Still unaware that the Volkswagen Vento ‘talking’ ad appeared first in The Hindu, Madras, and not The Times of India, and that it also appears in The Hindu Business Line, the adman turned columnist Anil Thakraney lists three reasons why the ad doesn’t work, in Money Life:
1) Getting instant attention cannot be the sole purpose of advertising… The idea must always be to get attention in an endearing way, and in a way that the route embellishes the brand’s core personality.
2) It’s a boring, non-stop chatter from a sleepy voice, that pretty much translates what the ad is already saying. Now if my newspaper has to play the role of a radio in my life (eeeeks!), the least it must do is to entertain me.
3) For a luxury sedan, isn’t The Times of India, a mass paper, a waste of the ad rupee? Wouldn’t this gimmick have been more suitable for, say, The Economic Times? Or one of those many auto mags?
Read the full article: Gaddi badnaam hui
Also read: ‘Talking’ ads in The Hindu and The Times of India
IJR 
The grapes were sour?