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At the first sight, tall Sumanto Chattopadhyay with his long hair and beard looks as if he has just walked out of the sets of Lord of the Rings. The group creative director of Ogilvy & Mather Mumbai and creative director of the company's Kolkata unit, dons many hats.
When not making award winning advertisements, Chattopadhyay takes up the role of a writer, a model or an actor.
He talks to Komal Mehta on what drives him.
How did you decide to take up advertising after your MBA?
It is unusual for an MBA not to get into advertising but to get into the creative section. The reason was that be it undergraduation studies or MBA, I enjoyed writing. Given that I enjoyed it per se and that I found the advertising part of MBA most interesting, I thought of trying my hand at writing and thereafter got into advertising.
But then why did you do an MBA?
Simply because I was confused. My father was a professor at the Indian Institute of Management and he always told his sons to do MBA. However, while studying, I found that I was not cut out for a 9-to-5 job.
You did your MBA in Canada after which you joined an ad agency in Kolkata -- why did you come back?
People always think the grass is greener on the other side. I did enjoy my stay abroad but to me it was 'been there, done that.' It may sound strange but I love India and I love being in India. I love travelling abroad and luckily my job allows me to do that quite a lot. But I would rather be a first class citizen in my own country.
About you being a multi-faceted creative person. . .
I think I'm unusual but that's why I'm in the creative. Sometimes people think that creative people try to put on an image. I think they are driven by an inner compulsion. It feels like marching to the beat of a drummer -- someone inside you.
Being creative is just about exploring your inner self -- it is about finding things that give you satisfaction. That path can sometimes can be circular. I think when I took this break and did a play and thereafter came back to advertising, I felt revived and refreshed. It feels like you have explored another part of your brain. Also, I love writing short stories, articles on advertising. Exploring different traits keeps me going.
How did you join O&M?
O&M for a decade has been 'the place' and I felt if I'm going to be in advertising, let me be in the most creative place ever. It's much tougher here because the competition is so high. To make your place within the organisation, you have to push yourself because there are lots of talented people.
On the varied ads you have created. . .
a. Tea Board of India (The 3-ad campaign)
Tea is India's universal drink,everybody has chai. From the youngest to the oldest, richest to the poorest. Basically Tea Board is promoting tea as the coffee bars have crowded all around and juices and colas have caught on with the youth. We decided to make tea a little more on top of our minds.
Also as habits start at an early age, we targeted the youth. The basic idea was that tea is a down-to-earth drink which is why we are saying it is the 'real drink for real people'. The ad is not at all pretentious, has no frills and it's very you. It's like you do not drink tea to make a statement.
b. Pond's
Pond's Cold Xream has come up with this 'Women for Women Fund' ('Your face speaks for you' ad) which is basically an effort towards doing something for women, something against violence. The execution of the ad at a time when the Domestic Violence Act was passed was coincidental.
Digressing from a tried and tested formula, we had a client here who something that would get everyone thinking. The ad is so revolutionary, so different and something that has not been done before.
c. Adoption campaign (soft toys, new outdoors ad)
The Indian Association for Promotion of Adoption and Child Welfare is a Mumbai-based NGO. The good thing about this ad is that, even though it has run in a limited way -- just the print and the outdoors, it got nice responses. People wrote in after seeing it that they have either adopted or have decided to adopt.
This ad has won a lot of awards and it got people thinking about a subject not talked about before.
d. Maharashtra Tourism (print ads)
It's mostly meant for the foreign market. This is an ad that won a lot of awards. In fact, this particular campaign was featured in the (British marketing giant) WPP book. Out of the 2000 offices which are part of WPP around the world, O&M Mumbai was ranked the best.
We are the WPP's most creative office around the world.To me this was a matter of pride, it was even better than winning all the awards.
e. Dove
'The campaign for real beauty' is the international campaign of Dove. Each country has to decide when they want to launch it and how.
What do you feel about Indian advertising being ranked 21st in creativity?
On one hand, it is fabulous because earlier we were nowhere. There is a lot of interest about India in foreign countries. Our standard of work has also risen, our work is getting recognised abroad. Now we have to make concerted efforts to go higher. We can't say that we are 21st and need to celebrate. For, we must be number 1 and there is no reason why we can't be.
Though we have started the process, all the ad agencies of the country should make a wholesome effort. If you look at Latin American states, they support each other.When you go to Cannes, there are some publications that come out with the best of advertisements. All that helps publicise the works and lets them be on the jurors' minds.
In any of the Latin American countries sends in an entry and there is a Latin American juror, the latter is more likely to vote for the ad. It's not that he or she votes for it just because it is from his or her country but it gets pushed for being good.
You must not think that just because I am from O&M, I won't let other agencies get ahead. For instance, I was a jury member at the London Advertising Awards, and the Slim Jeans campaign from JWT was clearly the best entry, so I voted for it and was happy that it won. That community feeling should come in.
What is your perception about Indian advertising abroad?
There is a huge interest about India in foreign countries and people are dying to see what India is doing. Given that the world is taking interest in the Indian culture and we are being globalised, we must raise our standards. We have to keep up the pressure. I think in India we have this habit that one year we do well and the next year we lax. We must not get complacent.
