The Brief

Today’s Indian woman is career-oriented, independent and sports an active lifestyle. While she strives for professional recognition, she is also focused on how she looks and presents herself. She follows a thorough beauty regime of applying moisturizer, foundation and sunscreen. Globally, this time consuming regime is simplified by BB Creams. L’Oreal launched India’s first BB Cream, Garnier BB, five months ahead of Unilever’s Pond’s BB+. Hence, Pond’s had to negate Garnier’s first mover advantage and be synonymous with BB.

Describe how the promotion developed from concept to implementation

Café Coffee Day a.k.a. CCD, dominates Indian coffee landscape with 1354 outlets across 200 cities, making them our preferred partner. CCD sells approx. 3.1 million cups to women every month, making it their most popular beverage. We decided to stencil the Pond’s BB+ message across all cappuccinos sold over a month at CCDs. To reinforce on the Pond’s message we dialed-up the surrounding ambience through saucer tags, danglers and tent cards, ensuring that every cappuccino drinker saw the Pond’s BB+ message. Women also experienced the product first-hand with samples at each CCD outlet.

Describe the success of the promotion with both client and consumer including some quantifiable results

During the campaign, CCD sold 4.65 million Pond’s BB+ cappuccinos to women alone! Bespoke research showed that 9 out of 10 women recalled the Pond’s BB+ message. The activity went viral, with women sharing pictures of their cappuccinos with #PondsBB+ across social media. Google trends recorded the highest search index for the brand during this period. Most importantly, we surpassed Garnier BB and gained 57% of the BB market in just three months of the launch.

Explain why the method of promotion was most relevant to the product or service

While a mainstream media battle was in play, to really make a difference, we couldn’t keep “shouting at her”; but had to engage her in a relaxed ambience. IMRB’s primary research suggested that hanging with her mates at Coffee Chains is her single most preferred social activity. She and her mates consumed 4.5 million cups of cappuccino here monthly. We decided to leave a mark on each of those cappuccinos, LITERALLY! However, cappuccino has a thin froth and stenciling anything over it was impossible. Hence, typically such messaging is restricted to the Frappe that sells a third of cappuccino.