Summary:A small but powerful idea generates its own PR. This idea is yet another demonstration of that. We didn’t have millions to blow to make a major paid-media campaign but we wanted to make a difference. And so we observed that cigarettes are sold loose in India unlike other countries. And almost all cigarette shops in India are fitted with public lighter boxes. Also 80% of Indian smokers don't stock cigarettes but instead buy them loose, and light them using these lighter boxes. We thought why not make these lighter boxes the very medium and deliver a surprising message here. It may not cost the world but the world will love this idea.So we turned existing lighter boxes into 'chanting lighters'. Every time a smoker tried to light a cigarette from it, it played 'Raam Naam Satya Hai' - a chant which is sung when someone's corpse is carried to the funeral pyre in India. It didn’t just prompt the smokers to not smoke, it made both, the streets and the virtual world abuzz with impact as is evident from the results of the campaign:300,000 YouTube views and millions of rupees of free media coverage at hardly any cost.

Creative Execution:We turned existing lighter boxes fitted in Indian cigarette shops into 'Chanting Lighters'. Every time a smoker tried to light a cigarette from it, it played 'Raam Naam Satya Hai' - a chant which is sung when someone's corpse is carried to the funeral pyre in India. What aided the impact was the fact that these lighter boxes are a vantage point around which most smokers chat and catch up - so it turned out to be the ideal place to ambush the smoker. A video of this activation was uploaded on YouTube, and with over 300,000 views, it quickly became a rage. This made both international and local media evince interest in our unique idea, optimizing the reach of our campaign across the world and across India.

The video uploaded on YouTube by CPAA instantly became all the rage. Shared on Facebook, Google+, Twitter etc, the video has over 300,000 views. The world’s leading websites such as dailymail.co.uk, CBSnews.com & abcactionnews.com published this video. Plus, India’s leading business TV channel NDTV Profit hailed it as truly impactful. Others, like leading Indian daily Hindustan Times and local newspapers, covered it too, creating millions of rupees' worth of free press coverage in India and across the world. But the most heart-warming result is that CPAA now plans to take this unique chanting lighter to hundreds of other centres in India.