MUMBAI, INDIA – With the season of romance just around the corner, Cadbury 5 Star, the iconic, youth brand from Mondelez India, has launched ‘The 5 Star Valentine’s Day Alibi,’ an innovative campaign that attempts to save singles from the dreaded question – ‘What are you doing on Valentine’s Day?’ Instead of feeling awkward, or coming up with excuses, single people can now say, “I’m going to my cousin’s wedding,” without having to lie.
Why? Because the brand has taken over an island located off the coast of Karnataka and renamed it ‘My Cousin’s Wedding.’ By doing so, they’ve created a fool-proof alibi which also offers a much better way to spend Valentine’s Day – eating complimentary 5 Stars and doing absolutely nothing on a beautiful island, with no one around to disturb you. Consumers looking to escape to the island can scan a 5 Star pack, mine ‘NothingCoins’ (a digital coin launched by the brand recently) and use them to bid on a trip the island.
But that’s not all – the island now even has its own embassy, located at Pedder Road in Mumbai. Customers can walk in, get a glimpse of the island through a VR experience and then apply for a Visa to the island, at the Immigration Desk. The embassy is an experience in itself, with a ‘mush detector’ keeping the embassy ground safe from any cheesy objects you might be carrying, and a sand-filled ‘transit visa’ room that lets you experience what it’s like to do nothing on the island.
Anil Viswanathan, vice president, marketing – Mondelez, India, “Being at the heart of the country’s youth culture, Cadbury 5 Star has always communicated narratives that are witty and relatable. As a brand that truly understands Gen Z, we wanted our Valentine’s Day campaign to represent singles – to not only help them steer away from the awkward questions but also give them an experience to sit back and do nothing; bringing back the Cadbury 5 Star promise with elements of humour and quirk intact. After all, singles also deserve to have fun.”
Sukesh Nayak, chief creative officer, Ogilvy India, “Valentine’s Day can be quite daunting for someone who’s single or just not into it. Since 5 Star has been championing the cause of people who just want to ‘do nothing’, we took it a step further this year by offering them a perfect escape from the madness. A commonly used excuse that will no more be a lie. As crazy as it sounds, some people will soon be spending Valentine’s Day doing literally nothing on a faraway island called ‘My Cousin’s Wedding.’
Shekhar Banerjee, chief client officer and head-west, Wavemaker India, “We didn’t just stop at creating an Island called My Cousin’s Wedding but also created a larger-than-life Embassy similar to a real one to create a legit experience. If that wasn’t enough, we even went ahead and created outdoor banter with a counter-culture approach between Cadbury 5 Star and Cadbury Silk thus establishing the brand’s different positioning while still leveraging the occasion that’s meant for the brands promoting love. To amplify the campaign further we tapped into various relevant youth touch points with a 360 activation that helped us dial up the messaging across our TG and build in the brand messaging of escaping this Valentine’s by simply Doing Nothing! The response has been overwhelming and a lot of chatter around the escape plan by simply doing nothing is the talk of the town.”
Taking its proposition of ‘Do Nothing’ a step ahead, the campaign aims to fight off the pressure of celebrating Valentine’s Day in a fun way.
CREDITS
Creative Agency: Ogilvy India
Chief Creative Officers, Ogilvy India: Sukesh Nayak, Kainaz Karmakar, Harshad Rajadhyaksha
Creative Team: Karunasagar Sridharan, Nishigandh Dhende, Kaustubh Basankar, Jugal Joseph
Planning team: Ganapathy Balagopalan, Russell John, Nadia Miranda
Account Management: Prakash Nair, Beenu Kurup, Priya Thakkar, Tanmay Rajpurkar, Abhijeet Nirban, Vini Dedhia
Media Agency: Wavemaker India
