Tata Safari Dicor fetches ‘Overdrive Campaign of the Year’ award for O&M

At the annual Overdrive Awards for vehicle excellence, Sagar Mahabaleshwarkar, creative director, O&M, along with Sanjay Gupta, product manager, utility vehicles, passenger car business unit, Tata Motors, bagged the ‘Overdrive Campaign of the Year’ award for the Tata Safari ‘Reclaim Your Life’ campaign. The awards were organised by Infomedia India, publishers of ‘Overdrive’ magazine.

The campaign featured young professionals dealing with the angst they face in everyday life, and how Tata Safari Dicor gives them the power to ‘reclaim their lives’.

The campaign, which was unveiled in August 2005, had two definite goals to accomplish. Gupta of Tata Motors explains, “First, we didn’t want to deviate too much from the earlier ‘Make your own road’ campaign, which depicted the vehicle as one meant for the outdoors. Second, the Dicor was an upgraded version of Tata Safari. So we had to highlight the new vehicle by introducing a more human aspect to it.”

After this campaign was launched in August, 2005, Gupta claims there has been a 50 per cent increase in sales. “On an average, we’re selling 300-500 vehicles per month,” remarks an enthused Gupta. “We hope to sell 6,000 vehicles by the end of the next financial year.”

The other nominees for the ‘Overdrive Campaign of the Year’ category were Bajaj Avenger for the ‘Feel Like God’ campaign, Skoda (‘When You Care Enough It Shows’), and Indica V2 (the ‘boxing’ campaign).

Meanwhile, Maruti Suzuki Swift bagged the ‘Car of the Year’ award, while TVS Apache was named the ‘Bike of the Year’. The ‘Scooter of the Year’ was TVS Scooty Pep Plus, while the ‘Utility Vehicle of the Year’ went to Toyota Innova. The ‘Import Car of the Year’ was Audi A6.

Apart from the Overdrive Awards, Infomedia India also organised the Auto Monitor Awards, which had four categories. The ‘Person of the Year’ award went to Anand Mahindra. Toyota India and The Environment Research Institute (TERI) jointly bagged the ‘Corporate Social Responsibility Initiative of the Year’.

At the same awards ceremony, the ‘Commercial Vehicle Manufacturer of the Year’ went to Tata Motors, while Bharat Forge bagged the ‘Auto Component Manufacturer of the Year’.

© 2006 agencyfaqs!