The sombre note that shadowed advertising in the last two months has lifted going by the cheerier campaigns that brands put out last fortnight. From Father’s Day to World Music Day to International Yoga Day, brands did some good occasion marketing. Several were clever enough to also do some opportunistic moment marketing around the Ronaldo snubbing Coca Cola incident. Fevicol, Paytm, Ikea, Amul all came up with cheeky campaigns with Fevicol perhaps grabbing the honours on being the fastest as well as the coolest.

Care in every action

On Father’s Day from the syrupy to the sentimental to the transactional (gifting ideas) there were plenty of campaigns, but what caught our eye was a very sweet one from digital insurance firm Acko General. Conceived by Lowe Lintas Mumbai, the film shows a father sternly quizzing his daughter on a broken rear view mirror on his car. The grandfather chips in at this point to defend the girl, and ends up owning up to the damage. What does the father do? That’s the heart tugging sequence in the film as their roles are reversed, but the son surprises the father.

Roaring at Cannes

India bettered its 2019 performance at the 2021 Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity, which ended on Friday, winning a total of 22 metals. India had won 18 metals in 2019. In 2020, the Cannes Lions had been cancelled.

FCB India’s agencies including FCB Interface and FCB Ulka had a good outing, winning 8 metals including 1 Gold, 3 Silver and 4 Bronze, followed by Dentsu Webchutney at 7 metals.

FCB Interface’s ‘The Punishing Signal’ campaign for Mumbai Police, which was launched in January 2020 roared at Cannes, winning several metals. The agency had put up special decibel meters connected to traffic signals across the megapolis. When the honking decibel level exceeded a dangerous 85dB, the signal timer would reset itself, thus punishing the impatient honkers by making them wait longer at the signal.

Dentsu Webchutney ‘The 8-bit Journo’ campaign for Vice which set out to inform the public of Jammu & Kashmir what transpired in the world when they were under a 100+ day internet blackout did well as well.

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