Rajeev Ravindranathan 7/26/18 Rajeev Ravindranathan 7/26/18

Imitation is not flattery. It's irritating.

The ad above was released by The Hindu for their theatre festival.
The other one was released by our client Vijay Karnataka for their theatre festival. A full 6 years ago.

"It's not copied, it's inspired."
Sure. In which case a photocopier is the world's epitome of creative originality. Drama, cops, errant rider, theatre festival. Even identical twins have differences.

The drill is simple for a creator of advertising. Understand your product, understand your consumer, make one relevant to the other, create the work. But there are other responsibilities too. A preliminary research to verify the originality and freshness of the idea, to acknowledge and accept that it may have been done before and ensure that posts such as these don't get written months down the line.

Our work like most of our work was created with minimal budgets, shot by our own team, features struggling actors, one our own employees. Copying the ad isn't just a disservice to creative professionals, it is unfair to them too.

Sorry <insert The Hindu's agency's name here>. We're not flattered, not in the least bit.

Rajeev Ravindranathan 7/19/17 Rajeev Ravindranathan 7/19/17

GRABBING A MONKEY BY ITS BOX

We live in an age with so much advertising onslaught in our field of vision, that even exciting brand ideas can get lost in the noise. In the race to be noticed/funded, brands are only ending up trying to be bigger, better, faster, hotter, or any other '-er' word you can think of.

And every once in a while, an organisation comes by, with a fascinating idea and its heart in the right place. And we, at People Design & Communications, are lucky that they came by, in our general direction.

MonkeyBox - a simple, powerful idea:

MonkeyBox was born out of the idea that parents as much as they desire, find it really difficult to make school lunches healthy & exciting for the kids. MonkeyBox is a revolutionary service that plans and prepares delicious, nutritious food for children, and delivers them to kids at school. With a team of nutritionists, 5-star chefs & experts from the restaurant business, MonkeyBox, as a brand was clear about the strengths & the value they had on offer.

The Communications Challenge:

The most enduring, evocative communication campaigns are built on consumer insights. And with a service like MonkeyBox, we had to sit down and observe how the parents & school kids experienced MonkeyBox.

Sidestepping the Startup Cliche:

We had to steer clear of "selling" the brand benefits. Startups usually fall into this trap - of assuming the consumer would want a product/service merely because it didn't exist before. That hardly happens. A brand becomes relevant only when it fits into an existing consumer need.

The Breakthrough:

MonkeyBox had already begun operations in South Bangalore, fine-tuning the process of preparation & delivery. It was ideal, because it gave us an opportunity to talk to parents & kids, and understand how MonkeyBox mattered to them. And we did it over time.

The curiously consistent feedback we heard from almost all parents was that they wished MonkeyBox wouldn't make & deliver food only to school kids, but to adults too. What this meant was:

1) The kids were loving the food they were eating, AND were talking about it at home

2) Parents clearly were curious about the food, even as they had access to the menu, detailed descriptions & nutritional info

3) Kids were enjoying showing-off this service that was off-bounds even for their parents.

4) Parents were more trusting of MonkeyBox, now that the food had passed the litmus test of their kids.

The People Design & Communications Campaign:

MonkeyBox is a specialist in preparing healthy, yummy meals for kids and delivering them to school. Only. So the only way to eat a MonkeyBox is if you were in school, and were....a child.

Therefore:

Cinemagraphs

This idea is campaignable and throws open exciting stories across media, including Press, Outdoor, Radio & Film.

Results:

MonkeyBox launched with a radio campaign across 2 stations in Bangalore. Playing off the same campaign thought, the 2 radio spots stood out for their entertainment value & the clear hook - Sorry Dads & Mums, MonkeyBox is only for your kids.

MonkeyBox achieved its target number of app downloads, in just 2 weeks of this concentrated radio campaign.

At the time of hitting publish, MonkeyBox is at the threshold of launching services all across Bangalore, a new radio campaign ready to go live, a rich digital & social-media campaign, and a press and outdoor campaign standing by to explode.

Follow MonkeyBox on

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/monkeyboxfoods/

Twitter: @kidsmonkeybox

Instagram: @kidsmonkeybox