Reid & Taylor earmarks Rs 4.5 crore to promote 20th Bond film

In what could well be one of the biggest promotions conducted in sync with a Hollywood movie's release in India, premium luxury suiting brand Reid & Taylor has allocated a budget of Rs 4.5 crore for multi-level promotions for the India release of latest Bond movie, ‘Die Another Day'. In keeping with its three-year-old association with the legendary master spy, Reid & Taylor has taken on the responsibility of promoting the 20th Bond installment through a multimedia campaign - involving print, outdoor and electronic media - and ground-level promotions.

According to a prepared statement from the company, ‘The promotions, which include both trade and consumer promotion, aim to create a binding relationship between the brand and the consumer, and the brand and the retailer, who is ultimately responsible for the extra push towards the consumer.' Expanding on this, Tarun Joshi, branch head, Percept Advertising, Mumbai, told agencyfaqs!, "We have planned many ground-level activities across 13 metros and mini-metros. For instance, both consumers and the trade would get access to the movie's premiere in each of the metros. Plus we are planning a huge lifestyle event based around James Bond as an icon for the well-dressed male. The event kicks off in Mumbai in mid-January (2003), and will be taken to other cities. Overall, the promotion focuses on close consumer contact, reinforcing the brand's connect with James Bond."

Speaking about the brand's association with Bond, Joshi explains that Percept first came up with the idea of using Bond around the time the brand was being launched in the country, back in 1999. "When Reid & Taylor was being launched, we coined the line ‘Bond with the Best'," he says. "This was because, internationally, Reid & Taylor is seen as among the best. The reason we chose to associate with the Bond persona is because anyone will admit that James Bond is synonymous with style, and is an iconization of the best-dressed man."

The association has certainly worked in the brand's favour. "It was a very difficult time for entry, as the suiting market in India had some really strong players," Joshi lays down the facts. "Every brand had associated with one or the other celebrity, and had built huge equity on the back of lifestyle. And none of the existing brands were pushovers. But Reid & Taylor, with its top-down approach, has been successful, and in three short years, commands over 10 per cent share of the worsted suiting market." For the record, Raymond leads the market - which is valued at roughly Rs 2,000 crore - with a 40-per cent share.

Interestingly, Reid & Taylor is currently also looking at growing its base by appealing to non-metro consumers. "There is a huge market for worsted suiting in the semi-urban parts of the country," Joshi points out. "Suiting is heavily consumed in the non-metros, especially during occasions such as weddings. That is one audience that Reid & Taylor hasn't addressed so far, but now we're looking at them seriously." In fact, Percept has just created a two-commercial campaign aimed at the more ‘mass-based' consumer.

The commercials - which would run concurrently to the Bond promo - are about the values and emotions inherent to human bonds. So one ad has a fashion designer dressing her brother for his wedding, while the other is about a son and a daughter helping their father choose a suit for his twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. "We did not want to compromise the image that Reid & Taylor has built, yet we wanted to go more mass," says Joshi. "So we have chosen to multi-dimensionalize the thought ‘Bond with the Best'. Here, the ‘bond' that we are talking about could be anything - the bond between father and son, brother and sister, the consumer and the fabric… It's a relationship that people share, and that's the thought behind ‘Bond with the Best'."

This is not to suggest that Reid & Taylor is gradually breaking away from the Bond persona, Joshi cautions. "We will certainly be staying with and associating with the James Bond platform. We have a strategic alliance with the owners of the James Bond license to promote Bond in India through Reid & Taylor." Joshi does not reveal details about the licensing agreement. "We've been with them for three years… you can see it's a long-term alliance," he smiles.

He also takes some of the credit for Bond's popularity in India. "Reid & Taylor has contributed to James Bond's popularity here. The fact that ‘Die Another Day' has a separate Telugu release (apart from a Hindi one) proves that. James Bond is certainly penetrating deeper, and that is helping Reid & Taylor. It's so perfectly mutually beneficial." © 2002 agencyfaqs!