What about the new media that are coming up -- mobile, Internet, etc? What does the future look like?
I agree advertising is a dynamic world that is changing very fast. In India, television will be big for a long time to come. For, we are not in the same stage in development cycle as other countries. Even today, Internet that is so huge in other
countries is small in India. It is growing among the urban youth but even then it is nothing compared to what it is in other countries.
However, for the adoption campaign we had used an e-mail viral as our television reach was limited. We would send a link to the ad that was uploaded on the Internet and the subject was 'If you don't like what you see, pass it on'. It was an unpleasant subject of a baby being dumped in a dustbin. We had even used MMS.
There were many instances in which the person who sent the message received it back. There are many Web sites like
YouTube today where you can put up stuff. Blogging, podcasting, videocasting are all very powerful abroad but in India, the reach is not very wide.
Is advertising is not being favoured by students anymore?
In advertising, the pay is less, the hours are long and stressful and there are so many other options that are coming up. Advertising has crazy hours and you cannot run away from that. It is a service industry and at the end, it is the client
who dictates. If he asks us to do something at 5.30 in the morning the next day, we have to do it.
We can say 'no' twice but on the third time, we have to do it. The margins too are becoming slimmer and slimmer because the clients what more bang for their advertising buck. They are always negotiating with us to give them more value for money.
Now what is mostly happening is that you work for an Internet company, a radio or a television channel and do
creative work along with a better pay and a more decent working hours.
Is it going to continue going that way?
I think adjustment is bound to happen as especially if talents start moving away from advertising. Believe me, this industry only runs on talent. Without creative talent, it is nothing. I think the market is in flux and that is how the whole capitalist system works.
If agencies today are not being able to pay more because clients are not valuing them enough and if people start moving out of this industry, the clients are bound to pay more. I do that the pay scale will get revived.
At O&M in the last couple of years, we have increased the starting salaries. We have started an initiative -- 'Ogilvy on campus', which aims to reach out to talents on the campuses. We have a lot of trainees working here. Those who get trained here are very happy because they actually get to work on real stuff. In fact, now we have many people applying but we don't have enough room to accommodate them.
Please comment on what you once wrote in an article -- 'advertising isn't a bad way to earn a living, as long as you believe it's for a good cause. The only small hitch is that as a creative guy, you have to accept the anonymity that comes with the job. Because the ads you create usually glamourise someone or something else, rarely you'.
If you look at the context of creativity, whether you get bouquets or brickbats, they come directly to you. In advertising it's not like that. You are paid by certain either HLL or Kodak to create and ad campaign which glamorises them, make them famous but people don't really get to know who made it.
In fact, award ceremonies are meant for that, they give creative people the recognition they seek.The reason that people have been willing to work at lesser pay and longer hours is because of this recognition.
With the media explosion, however, things have changed. So much is being written about the creative people. But usually, in advertising, one guy is asking the ad in the back office, orchestrating the execution but you see someone else in the front.
The things you glamorise may not be so great in themselves. Does it bother you?
It does bother me, you have the power to influence people. At least I feel fortunate that I don't work on any brand which I feel is harmful. I have never regretted working on anything but I think that the possibility is always there. I believe that by and large if you advertise a product that is bad, it goes out of the market sooner. People try it and
find it to be bad, then people stop buying it and the word of mouth makes it die.
But for a product like cigarettes, lot of regulation needs to be done.What I find hypocritical is that the government will ban the advertising of the product but not ban the product itself.
How did you get into modelling?
I was in advertising and I was often asked to do some in-house modelling for O&M. I got my portfolio done from Boman Irani, who was a photographer at that time. I circulated my pictures and I started getting work.
I did not pursue it seriously because I couldn't ask people for work for lack of time. Most of the times, I would do modelling over the weekends or I'd take a day off. It was a nice source of additional income because I was quite broke then. I used live as a paying guest and used to commute from Andheri.
Once I started earning from modelling I could afford to take a cab.
I got busier soon and, therefore, stopped doing too much of modelling.
You recently did the Gibsons Guitar ad.
I was really excited about it because it involved (filmmaker) Gurinder Chaddha and because I loved Bend it like Beckham.
How come all creative ad guys have this long hair and beard get up?
I think now everyone's is copying it but I started it (smiles). I like it that way. (He admits to having 'cried' when he had to cut his hair for the Peter Englad ad with Kareena Kapoor.)
How did theatre happen?
Theatre was something I really wanted to do. I wanted to act. To me it's a very creative thing. Advertising is very theatrical, the whole process of selling a creative involves drama. And all of advertising is drama so I think they are related. For me, theatre is a creative process and I really enjoy it.
Tell me about the movies that you acted in -- Char Adhyay and Is Raat ki Subah Nahi.
In Char Adhyay (1997), I played the central role. It was released only in Kolkata. It was only the film festival circuit kind of a film. As a Bengali, I've always loved (Rabindranath) Tagore's plays. My grandmother had the famous last name. She was an actress who used to act in Tagore's plays when he was alive.
So I chose to act in Char Adhyay thinking of the family tradition. I also did a small role in Is Raat Ki Subah
Nahi.