Coca-Cola and Pepsi are such huge brands they can be seen the world over. But in India, a challenger brand is disrupting the market by offering a new cola, Campa Cola for half the price of the bigger names.
Campa Cola is part of Reliance Industries, headed up by Asia's richest man, Mukesh Ambani. The cola has achieved double digital market share a couple of years after its relaunch (it was previously popular in the '80s before the bigger players took over in the '90s) and costs a fraction of the price of regular cola, at just 10 rupees or 0.12 cents for 200ml.
So is this success solely down to price, or is Campa Cola's marketing strategy challenging Coca-Cola and Pepsi, too? Has it produced one of the world's best adverts or top logos? Let's take a look...
Campa Cola was rebranded in 2023 and is now available in orange and lemon as well as classic cola. It is being positioned as a more affordable option compared to its larger rivals. The logo itself is not really much to write home about (unlike the Coca-Cola logo history). It consists of a simple 'Campa' with a swoosh of colour behind it, with the colours varying depending on the product.
From what I can see online, the adverts themselves are also nothing particularly special. They just show some people drinking Campa Cola. There's no humour or warm and fuzzy feeling induced, like we're used to for the likes of Coca-Cola and Pepsi, who are continuously having to come up with ways to engage customers who are well aware of who they are.
There are some nice print ads (see above) that launched with the rebrand though, which show off the new flavours with the strapline 'Great Indian Taste'.
The company has also sponsored teams in the Indian Premier League, increasing its visibility.
It just goes to show that with the right price and money behind you, you don't need hugely fancy marketing to take off.
Campa Cola's strategy is causing Coca-Cola to change tactics, and it has introduced no-sugar versions of its drinks at cut prices in order to try and capture the market. It has also reduced the price of its classic drink in some areas, according to Good Returns.
This isn't the first time that Asia's richest man has disrupted the market. According to Bloomberg, his company disrupted the telecoms industry by offering free data to Indians, and the media industry by launching a rival to Netflix and Amazon, JioHotstar.
So what can we learn from the success of Campa Cola? First of all, if you're the richest man in Asia, you don't need particularly clever marketing gimmicks or witty slogans to get a product off the ground. You just need to give people what they want, which is often a cheaper version of something that already exists and then tell them about it, by getting your message out to lots of people at the same time.
Whether Coca-Cola and Pepsi will be able to fight back remains to be seen. Can marketing campaigns save them?
For campaigns that have changed the world, see our best print ads roundup.
