Cadbury 5 Star: Tales of bravado on air

Cadbury 5 Star's ongoing Jo Khaaye Kho Jaaye campaign spreads a ‘public service message’, urging people to help out fellow Cadbury 5 Star eaters, through its TV commercials. However, the brand has not stopped at a single film to promote the concept. The accompanying radio spots, which target the youth, reinforce the ‘public service’ flavour of the TVC to connect with the target group.

Cracked by O&M, the brand has released six radio spots that narrate tales of bravado and reinforce the initiative. The creative team behind the spots include Abhijit Avasthi, Sameer Sojwal and Suyash Khabya. The radio spots were produced by Ronnie Desai of Musica.

The spots have been designed on two different creative routes. While three spots give the versions of individuals who have helped out fellow Cadbury 5 Star eaters, saved them from imminent danger and then got rewarded, the other three – titled 'Thank you' spots – air the gratitude of individuals who have been helped by responsible citizens.

In one spot, a man, while coming back from work, saves a boy, lost in the taste of Cadbury 5 Star, from goons. In another, an old lady saves a girl from getting hit by a truck while in a third, a Bhelpuriwala (street snacks vendor) saves a girl from falling into a gutter. All these people narrate their stories in first person accounts and later say that they got rewarded for their acts of bravery.

The ‘Thank you’ spots are stories of people who had got lost in the taste of Cadbury 5 Star, thanking those who had helped and saved them from imminent danger. In this category, one spot has a girl, who managed to catch the last local train, thanking a lady who helped her to do so.

Another spot has a jeweller thanking an unknown person who helped to lock up his valuables and money in the safe, while yet another spot has one man thanking another who had helped him cross a busy road full of speeding vehicles while he was lost in the taste of 5 Star.

Avasthi reveals that in order to make the spots sound real, the agency did not use any voice-over artists, which is generally the norm for regular radio spots. Instead, they used untrained voices of a local distributor of groceries in Thane, a Gujarati cook, a waiter from the O&M canteen and also those of a copywriter, a films department personnel and a designer from the agency.

The spots were released roughly 10 days after the TVC went on air in mid February. Private FM channels were used as a part of the media mix in the Mumbai, Hyderabad, Delhi and Chennai markets – the west and south especially being big markets for the brand. Targeted mainly at the youth, the spots are being aired during morning and evening prime times of the day.

The brand also engaged through media innovations, wherein a radio jockey from Radio One was roped in to spread the message by helping 5 Star consumers on-air.

Apart from TV and radio, outdoor hoardings, with the message ‘5 Star khaanewaalo ko road cross karvayein’ (Help those eating a 5 Star to cross the road) have also been used to retain the flavour of a public service message.