For its latest campaign, German haircare brand Schwarzkopf has picked a sharp insight—its name is a mouthful and difficult to pronounce, with most stumbling and fumbling to get it right.
The latest ad asks ‘what’s in a name’: Mira Kapoor walks into a salon and says, “I’m limitless. Can you put that on display?” The brand name may cause confusion, but in the ad, the products are shown to do the trick and ensure that you choose them the next time you are at the salon.
Schwarzkopf tries to bring a salon environment alive by capitalising on ASMR sounds — with professionals using faucets, trimmers, and hair sprays. But that’s largely ineffective as the music comes in way too soon and the ad’s pace fails to fit with the relaxing ASMR.
Toward the end, a voiceover and Kapoor pronounce the brand name correctly.
While the insight is exciting, the execution is flimsy and lacks direction. The ad fails to make Schwarzkopf stand out among other luxury beauty products. It would be very easy to mistake the tall cylindrical Schwarzkopf bottles for any other drugstore haircare product.
The brand had a chance to be experimental and witty, but it probably didn’t find the risk worth it. Nobody takes their hair lightly — and perhaps Schwarzkopf thought that humour won’t make people choose an expensive brand. The long and short is, the ad is a khichdi of a lot of ideas, with creative directors and brand representatives having failed to settle on one. You end up being unconvinced to visit a store and pick Schwarzkopf.
No break from tradition
Haircare product ads in India have always followed a template: Fancy shampoos and serums that give you unrealistically lustrous and bouncy hair. Products have been marketed with the idea of giving women ‘salon hair’ at home — TRESemmé became the face of it when it came to India in 2012.
In 2010, Garnier tried to relate to the average customer: Fructis Shampoo+Oil 2-in-1 was marketed in a way that took the shampoo from the salon to your bathroom shelf. It was made for a generation that had no time to oil their hair the good old way. And many even bought it. But Garnier succumbed to showing artificially shiny and thick hair — at home. Dove, too, tries to hold up ‘real beauty’ standards but models always feature picture-perfect hair.
Haircare brands need to understand that Gen Z has moved on from salon-style hair at home. Schwarzkopf’s ‘limitless’ campaign speaks to only a few.
(Edited by Humra Laeeq)