Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Creating waves
Some saw it as an emasculation of the Great Indian Role Model. Others raised toasts to him. Finally, they
cheered, some ‘real flesh and blood’ they said – emotions, a sense of humor and sensitivity rather than
just brawn. Even a touch of vulnerability. The dream guy with no shining armour. A man for the liberated
Indian woman. Someone who doesn’t see himself with Rambo’s body and a James Bond style.
The Complete Man. From Raymond.
Rival players
Rival brands knew that they had to position themselves away from the Complete Man. Just to gain an
identity – of any sort.
The obvious way to stand apart, as some brands had known all along, was not to have a fictitious
personality, but an actual celebrity. Vimal had a series a cricketers, back in the 1980’s, including Vivian
Richards and Ravi Shastri. Digjam had Shekhar Kapur, the film maker. ‘Tiger’ Pataudi was the Gwalior
Suitings man, and Sunil Gavaskar posed for Dinesh Suitings. But agencies subconsciously started to
emulate the persona of the Complete Man. Pataudi turned discernibly more ‘family-oriented’ in the later
days of the Gwalior series, with his wife Sharmila Tagore and actor son Saif Ali Khan making appearances.
Shah Rukh played ‘Mayur’ Khan for Mayur suitings, an actor with a ‘family man’ image. OCM tried to go
soft too and attempted to show how the suiting gets the OCM man his wife’s attention. The ad spot had
the wife not noticing her husband when he comes home from work, until he changes into a suit. Suiting
companies like Reid & Taylor still go in for celebrity advertising and today Amitabh Bachhan endorses the
brand instead of Pierce Brosnan.
And ofcourse, the man getting the girl is a re-current theme.
However in the dawn of this millennium suiting advertising has become more product oriented. Brands
today hawk the feel and finish of the fabric. Occasionally we have suitings which claim to look good but
are not as expensive. This is a direct hit at Raymond.