, the golden macho man disappears leaving the lady to instruct her poor little man to take the shampoo from the shelf because “it’s got beer”. So the next time you want your wife fantasising about some golden hulk with a magical musical instrument, take her advice and buy the beer shampoo. As for me, since the concept of man hair hardly applies to me any more, I am not a customer. I am guessing market feedback showed that the target audience loved the first ad with the beer guy. And this has emboldened Publicis Ambience to come out with a sequel. Makes sense. Give them what they like. We hope they’ll like it even more.

Hand-me-downs

We’ve all been a part of the hand-me-down culture. By “we” I mean people in my generation. I really don’t know if today’s kids tolerate hand-me-downs, but I’ll take Mudra DDB’s word for it. And so you have this little fellow who is erasing the name of his elder brother to write his own and looking on enviously as big brother deeply inhales the fragrance of the new books. And he struggles to hold up his loose “handed-me-down” school shorts and huffs and puffs on his old bicycle while big brother sails past on the new bike. But there’s a comeuppance coming. You see one of the brothers all grown up and driving this car and he looks in his rear view mirror and sees the new Polo from Volkswagen. It doesn’t stay in the rear view mirror for long. It pulls up alongside and you see another smart young man. You quickly debate in your mind, ‘Is this the elder brother with the earlier young man in a hand-me-down car?’, then your instinct tells you, ‘No, of course not, that would be a horror movie plot.” This is the younger brother, rid of all the hand-me downs in his life overtaking the horrible big brother who enjoyed all the new stuff all his earlier life”. This time the young one has the prize – the new Polo with all the new features, etc. So how did you deduce all this? Well, obviously with a little imagination and some generosity to the poor bloke who got lost somewhere with some hand-me-down script for a great car. Well, anyone will understand that if you get the new Polo, you are not handing it down in a hurry. My son will tell you that. He doesn’t even let me drive his.

India-friendly

Germany certainly has a strong presence in our lives these days. Its cars have made a huge impact. The luxury segment of the automobile sector is monopolised by them. They have driven the poor Japanese away from the segment. And German engineering has always been something we have looked up to. So one was a little surprised to see the beginning of this TVC for Lufthansa where good old Grandfather breaks the good news of their New York trip to the little grandson also telling him they would be flying on a German airline, in an almost apologetic tone. The Germans are “different”, he explains, their movies look grey, they probably haven’t heard of Bollywood (that is now a disqualification?) and about their food, the less said the better. Then the surprises begin. As they board the aircraft, they are greeted with a warm “Namaste”, view some Bollywood movies and finally a tray loaded with what looks like delectable Indian food arrives. The little boy can be excused for thinking they have boarded the wrong airline. Seeing the film I thought they had studied customer feedback and then squarely addressed it, showing how things had changed. I definitely came away saying I would give it a shot next time, especially as they also have full flat beds now.

Ramesh Narayan is a communications consultant. Send your comments to cat.a.lyst@thehindu.co.in

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