Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Multi National Cheaters

Indians , like a majority of people from a large part of the non-Western world , haven't lost that white- skin- sahibs- are -superior complex . it extends to this deep-rooted belief that they are better than us , that foreign companies are more honest , hugely more ethical and far more trustworthy .

nothing , absolutely nothing can be further from the truth .
 i am  not saying this out of some great sense of patriotism , or a great desire  to knock everything foreign.
 I have had this great fortune of  working with some of the most honest and upright people and companies  in India, and they are all Indians.
a few  Scenarios.
 when  amul was Launching India's first milkshakes, we had found out that the most popular flavors were strawberry and chocolate. when dr kurien  was told about this, his instant reaction was “I have access to your chocolate  throughout the year, but don't have access to real strawberries. and I will not launch an artificial strawberry flavor, no matter how successful it will become".  so we launched chocolate and ilaichi  flavors. ethics  winning over profit.

 When Mr r.k. krishnakumar  was the managing director of tata tea ,  in a  presentation of a  media plan for a new campaign of tata tea ,  he was told that although getting spots on mahabharat (  which at that time was the most popular, must–watch program on Indian television) was extremely difficult, we will  manage with our contacts in doordarshan .  his immediate reaction was, if there is any underhand dealing or bribery involved in getting those spots, then he is not interested. not only that but if he ever found out that we had resorted to some such dealings, he will sack the agency regardless of how much he liked the creative work produced.
  ethics  winning over profit.
 when we were launching India's first iodized salt, tata salt , mr darbari seth ,  but then chairman of tata chemicals said , "  while  we're doing this campaign to sell packaged salt, we have to release a campaign to educate people that the usage of  salt  should be minimized in their cooking, because too much salt is bad for the  health .  as a responsible corporate citizen, we owe it to the people. Imagine India's biggest salt company telling people to eat less salt .
 ethics  winning over  profit.

 while  working on a new advertising campaign for vice vajradanti , i pointed out to  mr gajanan pendharkar , the chairman of vicco ,  that as a regular  user of his toothpaste, I find that sometimes the paste is too watery and  can something be done about that.  his instant response was the consistency of the paste depends on the water content in the bark of one of the ingredients, and it will  always differ from batch to batch. And he will not add anything artificial to get uniform consistency. In fact he went ahead to advise me that in every advertising created for this company, strict attention  should be given to being honest and not claim anything that the product does not have or deliver. When the price  of  sandalwood oil  became so high that the entire pricing of vicco  turmeric and sandalwood  cream would go haywire unless he switched to using artificial sandalwood essence  ,  he chose to launch a cream without Sandalwood oil and proudly called it so.
 ethics  winning over profit.

 now let's look at some of the biggest international names in business. mr darbari seth 

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