Tell us about your role in the creation of this work.
All the work on this campaign has been a result of complete collaboration between Dentsu Impact and the IKEA team. Starting with comprehensive researches to understand the lives at home of our audience, to arriving at the IKEA positioning for India, defining the creative space for the launch communication and finally the execution thereof, the entire journey has been something that we have worked on together.
Give us an overview of the campaign, what is it about?
The campaign is a perfect amalgamation of life at home in India and IKEA’s point of view on life at home. It’s not about perfect looking, luxurious homes with a ‘too good to be true’ showcase of home & relations, but about the real, chaotic and not-so-perfect everyday life that comes with its own little ups and downs. This is where IKEA comes into the picture with solutions that help make this everyday even brighter. So, it is not just the big changes or moments that solutions at IKEA brighten up, but it’s about the everyday.
Tell us about the details creative brief, what did it ask?
The creative brief was centered around delivering the key message of ‘make everyday brighter’ in a way that adheres to IKEA’s global tonality while being relevant to a strong Indian cultural insight. The consumer was defined as the ‘many people’ who seek beautiful, functional, durable & sustainable home furnishing solutions that are affordable.
Which insight led to the creation of this piece of work?
The larger cultural insight revolved around how the Indian socio-cultural fabric was undergoing change and seeing manifestation in evolving family dynamics, modernizing value systems, loosening social mores, blurring of gender roles, etc. with a more contemporary face of new India emerging. IKEA is the enabler of a brighter everyday for this modern India, speaking to the many people and enabling them access to affordable, functional, beautiful, durable and sustainable home furnishing solutions.
Can you share with us any alternative ideas (if any) for this campaign? Why was this idea chosen?
Yes, we did explore various ideas. However, once this idea was conceptualized, we all knew that this was the one to go with. The basis of choosing this idea was that this concept is something that is best suited to showcase the role that IKEA can play in our consumers’ lives, while being completely rooted in IKEA’s core values and point of view on life at home.
How did the client initially react to this idea
They loved it from the word ‘go’. It resonated very well with them from the beginning, with a consensus in the entire team!
What was the greatest challenge that you and your team faced during development.
The biggest challenge was to create a concept that has a fine balance between IKEA’s global tonality and Indian sensibilities, especially given the largely traditional market of Hyderabad. IKEA has a very strong global tonality that ensures that the brand’s core and vocabulary remains intact from country to country. India, of course, is unlike any Western market, and creating communication from the lens of India was key.
What did you enjoy most about seeing this campaign through? Did you learn anything new from the experience?
The fact that we get to launch an iconic brand like IKEA in India is no doubt the best part of it all. At the same time working with IKEA has been one of the most enriching experiences for us, completely defying the agency-client relationship stereotypes. This campaign has been a result of true collaboration between IKEA and us. Working with the IKEA team and the kind of expertise and work culture they promote has been a great learning, and one that was an immensely satisfying as well.
Where do you see this campaign going in the future?
This is just the start for IKEA in India, and there will be a lot more that you will see from the brand. The core of course will remain the same, the manifestation will be different.
There is in fact a lot in store for the coming days, and we won’t like to give away the suspense just now. All we can say is that you will be seeing a lot more from IKEA, work that we are extremely excited about!