For God’s Sake: An Adman on the Business of Religion.
The title says it all. And if you have seen the movie OH MY GOD then you will know exactly what I am talking about. But then the movie has its own bottom line, am an atheist and my views came pretty strong on the business of religion, do read my review of this movie.
Back to the book. Written by a veteran adman, Ambi Parameswaran who has been in the advertising industry for more than 25 years. In the book Ambi clearly portrays how Indian companies and brands have cleverly played along with the so very sensitive religious Indians, since a long time now. Every chapter starts with his personal experience on the subject and then he talks about the trend in that sector/topic.
At times the description of each and every religious activity, the rituals description and the listing of all the gods and the names of many such activity kind of goes over the top. Me being what I am, I skipped those parts and got interested in all the other parts where brands were linked to the Indian mindset of the religious beliefs of that era.
For example, he talks about a research he did on portrayal of Indian wives in the print ads since 1960 till now. Has the bindi disappeared altogether from ads as compared to current print ads? What about women in Saari vs. women in western clothes? How has been the trend? You will know when you read.
The whole religious travel business in India is a very big business, he talks about multiple religious yatra’s that keeps many industries running in India. Tour packages, pooja samagri, agarbatti and many more things.
Similarly many such interesting areas like – A compulsory pooja before doing anything – marriage, housewarming new car, new office, home etc. The entire business of marriage is a large business, and a very fulfilling one indeed. Religious music, TV channels, mythological tv shows (remember Ramayan and Mahabharat on DD), has a good case study on Life OK channel also. Not only Hindus, how do business in other religious suit themselves to the flow of spirituality. Then there is a Mont Blanc blunder with Gandhiji offer, classic case study. Then his Chennai office opening story is also neat.
Only negative of this book, which is purely my personal view, is that at many places it has a lot of detailing about gods and other nitty gritty not related to the theme of the book.
But if you are interested in Brands and how the religion plays an important part in how you launch your product, open an office etc. This book will rekindle you. An easy weekend reading is what I would say.
You can buy the book at Amazon