Pepsi, in India, is known for truly memorable slogans/captions. Right from 1990’s Yehi Hai Right Choice Baby, to 1997’s Nothing Official About It… to Yeh Dil Maange More (1998), they have always created lines that cut across language barriers in India with a distinctly Hinglish style.
In some of the later attempts, like Azaadi Dil Ki, Yeh Pyaas Hai Badi, Oh Yes Abhi, Yeh Hai Youngistaan Meri Jaan and Pepsi Thi Pi Gaya, they ditched the Hinglish style and moved more towards Hindi (despite ‘Young’istaan). Possibly owing to the change, these lines were not as popular as the earlier ones that enjoyed pan-Indian appeal.
Pepsi’s latest slogan is: ‘Har Ghoont Mein Swag’.
Here’s a playlist of some of Pepsi’s TVCs from the past, including the latest one:
The latest one falls in the more-Hindi series, despite ‘swag’. If the earlier lines used simple Hindi words that could be understood by Indians across states too (with some difficulty given Hindi is not their primary language or mother tongue) thanks to Government-led push of Hindi across the country and the efforts of people across states to learn Hindi for purely functional reasons. So words like ‘azaadi’, ‘badi’, ‘meri jaan’ and ‘pi gaya’ are simple enough to understand without much effort. These are also commonly used words in mainstream Hindi cinema, adding to their reach.
But I reckon ‘ghoont’ may not be such a word. Meaning ‘sip’ in Hindi, I don’t recall the word either in popular Hindi songs or Hindi film titles (‘Roy’ wasn’t a big enough hit even in the North, and despite being incredibly catchy, “Sooraj dooba hai yaaron, Do ghoont nashe ke maaro” may not be a pan-Indian appealing song). But Pepsi seems to be going full steam ahead using the slogan as a hashtag on their social media properties (which don’t differentiate between states in India, obviously) and the TVC being played in regional language channels too.
For someone with Hindi as the mother tongue and who speaks it daily, the point about ‘ghoont’ being slightly difficult to understand may not even occur. But, they may also not be able to see it from the perspective of someone who doesn’t speak the language on a day-to-day basis and for whom Hindi is not the mother tongue. (Recall the . From the perspective of who coined that phrase, it was perfectly fine and wonderfully on-point. But when you are communicating with a multilingual audience, you do need to set aside your own perspectives and think on behalf of others, by adding perspectives of people different from you).
I’d love to know if Pepsi, or its agency Wunderman Thompson tried understanding the slogan’s appeal/comprehension with people who do not speak Hindi, or don’t care for Hindi particularly (yes, that’s possible, in a country where Hindi is NOT the only/national language!). English is aspirational (whether we like it or not), but Hindi is not, because there are several other regional languages (Hindi is yet another regional language) that vie for our fellow citizens’ love and affection.
Hindi used to aspirational too, at one point, when the power centers in India, from an employment perspective, were New Delhi and Bombay. Now, they vie for other power centers of employment like Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Chennai, where Hindi is not the primary language of communication. But English continues to be aspirational because of the perceived access it gives outside India.
The earlier Pepsi captions understood this and made a clever bridge between simple Hindi words and English, leading to truly memorable slogans with pan-Indian appeal. Har Ghoont Mein Swag doesn’t probably fit that standard, even though the brand has gone ahead with even a full-fledged song and music video featuring Tiger Shroff, Disha Patani and Badshah.
Is this wrong? Of course not! Given the T-series association, Pepsi India knows perfectly who it is targeting with this slogan – the Hindi-Punjabi belt, primarily. And that’s a really large market to go after. I just wonder if they considered pan-India appeal as a need at all, like the earlier slogans, ‘Yehi Hai Right Choice Baby’ and ‘Yeh Dil Maange More’ that became buzzy all through India.