Coca-Cola banks on stars to power TVCs

NEW DELHI: Coca-Cola India has launched its festive season

television effort, featuring two of the country's biggest stars in

modified versions of its global "Life tastes good" campaign.

Timed for this month's Deepavali, the festival of lights, the TVCs show

Hrithik Roshan and Aamir Khan as "real people", experiencing the hiccups

of daily life and then kicking back to enjoy a Coke.

Arvind Mohan, planning director of McCann-Erickson India, said the

campaign associated the brand with "real life moments and about making

each day wonderful".

Instead of the "Life tastes good" tagline, the brand built its India

campaign around the "Life to be like this" premise.

"The new campaigns convey the same thought and values of the brand, but

expressed in an Indian way," said Shripad Nadkarni, Coca-Cola India's

vice-president for marketing.

In the first TVC, Aamir opens a bottle of Coke while watching a

Coke-sponsored cricket match. But he is disturbed by a screaming couple

arguing in the next apartment.

With his bottle of Coke, he sneaks into their home and drops two "sorry

notes" purportedly from each of them for the other.

On his return, he finds that he has forgotten to bring his Coke bottle

back with him. While opening another bottle, Aamir draws satisfaction

from knowing that the couple have made up.

In the second TVC, Hrithik and his film crew stop in a village after

their vehicle has broken down. India's latest hearthrob mingles with the

villagers, who fail to recognise him. He offers them a Coke, dances with

the younger villagers before the TVC ends with the villagers suggesting

that he become an actor.