SPRITE ADVERTISING STRATEGY

Sprite is one of the fastest growing brands in the 7000 crore carbonated soft

drink (CSD) market in India. Taking the place of the erstwhile Limca, the

brand is positioned as a basic thirst quencher. The brand in India is

competing with Mountain Dew.

Sprite was launched in India in 1999 has caught the attention of Indian consumer by positioning

itself as a plain soft drink. The initial baseline have rightly captured the essence of Sprite as ³

Bujaye only pyas, Baki All Bakwas ³. The protagonists in the campaigns also have that ³cool

³attitude thus breaking clutter of high decibel Cola ads.

They have done a commendable job by being able to maintain the same USP with their new and refreshing advertisements made

it all the more a very effective branding exercise. All the advertisement of Sprite carried the tag line very well coupled with

some very witty and cool advertisements.

SPRITE: BUJAYE ONLY PYAS, BAKI ALL BAKWAS Sprite may talk straight but its creative team has no option but to think laterally whenever faced

with the client brief. Going by the branding proposition, no drink resonates and talks µseedhi baat¶ in a manner like Coca-Cola's

clear lime drink, Sprite. The brand, well known for its no-nonsense attitude, has taken to its first advertising attempt for 2009.

With the Seedhi Baat, No Bakwaas tagline, the first of the two

television commercials opens on two friends playing Carrom. The Sprite drinker points out that he is going to lay his hands on the

red coin (queen) in the game. His friend, who catches sight of a young girl walking into the compound with her dog, is very much

sure of the 'queen' stepping in for him.

He thinks of a twisted way of reaching out to the lady - through her dog, named Killer. While she stops at a nearby store, he

runs to pet Killer and impress her indirectly. To his surprise, the Sprite drinker candidly invites her for a game of Carrom. She is

obviously worried about Killer. The 'dog lover' is forced to help in this department. The film closes on a product shot and the

tagline.

The second commercial, in a South Indian wedding set-up, has a Sprite and a non-Sprite person

interested in the same girl. The latter finds an indirect of winning the girl's heart ± through her parents. He begins to serve 'sambhar' to the family members

one by one. In the meantime, the Sprite drinker makes it directly to the girl and takes the seat right next to her. To make things

worse, while the non-Sprite friend sweetly offers 'sambhar' to the girl, she shatters his heart by addressing him as her younger

brother.

The tag line clicked since it was too simple and realistic. A carbonated beverage is supposed to

quench thirst and that¶s all, period. This is exactly what Sprite marketed itself as and I presume it did reasonably well.

The idea here is that the tagline became Sprite¶s USP (Unique Selling Proposition). THE BATTLE CONTINUES

While Mountain Dew which has a cult status in the west so far did not achieve such a status in

India. Analysts say that the protagonists in Mountain Dew do not have the mass appeal as that of

Sprite.

With the war in this segment is increasing , Dew tried to directly

attack the Sprite by portraying the protagonist as a fool but did not

succeed much.

Sprite changed the baseline of ³ Baki all Bakwaas ³ to ³ No gyan

only Sprite´ and tried to further build on the successful positioning. But some of the ads went too

far with the protagonist portraying a larger than life image. Then again the baseline changed to ³

Clear Hai ³ .

I feel that the baseline ³ Baki all Bakwaas ³ was changed too soon because it had immense