BANGALORE: After Akshay Kumar, who promoted Ruff & Tuff, one more Bollywood star is getting into apparel endorsement. Arvind Brands has appointed Saif Ali Khan as the brand ambassador for its New Port brand.
The promotional campaign revolves around 'Saif's Style Fundas' - where the star tells us how to be more stylish, the Newport way.
"Indian Youth are more fashion conscious than they have ever been, says Arvind Brands president Darshan Mehta, adding, "It's a growing awareness that's fueled by stylish Bollywood movies. Newport is uniquely placed to lead this style revolution. It's a brand that understands youth fashion. The new campaign is designed to showcase Newport's strong sense of style and it couldn't have a more suitable brand ambassador - Saif Ali Khan is one of the most fashionable and popular stars in the Bollywood scene. Style is something that Saif and Newport have in common".
Speaking to indiantelevision.com on the ad budget, Mehta says, "Our ad budgets have been around 9 per cent and we hall me maintaining this budget. We are going to have a high octane campaign in the next two to three days. You will see larger than life shot of Saif. It is going to be promoted hugely by large sized hoardings with shots of Saif in different types of jean designs, to supplement this we are going to make use of bazaar power, which is if you go to a store or the market place, you will see a lot of these visuals"
Speaking on the ad strategy, Mehta states, "We 've not looked at television and magazines for this campaign, but our media agency has recommended television. We may possibly look at it after the spring-summer season - maybe the fall-winter season. Our communication spends for the year as I mentioned is 9 per cent of Rs. 850 million or around 70-80 million which would be shared across all the modes of communication. We are planning to cover around 120 top towns and cities; this may even go up to 300 initially for the campaign."
Newport has twenty one distribution channels and a brand presence in 2000 retail outlets in the country- another 80 specifically meant only Newport. Alok Nanda and Associates, Mumbai will be doing the New Port ad campaign.
