7up an insignificant interlude in a wedding celebration

BY ALI NAQVI –

The new half cooked 7up TVC is out featuring Kubra Khan and Bilal Ashraf. After setting a higher benchmark with exciting ‘food ka love’ TVCs 7up has hit the lowest bottom. The cupid could not strike any blow and the love it seems will wither away.

The scene opens to show a wedding celebration. The mood setting shot at the start of the TVC does not establish a festive wedding. We only see the couple sitting on stage and a faint glimpse of a bunch of people dancing, hardly half a second. Taking a weak start the ad keeps getting weaker.

The groom Bilal Ashraf takes the hand of the bride Kubra Khan and as he is about to ask her for a dance Kubra looks at 7up bottles and the food ready to be served. She suggests having food first. Then comes the most important part where the brand comes in. But it comes in as unceremoniously as it goes out unimpressively and the TVC ends with an unnoticeable dance step of the couple.

You might be thinking how expressionless and lifeless were the previous two paragraphs. Well, you are right, but this is exactly how the TVC goes, lifeless and expressionless. Actually there is nothing to communicate. The ad is hollow, the absence of a storyline makes it hard to fathom. ‘Kuch khanay ke liye kuch khona parta hai’ does not make any sense at all.

Manalo Food Ka Love was one of the most powerful campaign ideas we have seen in recent times. 7up has developed great films around this idea. Sprite, the major competitor of 7up, looked intimidated by this unbeatable idea. 7up has lost the way with the current TVC. Overall Pepsi Co., is struggling to come out with an effective communication. Pepsi as a brand is falling apart thanks to their directionless marketing strategy, and now 7up. The brand needs to be extremely careful as the competition is highly vigilant and active to feast on mistakes of their competitors.