India is a massive tea drinking nation. Majority of tea consumption happens at tea stalls run by the chai-wallahs (tea stall owners) serving the local population. These stalls are social hubs for the masses, where people pause for conversation over a cup of tea. On an average, per year, these chai wallahs consume 91 kgs of tea as compared to 5 kgs of tea consumed by a housewife. We needed to build a strong emotional bond with these chai wallahs. The challenge was that the chai-wallahs have no time to watch TV and are often illiterate and hence we were unable to reach them through the usual media channels. They do however live by their mobile phones.

So we developed an exclusive strategy that could be delivered by the old fashioned cold calling technology. We created the Goodlife Club – a virtual club exclusive for the chai-wallahs that gave them real life benefits and an exclusive entertainment channel.

We launched across 500 stalls in Madurai & Coimbatore using CRM and automated out bound dialer calls to deliver amusing content and membership information. We gave them accident insurance and scholarship for their children. We created a virtual character called Aishwarya to anchor all communication and keep them engaged. To clinch the relationship actor Chiyaan Vikram considered a demi god called the members to wish them a happy Diwali whilst actor Dhanush rang them to give them free talk time. The word spread quickly and soon our costumer care center was receiving queries about the clubs membership and its perks.

The significant difference in the Goodlife club program this year is the personalization of content.

This is an entirely new element that taps into new capabilities in mobile to move the campaign to a whole new level.

The background is that these chai wallahs revere their superstars.

They take movies and movie trends quite seriously. To get a glimpse of these stars is a part of all of their bucket lists.

We made this dream of theirs come to life. We collected data on their birthdays and anniversaries.

And on these special days superstars Vikram and Dhanush called to wish them.

This led to new levels of engagement never seen before.

This additional activation makes it relevant for the categories ‘user experience’ and ‘community building / management’ as the personalization was a vital component that did not exist last year (hence why we did not enter it into these categories last year).

The true success of the campaign

• 75% of Outbound dialer calls received and listened.

• 90% of club members were active over the campaign

• As a measure of engagement the time hungry chai-wallah spent on an average 10 minutes every month hooked to the lines

• Brooke Bond’s sales growth numbers in Madurai and Coimbatore, grew 40 per cent higher than those in similar market sizes.

The utilities such as insurance and scholarships were welcomed, thereby creating much goodwill toward the company, also signaling the beginning of a new emotional connect with its tea brand.