Do Celebrity Endorsements make sense?

Product : A chocolate
Actual Ad 1
A Indian movie mega-star sharing screen space with a bovine creature talking about movies.
Imagine Ad 1
A very small kid talking about how he feels when he thinks about chocolates
of this brand it to the strains of Sinatra crooning away to glory in the background with his parents looking on fondingly.

Product : A mobile phone
Actual Ad 2
A lady speaking on her mobile, but because a person next to her doesnt see the mobile, thinks she is speaking to him and makes a fool of himself.
The point being highlighted here is the size of the mobile.
Imagine Ad 2
The above mentioned illustrious mega-star bragging about his sons marriage on the mobile being marketed.
Well I could give flight to my imagination and come up with innumerable such instances where star power can or has come to nought while advertising for goods for the Indian consumer.
I'm also sure many of you will come up with instances where a Prahlad Kakkar or a Piyush Pandey might have used the stars of this subcontinent to sell products to us in a manner which we shall remember fondly.
Before digressing any further, the point I'm trying to make is Indians buy products not becuase of their personal likings for a celebrity endorsing it but becuase he/she thinks the product makes sense to shell out his/her hard earned moolah for it.
Just because a cricketer washes his dirty linen in a particular brand of washing machine, would the Indian consumer troop into a shop and take the washing machine home?
Or take the instance of a leading lady using a mosquito repellant to enhance the acoustics of her house so that she could give audience to her nth suitor, does this encourage you to buy the repellant to save your family from dengue?
Well some might agree that these are instances of bad advertising rather than diminishing the rationale behind celebrities endorsing products, I might be tempted to agree.
But the agreement will be restricted to my conforming with the judgement on the quality of the ads.
Products sell in India because of a few critical points:
1) Utility
2) Affordability
3) Longevity
Celebrities can restrict the consumer to watching the ad and probably highlighting the brand value in the subconscous of the end user but cometh the hour cometh the economics of the user.
Imagine this situation:
Shopkeeper : "Sir which air conditioner would you want to buy this summer"
Average Indian Consumer 1: "I want the air conditioner in which Dhoni's hair flays about, infact my mother mistook him for Aishwairya Rai in the ad"
CUT....
Average Indian Consumer 2: "Gimme that one I saw in the ad, the one which was taking bragging bout using less power, can it also run without power??"
Hope you are getting the picture......
PS: All original ad ideas mentioned in this atricle are the IPR of the author, only the highest bidder will be given entertained for the rights, and the new ad should feature Abhi-Ash......

Tubthumping

35 days to D-Day
2 weeks to mom-dads visit
1 year to sort out my life
3 years to marriage
3 years away from hitting the 30 mark

Life it seems is all about "dead"lines...ironic isnt it..
the next 35 odd days will be really crucial....sounds like a cleche..but it really is Now or Never...
I dont have a Plan B, my plan A hasnt yet hit the high road..nbut Im banking on the exam fever hitting me hard and forcing me into overdrive...

Work touchwood is nt great now, the reason being, in my current state I cannot concentrate on nything other than D-Day...
My heart is thumping....35..34..33....the countdown has begun....

Late Resolutions

Some late new year resolutions
1) No more tele till D-Day, that will some resolution to honour, lets see, will take a channel tut tut a day at a time...
2) Learn a new thing every day, thats excluding stuuf to do with D-Day
3) No more breaks till D-Day...

More on D-Day in subsequent posts......

Reality Check

27 and ticking......
Our mornings conversation triggerred this absurd thought process in my mind......
Whn I look at myself in the mirror, I still c a guy fresh out of college.....
But wht do ppl think of me whn they c me.....
a person who is fast approaching middle age and yet to hit his stride?
a person is still young with time opn his hands to sort himself out?
no opinion , too average to form an opinion on....
I c the strands of grey hair on my temple, the gasps for breath when I climb the stairs, two at a time, the want to settle down in life, the want to slow down....
I am no longer Gen-Next.....Im just ex-Gen-Next........
Guess till I hit 30 I'll give myself the benefit of doubt, Im Still Young....
Till 30 all u doubting thomases, go fish............

