Beck’s Ice ad takes a dig at Kingfisher
Experts feel the ad might be able to create a buzz in the market, but is unlikely to impact rivals’ sales.
India has banned advertising of liquor and tobacco products.
In a rare case of a spoof in surrogate advertising, Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s biggest brewing company, has come out with a commercial that takes a potshot at the country’s top-selling beer brand Kingfisher.
The advertisement, launched online, shows a kingfisher spilling a fish after catching it, and goes on to say, “Kingfisher is just not that smooth” but Beck’s Ice is super smooth.
India has banned advertising of liquor and tobacco products, but in the absence of clear guidelines over social media space, liquor companies have been directly promoting their brands on platforms such as YouTube, Twitter and Facebook.
AB InBev, the brewer of brands such as Budweiser and Corona, said the advertisement’s main focus was to showcase its pure-malt variant’s ingredient.
“We aim to offer our consumers transparency about the distinct natural ingredients that are brewed to make Beck’s Ice a smooth offering and further elevate the beer category,” a company spokesperson said.
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Shekhar Ramamurthy, managing director at Heineken-controlled United Breweries that makes Kingfisher beer, declined to comment.
Experts feel the ad might be able to create a buzz in the market, but is unlikely to impact rivals’ sales.
“It is not easy for a new brand like Beck’s Ice to steal shares from UB which historically has a 50% plus market share in India by issuing a direct ad alone,” Abneesh Roy, senior vice president at Edelweiss Securities, said.
