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By Prabhakar Mundkur
The year-end was full of the cacophony of writers making predictions for 2018, or mundane reviews of 2017, in spite of the fact that a calendar year has no particular statistical significance for trend spotting. Change is always continuous and never separated by any discrete intervals, especially an interval that lasts exactly twelve months. In some ways, 2017 may have just stolen the thunder from 2018, with the strides in artificial intelligence in the form of Sophia the Robot, or personal assistants like Alexa making a major impact in our lives towards the end of the year.
But one bright spot for December was the Lion of St Mark awarded to the much-deserved Pandey brothers. They have truly raised the bar of creativity to a global standard, besides putting India firmly on the advertising creativity map.  Showering undue adulation on our stars is an Indian trait and we do it constantly with all our stars, whether they are from cinema, sports or any other field. We may just have added ‘advertising’ to the adulation list.
With this award, Piyush and Prasoon Pandey join an illustrious band of creative people around the world that has included David Droga, Marcello Serpa, Bob Greenburg, Joe Pytka, Lee Clow, Dan Wieden and Sir John Hegarty. Not everyone might be aware of the work created by these distinguished gentlemen, or even knowwhere they work.The Lion of St Mark is one of those awards that lets the winner soak in humility and pride so deserving of a life time award, which by definition implies that it can only be won once.
St Mark incidentally is the evangelist pictured in the form of a winged Lion holding a Bible and is symbol of the city of Venice where the first Cannes was held in 1954. But the significance of all this may be lost to many, or otherwisedismissed as unimportant.  At least one of our advertising weeklies, which covered the event exclusively, could well have educated their readers on the significance of the award.
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For the marketing intellectual, the introduction of Thums Up Charged might hold room for an interesting debate. Variants according to textbook marketers can endow the mother brand with rewards ranging from increased market share to a longer life. But how does that augur for a category like colas, which is increasingly being seen as unhealthy? And Thums up Charged might well be dubbed an even unhealthier variant given the extra levels of caffeine and the heightened aeration. So how will an unhealthier variant of an already unhealthy brand perform? Of course, to its credit, Thums Up remains the market leader in a market which has the world’s leading colas. Another point to debate might well be how will the two variants will be differentiated in the advertising. Will it be differentiated enough for the consumer to know which variant is being advertised or will the consumer just see it as another Thums Up ad? This often is the acid test for variant advertising.
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If the rumour mill is to be believed at least one leading ad agency of earlier years shut down its Delhi office on Dec 31. What a way to close 2017. I believe the agency is managing its Mumbai office on skeleton staff. Another well-known agency that at the turn of the millennium was threatening to hold the creative high ground is being absorbed by another agency in the same communications group. As an ad guy, I find this kind of news depressing. Partly because I always questioned the soothsayers and never wanted to believe in the death of advertising that has been a hot topic of discussion for some time now.
For those of us who were celebrating the close of the old year, I am sure this is a week for sobering up and reflecting on what the new year holds for all of us. Â The first week of a new year always feels like the end of one journey and the beginning of another.
Having spent nearly four decades in the advertising business with companies like JWT, Havas and Y & R in India, Africa, and Asia, veteran adperson Prabhakar Mundkur is Chief Mentor at HGS Interactive, a part of Hinduja Global Solutions. He was LinkedIn’s Top Voice in India in 2016 and is a prolific writer. He recently set up PrabhakarMundkur.com as homebase for his writings. Ad Buzz will appear weekly on MxMIndia.com. The views here are his own.