Blogging from office

tadaaaaaa...its tht time of the year again when I dont have any work and am in the mood to type out jestful mails(jestful from my perspective, mostly stupid mails as classified by the recipients)
today's topic is...come to think of it..such mails of mine dont have any topic generally and I think I will follow tht convention and keep this mail as confusing and generic as possibel, thus enabling freedom of thought for me...which truly refelcts my state of mind..confused, bored and with no specific thought..:-)))
To begin with , lets talk about bout FW@NJ Syndrome....more commonly known as the FirstWeek@a New Job....the victim of such a syndrome will reflect one of the following characteristics...if not all of them...or a combination of some of them...nyways..u get the drift right...
1) Immaculately Dressed
2) Very Polite
3) Restless till he/she gets the official mail id
4) Very happy if internet access is enabled and without restrictions
5) Very sad if the above condiution is not satisfied
6) Embarassed to display his/her temporary access card
7) "Checking" out the office "crowd"
8) Increased heart beat when assigned first task
9) Increased flow of "feel good" hormones when new mails from old friends hit their brand new inbox
Please Note : Beware of long mails from such victims, they tend to be never ending and make no sense, infact u start questioning the mental stability of the author...
Lets also talk about another common malice ailing todays young office goers, the ALSA syndrome, Im sure all of us have been ex-victims or are constantly attacked by this common yet dangerous syndrome......
Oh Sorry forgot to inform my highly learned audience bout the full form of the abopve mentioned acronym - ALSA - AfterLunchSleepAttack
The root cause of this syndrome is a non-existant entity in all bachelor office goers lifes...Breakfast...labelled by many as the most important meal of the day...
as soon as the clock strikes 12 noon, those enzymes hit our stomach wall and the fingers punching on the keyboard suddenly loose their strength and the pantry beckons out to you...
But those who are strong willed and ofcourse blessed with the gift of a heavy breakfast ignore this call....for weaker mortals like me..this call is too strong to ignore..
but wht follows afterwards should be seen to be believed....
Post lunch the two eyelids metamorphose from flesh to metal....the brain ceases to be a netwrok of neurons but becomes a blood eating peice of meat....
ur limbs suddenly feel the existance of gravity and that mattress lying in the one corner of ur room seems ur utopia.and..zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.zzzzzzzzzzzzzz....

Bored to death

life s sucha roller coaster, at one point u wanna some time for urself, the next u have so much of urself that ur sick of it....hahaha...
Life post Iflex has been tough, with all the change happenning and not happening at the same time, its been a emotional roller coaster....

personally this is a tough phase in my life, lets c how I cope up with it...

New beginning - 2007

Its a another new year...time for a fresh start, but that is such a big cliche.
Fresh starts never happen.

Friday@Office

blogspot is accessible from office..wow...tht is absolutely fantastic.....now I can think of writing..though I am certain will never be able to actually write on a regular basis...
Last night was strange...spent a lot of time thinking about where my life is heading..and it seems I am not doing so well with plannig my career...
2007 will be really crucial for me.....
Dotn want to write anymore.....getting too moody these days...

Another start, phew...

I have decided to give blogging another shot, in line with innumerable other events in my mundane life.
The last four years alone has been a roller coaster ride, paradoxical in nature to the rest of my life.
The short stint in Chennai, the rocking times at Bangalore, the life changing couple of years at Tokyo and maybe the most crucial year of my life@Mumbai, presently.
There are innumerable blogs on a bachelor's lif@Mumbai, mine with not add to the numbers, my blogging is merely an effort to share my innermost views with myself.

Life alone has taught me a few important lessons, most of which I never thought I would have to learn. I think it wouldn’t be prudent enough to delve into those personal experiences on this forum but if I do manage to continue blog, will surely mention a few of those moments.

As of now, Mumbai has taught me never to say die, and never to say “I give up”. Despite all the odds this city thrives and eggs itself on.
Hope the spirit of this metropolis rubs off on me, in desperate need of it.

Here’s to continued and sustained effort in life, strive on.