Axe gets Ranbir going with the clicker, without Axe

Hindustan Unilever has rolled out a new commercial for its latest fragrance, Blast. Bollywood actor Ranbir Kapoor features in the film.

Playing himself, Kapoor uses a clicker to record the number of times he’s able to grab female attention (and even male attention on a couple of instances). Through the day right from the gymnasium to the set of a movie, he grabs 147 clicks. He feels he’s done enough to out do his competition, but he’s in for a surprise. The man who he was competing is in the driver's seat, literally, with 2,475 hits. The secret for his success is then revealed, with a super introducing Axe Blast. The film ends with a shot of the man shown applying Axe Blast before beginning his day. 

On the film, Ara Hampartsoumian, regional business development director, BBH Singapore, said, “Young guys are competitive when it comes to the mating game. They like to keep score. This insight was inspired by a similar campaign we ran globally seven years ago featuring Ben Affleck. An ordinary guy, with new Axe Blast on his side, can beat the best (in this case, Ranbir Kapoor - who is the brand non-user!). We found this very differentiating vs. how other male deos use celebrities (as traditional ambassadors). The creative development was really straight forward - our creative team looked at what a typical day would look like for a star like Ranbir, added the layer of the power of Axe and then set Ranbir up for the fall not having used Axe. In the end, our The Axe hero can even overcome Star-power.”

Gaurav Raisinghani, category director, deodorants, Hindustan Unilever South Asia, added, “We wanted to create an iconic brand campaign for the launch of Axe's new fragrance), creatively executed in a cooler, trendier and more differentiating way vs. other me-too competitors."
 

Credits:

Agency: BBH (Singapore)

Executive creative director: Scott McClelland

Creative director and copywriter: Peter Callaghan

Client servicing: Ara Hampartsoumian

Agency producer: Georgina Kent

Production company: Bang Bang Films

Director: Nic & Sune

DOP: Simon Hawken

Produced by: Roopak Saluja, Mindy Tulsi and Heather Gupta

Group Head of Production: Cyrus Mendes

Associate Producer: Shruti Pulicheri

Assistant Directors: Pierre Timmins, Subhadra Mahajan & Prabodh Bhajni

Production Manager: Sunny Shah

Assistant Production Manager: Jatin Shah

Production Assistant: Jiten Arora

Director's Assistant: Nimesh Chaturvedi

Post Production Team: Abdeali Pedhiwala & Parag Darekar

Editor: Tushar Shivan

Art Director: Ajay Chodanker