Blue sky, naked mountains of Ladakh, endless road and a cruiser bike – it seems to be a dream come true for any passionate biker and such visuals featured in numerous television commercials of bike manufacturers worldwide. Bajaj came up with such a promotional film on World’s Brotherhood Day (11th September) in the year of 2016 and the film was made by Mullen Lintas. Quite fine till that! But they decided to include one competition bike also in the same film which captured a mega portion of the footage. It was Royal Enfield! "For a day, we kept our competitiveness aside" - Sumeet Narang, vice-president - marketing, Bajaj Auto, said. Putting the two bikes together was a real bold move. People appreciated the film for going beyond the brand, and viewed it as a magnanimous gesture from Bajaj. From Bajaj’s point of view, the film was a statement of stature where the brand Avenger was quite secure about acknowledging another mammoth bike brand, and 'World Brotherhood Day' was a great opportunity to showcase the 'riding as one' idea. See the ad here:
Yes we’ve seen brotherhood campaigns by several bike manufacturers earlier. Harley Davidson or Royal Enfield keeps consumers engaged with their brands by such campaigns regularly as bike marketing is as much about “bikers” as it is about “biking”. Bikers are seen as a large-hearted breed that looks out for each other on the road and such campaigns are effective indeed. But Bajaj’s idea to embrace and acknowledge competition sounded unique. Although the campaign’s positioning for consumers was about brotherhood, peace, liberation etc, hidden motive was to elevate Avenger to a level of a proper cruiser like “Bullet” and precipitate the brand gaps. Clearly there was a need for Avenger as a brand to rise! Bajaj also cleverly gave more air time to Royal Enfield, clearly making the pitch clear about Avenger being nothing less. Any biker knows Ladakh is Bullet paradise and none won't really find an Avenger there, and in that sense, this was almost a virtual assault on the core DNA of “Bullet”. Officially Royal Enfield snubbed to give feedback on Bajaj’s campaign as most probably they did not want to give unnecessary brand mileage to Bajaj Avenger. Brotherhood became one street way!
A few years back, an award winning peace day campaign was cleverly designed by Burger King to ambush Mcdonald’s. McDonald's wasn't willing to bite on a Burger King proposal to join forces in making a "McWhopper" in the name of promoting peace. McDonald’s said an obvious “no” in a late response but it was already a win-win campaign for Burger King. Burger King’s approach in the campaign was indeed very “guerilla” and the Bajaj Avenger creative also fell in the guerilla territory of advertisement, where the possibility & motives of a potential next attack remains hidden.
But was a brand rivalry between Bajaj and Royal Enfield ever existent earlier? Over a decade ago, Royal Enfield put out a TVC for its flagship Bullet model, mocking the famous Hoodibaba campaign for Bajaj Caliber. The TVC ended with the Hindi voiceover “Jab Bullet chale, Duniya rasta de (when bullet goes, world leaves road for it)”. See it here:
Most probably Bajaj had a game plan in mind. After one year of launching the “Brotherhood Campaign”, just a few days before Indian Independence Day celebration in 2017, they came up with one TVC taking potshots at Royal Enfield. This time Bajaj’s model was Bajaj Dominar 400, a touring motorcycle, which was rebranded from the Bajaj Pulsar CS400. While Dominar is an excellent product for city riding, it is difficult for it to break past the loyal customer base of Royal Enfield, who look forward to buy a bike for long leisure commuting. Bajaj Dominar positioned itself as a direct challenger brand. Let’s see what is there in the ad! A bunch of middle aged seasoned bikers go on a ride in a scenic hilly location. But instead of riding a bike, they sit atop elephants and find it quite hard to tackle them. A thumping sound, seemingly of Royal Enfield engine, is heard in the background. Suddenly 3 bike riders are seen in the vicinity with their speeding Dominar 400 bikes, which deliver a smooth engine sound and vroom past the elephant riders amidst their perplexing dejection. The TVC concludes with the voice over “Hathi Mat Palo (don’t make elephants your pet)”. The TVC mentions the name of Royal Enfield nowhere but Bajaj clearly shows that they will go all out as a challenger to challenge ageing Royal Enfield brand. Priced slightly above a 350cc Royal Enfield Classic, Dominar 400 is Bajaj’s sporty alternative to Royal Enfield and according to Bajaj, it provides hyper riding experience in long distance riding. See Bajaj Dominar 400 ad here:
