Abby’s is over, and best of the Indian and South Asian Advertising has been announced. Having won after tough scrutiny, they are the finest the industry has produced. Going with the mood, here are some that AdStand will like to give out.

The first is Laugh out of the Year award. No this is not for that video just released by someone called Tahar Shah, but fro someone even more audacious called MSG. The ad opens on a sort of comical dining rooms setting where one God Man is advising an even more comical looking gent to put ‘Kerosene Oil’ in his expensive car instead of expensive petrol. Surprisingly the man refutes God Man’s sermon and says cant spoil a car by pouring cheap fuel in it. The God Man goes on to tell him to stop eating food with pesticide and eat only MSG Pure Noodles. This, the man with a strange goatee looks whole-heartedly agrees with. You can make your day by laughing along with MSG here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1V9EVVB3YBU) It is amazing that there are consumers who despite being smart and erudite do listen to the voice of God. Now that the other God Man’s noodles have been alleged to have ash, this one can lay claim to be the most pious of all.

The second award is the Cave Man of the year award, and this goes to Red Chief Shoes. Mr. India meets Chulbul Pandey (https://youtu.be/mWYA1jxzwNE). There is nothing in the plot, a man is threatening a woman on knife point, she is wailing like the leading lady from 70’s movies do, suddenly the door is slammed off the hinges and in walks invisible Macho man in Red Chief shoes. The man with knife shivers in his pants drops his knife and scoots. Why is the shoe called “Man among shoes”, why does the ad say “Power of Real Leather” in another frame? Why did Mr. India wake up stuck in a time wrap? I thought the vest and underwear brands had explored every facet of the macho angle, but even they must be lest wondering. Please put your hands together for the cave man of the year award.

The Kidney Beans honest soup of the year award goes to the new 7Up commercial. The commercial starts with mocking beauty pageants and ends up mocking itself.  The women have a chance to win the contest based on final answer (https://youtu.be/tvpQZYXO9qU) and she wins by making mince meat of everybody in a pan full of kidney beans. If the green mood lighting on the set is indicative of the brand, then this one is a winner all the way. Incidentally it is worth checking of every potential beauty contest contestant is lining up to try the dish.

The unopportunistic ad of the year award goes to Yatra.com for its “don’t do narebazi, only do smajhdari”. I never knew that Yatra has changed the airline seating system and everyone will get to sit only on Window seat. The ad raises a burning social question: what happens when you discover that there are no window seats left in the flight? You don’t grin and bear it, you revolt with the aid of an app. If all this sounds confusing then do watch the ad (https://youtu.be/tvpQZYXO9qU). Is the joke on the brand or the person the brand is mocking? Yatra has gone into the war zone hoping to win the war that Snapdeal lost. Brand trolling the real life events is new.

On the subject of trolls, the troll conversation of the year has to go the founders of two unicorns of India. There is nothing to add to the just two tweets exchanged by Sachin Bansal and Kunal Bahl over Alibaba’s entry into India. After the two tweets, good sense prevailed and hopefully they picked the phone on each other.

The Grand Prix of the season has to go to Urban Ladder. Never ever has any brand ever released an ad as imaginative as this one. Urban Ladder released an ad on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/jobs2/view/117605734?trk=vsrp_jobs_res_name&trkInfo=VSRPsearchId%3A705449381459431181730%2CVSRPtargetId%3A117605734%2CVSRPcmpt%3Aprimary) asking for people who can be mattress tester. It didn’t matter that the ad was released on 1^st April, most people realized how easy their job is compared to the one Urban Ladder is offering and how they should trade their comfortable job for this really challenging profile. Urban Ladder. Well done Urban Ladder, really well done.

I am sure there are many more ads out there that deserve awards; we in advertising are very accommodative. Let’s create more categories.

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Naresh Gupta

@googlegupta / 9811160480

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