Hamara Big Idea

David Ogilvy once suggested a general guideline on how to recognise a big idea. Ask yourself five questions, he said, and if the answer to every one of them is yes, you have a big idea! The questions were: Did it make me gasp when I first saw it? Do I wish I had thought of it myself? Is it unique? Does it fit the strategy to perfection? Could it be used for 30 years?

It’s been more than 30 years since the ‘Hamara Bajaj’ campaign was released (33, if you want to be annoyingly precise), and it still ticks all of Ogilvy’s boxes! To be sure, the campaign has long been retired, but were it to be remade in today’s context, yet along the very same platform, it would still work.

Need for a Paradigm Shift

The campaign had its genesis in a peculiar, and at the time unfamiliar, problem that was impacting Bajaj scooters. Having ruled the Indian roads for decades, it was suddenly feeling the squeeze from more recent competition in the form of LML Vespa and Kinetic Honda. These more modern brands, shored up by foreign collaborations, were riding hard on technology – which kind of started to erode Bajaj’s safe, long-term positioning of trust and ‘Value for money for years’.

Bajaj was still India’s largest selling scooter and without any doubt enjoying the trust of the entire cross-section of Indian riders. But if it stood by and did nothing even as the aggressive competitors upped the technology ante, it ran the risk of being repositioned as old fashioned and fuddy duddy.

The brand was left with two options: Play catch-up on technology or reposition itself. It would take a few years to implement technology and, in any case, that platform would then make it sound like a me-too. Bajaj scooters had to be repositioned – the mere tried and trusted ‘value for money’ proposition would not cut it any longer.  

The Brief: ‘Like Nothing Before’

The agency, Lintas, was summoned with a very specific brief: Reposition Bajaj scooters in such a way that it not only built on its long-term leadership status, but elevated it to an unassailable position, allowing the company time to upgrade its technology. In short, tactical communication was no more the answer; neither was product differentiation. Nor focussing on leadership and trust. It had to be something much, much bigger. It had to tick all of Ogilvy’s ‘Big Idea’ boxes.

Over the next few months, the agency burned the midnight oil. They instinctively knew it had to be emotional, yet grounded in fact – that Bajaj still enjoyed 72% market share; was an Indian-made brand; and delivered reliable, trouble-free and efficient performance.

The months of brainstorming threw up a plethora of thoughts. Could it be about repositioning the rest of the competition collectively by suggesting that ‘there are scooters and there’s Bajaj’? Was reliability still a good stance – given that the brand was trusted by hordes of older riders? But wouldn’t that alienate the younger generation? What about likening Bajaj’s range of scooters to ‘The Unbeatables’? Suppose the numbers game was played – conceptually showing all of India riding a Bajaj.

The Making of the Big Idea!

Every suggestion seemed to fall way short. Some were still in the product differentiation and features space. Others merely seemed to string together adjectives and clever words. None of them were yet that proverbial ‘Big Idea’. Then came the thought of riding on the brand’s Indian equity. Could its ‘Indian-ness’ be explored? Like maybe drawing analogies with famous Indian monuments. And then it finally struck home: Why not intricately entwine the brand with the very idea of being Indian!

From there, it developed quickly and became crystal clear. Best of all, it was a truism and an everyday reality. A majority of scooter-owning Indian households rode a Bajaj every day. It was like a member of the family – involved in the typical Indian family’s daily activities and situations. Dropping kids off to school, or riding to work, a trip to the market place, short errands, or to visit friends. Simple joy rides too.

The agency dug deeper, conceptually revisiting India across its length and breadth; peering into its very heart and soul! In rural India it was common to use your Bajaj scooter to transport unwieldy dimensions of items, objects… even furniture, like a charpoy. Were not entire families loading themselves onto a single scooter and riding to their various destinations! Did the humble yet ubiquitous Bajaj scooter literally not journey through every city, town, village or back of beyond? At home on big city highways and village dirt tracks alike.

Capturing the Soul of India

The big idea cracked open, the situational suggestions flowed and overflowed. A final shortlist of 30 situations were identified and developed. Among them, the filmi youth using the scooter’s rear-view mirror to groom his hair; the just-married couple riding away in utter bliss; the proud elderly owner meticulously polishing his scooter; the street vendor carting his wares around; and the family conducting a puja for their newly acquired possession. Various everyday situations that went into a TVC campaign that almost any Indian could identify and empathise with.

And identification and empathy was what the campaign sought to evoke. And beyond that… the warm patriotic glow of being Indian! To go with the visuals, a softly endearing jingle was penned. The original big idea was ‘the great Indian spirit’, but the real winner lay in its interpretation into Hindi – Hamara Bajaj!

So simple and yet so impactful in its soul and delivery, that virtually every Indian embraced it as their own – regardless of whether they owned a Bajaj or not. Regardless of whether they rode a scooter or not! It truly captured the heart and mind of India. Much of the credit must also go to that doyen of Indian industry, Mr. Rahul Bajaj, who in his infinite wisdom ‘saw’ the utter potential of the campaign and approved it.

Standing the Test of Time

The Hamara Bajaj campaign worked like magic. It succeeded in sublimating the brand from mere transportation utility into the very soul of India. Though, the impact wasn’t just in the emotional space but translated into robust sales numbers. Or perhaps, more correctly, the ‘emotional’ spurred the ‘logical’. People were willing to wait their turn to own a Bajaj… to own a slice of India!

In a sense the success of the campaign was along the lines of what Chevrolet did in the US with their ‘Heartbeat of America’ proposition; or for that matter, the perception of Mercedes being the very symbol of German perfection.

But the true greatness of the Hamara Bajaj campaign should be measured far and distantly beyond its original utility. Beyond even Ogilvy’s five questions. Unlike anything before (never before was scooter advertising even dreamt of being approached anything like this), it instilled a sense of pride in every Bajaj stakeholder – customer, employee, shareholder, vendor, distributor… even those who had no direct stake in the brand, rather an emotional stake in the very idea of India. In that sense, every true Indian!

The ripples of the iconic campaign were felt for a long time to come. Even today, long after the communication was retired – long after even Bajaj stopped making scooters in favour of motorcycles and other vehicles (although more recently resurrecting the iconic Chetak in its new electric avatar) – people still remember the Hamara Bajaj communication. Someone brilliantly likened it to a piece of culture.

Time changes most things. But big ideas will always withstand the merciless onslaught of time.