Ad Campaigns
Farhan Akhtar and Deepika Padukone celebrate the little joys of life with Coca-Cola
MUMBAI: This New Year, the brand universally synonymous with happiness, Coca-Cola,gives a refreshing new twist to ‘Open Happiness’ and urges consumers to revel in the joys of life- big and small. The new campaign ‘Choti ho ya badi, har khushi mein Coca-Cola’, featuring the country`s heartthrobs and youth icons Farhan Akhtar and Deepika Padukone seeks to embrace and celebrate all the little moments of happiness that life throws up.
This campaign is another step in the company’s journey of taking Coca-Cola where it really belongs – the masses, the people at large. Coca-Cola’s great refreshing taste, its values; all resonate across the length and breadth of the country. This initiative is directed at helping the country’s fastest growing soft drink brand, Coca-Cola, tostay firmly on its course to the company’s Vision 2020.
The new campaign, which brings together Farhan and Deepika for the first time for a television commercial, spreads the Coca-Cola promise of happiness through a series of delightfully charmingads directed by the celebrated Anurag Kashyap. The campaign sees the two actors liven up the screen with their chemistry and engaging interactions in some everyday situations which have them cherish and rejoice the little joys of life with a bottle of refreshing Coca-Cola.
Speaking on the new campaign, Debabrata Mukherjee, VP – Marketing & Commercial, Coca-Cola India, said, “Coca-Cola is a brand that stands for optimism and happiness. With our new campaign, Choti ho ya badi, har khushi mein Coca-Cola’, we have translated the brand’s happy energy into a series of commercials which capture the essence of finding moments of joy in our day to day lives. The language is very colloquial; the situations are every day, so that every consumer in India can relate to it and feel happy about the celebratory situations. The message is very simple – celebrate your moments of happiness, small or big, with a bottle of Coca-Cola”.
He further added, “We are very happy to have both Farhan Akhtar and DeepikaPadukone join the Coca-Cola family. Our communication for Coca-Cola this year focuses on reaching the masses and both Deepika and Farhan slipped into the roles of “everyday people” with great ease. They are great role models and very inspirational for millions across the country”
Speaking about the campaign, newly appointed Coca-Cola brand ambassador, Actor Deepika Padukone said, “When I think of brand Coca-Cola the feeling of optimism and joy immediately resonates. I have been a huge fan of Brand Coca-Cola, one of the most aspirational and iconic brands in the world and I am glad to have finally got the opportunity to be associated with it. I have thoroughly enjoyed this experience and working with Farhan, Prasoon, Anurag and the entire team at Coca-Cola has been absolutely incredible. The beauty of brand Coca-Cola is the fact that it stands for values, which are very simple yet very powerful. Values which each and every individual in any part of the world will identify with. I am glad to play my part in delivering Coca-Cola’s message of ‘Happiness’ to one and all in a very ‘Refreshing’ and engaging manner”
Speaking about his experience and association with Coca-Cola, Farhan Akthar said “What stands out about brand Coca-Cola is its universal appeal. No matter where in the world you are, Coca-Cola is synonymous with celebration and joy. I am extremely excited to partner with Coca-Cola and to bring this joy to millions of consumers across the country. The entire team behind this campaign has made the experience tremendously enriching for me. I had a wonderful time shooting for the campaign which has given me an opportunity to portray a distinctly new character. A campaign which will connect with the way people including my fans, far and wide, celebrate their moments of happiness – big or small. All in all, just like Coca-Cola, it has been a very ‘refreshing’ experience.”
Anurag Kashyap who has directed the campaign, said, “The campaign pays ode to the ethos of brand Coca-Cola of celebrating moments of joy no matter how big or small. I loved the concept of taking the cosmopolitan and undoubtedly glamorous icons such as Deepika and Farhan and putting them in extremely rustic scenarios that appeal to masses across the country.The campaign is very fun, happy, and bubbly, just like the effervescence unique to a Coca-Cola. Coca-Cola has given us some iconic campaigns in the past that I have thoroughly enjoyed I hope this campaign receives the same appreciation.”
The campaign has been scripted by Prasoon Joshi and his creative team at McCann Erickson. The film has been produced by Producer Guneet Monga’s Golden Gaddi Films and directed by acclaimed director, Anurag Kashyap. The music of the campaign has been created by Mikey McCleary and Vishal Khurana.
In addition to leveraging mass media advertising, the integrated communication plan includes roll-out of an array of touch points including out-of-home (OOH) media, digital, behind the label promotion, point of sale merchandise and on-ground initiatives across all key markets.
Commenting on the Campaign, Prasoon Joshi, CEO and Chief Creative Officer, McCann World Group India says, “The concept of happiness is universal, and the joy that one look or a smile from that special someone invokes is universal and not constrained by demographics. Similarly, Coca-Cola delivers the promise of happiness universally; whether you are in small town or a metropolitan city you can celebrate the little joys of life with a refreshing bottle of Coca-Cola. It’s this thought that served as the inspiration for this campaign. We have Farhan Akhtar and Deepika Padukone, two young and highly successful actors that have captured the imagination of the whole country essaying characters that you and I could bump into on the streets of Chandigarh or Allahabad or any other city. “
Coca-Cola 2014 Thematic TVC- Feat Farhan Akhtar and Deepika Padukone
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
