The more I watch the new Cadbury Dairy Milk commercials, the more I lament about the deterioration in the communication. First there was the likeable, ‘Kuchch meetha ho jaaye’ campaign starring Amitabh Bachchan. Then came the parody, ‘Meetha hain khaana aaj pehli tareekh hain’, which was still palatable, I thought. Just when things were improving marginally with the ‘Shubh Aarambh’ campaign, you see their latest effort, ‘Meethe mein kuchch meetha ho jaaye’ (whatever it means!)
I see the point in Cadbury trying to do a Coca-Cola – ‘thanda matlab Coca-Cola’ and ‘meetha matlab Cadbury’, if that is the intention. Still appreciable! But the execution is puerile, to say the least. The interaction between the young husband and wife comes across as an ad for a contraceptive, what with both of them discussing the dinner menu as if they didn’t use protection last night. Also, the first ad where the grandmom apologises to her grand-daughter is a let-down.
The new Cadbury Silk campaign, too, is a big disappointment. The sight of grown-ups licking chocolate and sucking wrappers isn’t exactly amusing.
Was it a conscious effort to do away with the wit, humour or the vivacity of the erstwhile Cadbury campaigns?
Try recollecting the old ad where the hottie dodges the security and dances with gay abandon after her boyfriend hits a six. And you will probably understand why the new ads are so forgettable. The sheer innocence and the simple storyline worked wonders. There was no effort to hard-sell the chocolate unlike in their latest campaign as if, ‘Oh, you know what! The Indian family likes to eat desserts after dinner. So why not position the chocolate in that space?’ If that was what the brief to the agency was!
Like Ranbir Kapoor says in the latest Docomo ads, ‘Keep it simple, silly’!
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