Friday, December 4, 2015

Terror, cola wars and butter on Indian TV

Television did not spread from the major cities of India until the mid-1970s, so their "classic" commercials are mostly from the 1980s.  Here's a sampling, along with some other Indian TV bits...

Amul commercials (I believe Amul is a collective of dairy farmers):
-Amul ice-cream ad (1990s?)
-Amul "pizza cheese" (2000s... hot hot hot)
-Amul butter (a very old ad, from the early 1970s -- these seem like they would be shown in cinemas as opposed to on television... another is here)

-Doordarshan ID (this is the national TV network, not unlike the BBC... this terrified me then and now)

-Gold Spot commercials (I very much enjoy the man's over-British pronunciation)... as I understand it, the Indian government used to require foreign companies to partner with a local company.  So they didn't have Honda motorcycles, they had Hero-Honda.  They tried the same thing with Coca-Cola (which was already established) in the 1970s, and Coke said "forget it!  We're not partnering with someone local and giving you our formula."  So they left, and the soft-drink void was filled by already existing local drinks, then Pepsi, before Coke returned (under relaxed partnership rules).  The local drinks today barely exist, but in the 1980s, everyone could enjoy Gold Spot (orange), Limca (lemon-lime) and Thums Up (cola, SIC).  An article on the Indian cola wars is here.

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