Halloween: Indian brands try every trick (and treat) from the marketing playbook

Over the past few years, Halloween, the popular American festival that celebrates the spooky side of things, has captured the imagination of Indian consumers. Costume parties and trick-or-treating practices have become commonplace and the trends are on the rise with every passing year. The fascination for the spooky is somewhat universal, which explains why the festival has so many takers in India.

Given the growing appeal of Halloween, brands big and small have been cashing in on the popularity of the fest in India, goading consumers to shop for the festival through marketing campaigns, services and offers.

Industry watchers say that the festival is too good an opportunity for brands to let go. Here's why Indian companies have been using every trick in the marketing playbook to make the most of this fest.

Ghoulishly good marketing opportunity

Halloween is a treat for the confectionery brands since one of the rituals of the festival is to hand out candies to children who come for trick-or-treating.

Cadbury, one of Mondelez India’s brands, has started a month-long, multichannel spookfest that allows fans to engage in scary shenanigans across digital, social, and on-ground platforms. Consumers have to scan the QR code on the special edition Cadbury Choclairs pack to enter the microsite and unlock the Ghost Cam.

The native brand Faasos of Rebel Foods, an online restaurant chain, has launched an exciting Trick or Treat Happy Halloween promotion. With every Faasos roll pack, customers may expect a chilling surprise due to varying product and pack activation.

This year, PVR INOX has also curated a line of movies for cinema enthusiasts to celebrate this eerie occasion like never before by announcing the Halloween Film Festival. From 27th October to 2nd November, PVR INOX will host a Halloween Film Festival across select multiplexes.

Many e-commerce platforms have also played around with their user interface to make the consumers experience the spooky vibes of Halloween.

Since parties are such a big part of the festival, alco-bev brands can't afford to sleep on it. Bacardi India, for instance, is hosting Halloween parties across various cities and will be activating a marketing initiative at over 250+ outlets across 14 cities in the country.

Even OTT platforms such as Netflix, and Disney+Hotstar among others have curated a Halloween-special content lineup for the Indian audience during this time of the year.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Housing.com (@housingindia)

Housing.com's Halloween campaign takes a unique approach to highlight the challenges of finding the perfect home, even for supernatural beings like ghosts. In their short ad film, Housing.com introduces us to the endearing characters, Vibhooti and Pretna, two ghosts in search of a new and ideal residence that suits their spectral needs.

Under the West's spell

Speaking from a brand perspective, why Halloween is catching up with the Indian audiences, Nitin Saini, Vice President - Marketing, Mondelez International, said, "With the increasing influence of global pop culture, Indians have become more familiar with events like Halloween and its traditions, and this has led to a growing interest in celebrating the holiday. Moreover, various businesses in India have also realized the commercial potential of this occasion and see great opportunity to drive themed offerings and indulgent engagements as consumers are constantly on the lookout for unique and unconventional experiences."

Sameeksha Uniyal, Brand Lead - Brand Bacardi (India & SEA) said that social media has exposed Indians to global festivals and Halloween is one of them. She said, “It was not that big a few years ago but when we did it for the first time, the response was fabulous and the GenZ's were excited about it.

"This builds a connection It has become an important event in how we bring and keep GenZs and even people together. Everyone gets excited about new experiences and since this is still catching up, people are open to it."

Viren Razdan, Managing Director, Brandnomics, opined that the last decade has witnessed a transformative impact on our social, cultural and habits, largely driven by global media and entertainment. He noted that Western festivals - with little to no understanding, have quickly become social occasions. "Halloween is a great example of shallow understanding but quick ramping up on the social trend charts," he said.

Naturally, marketers have been quick to read this underlying change. "They have aggressively adapted to this tune to create these occasions. Valentine’s Day a decade ago had few coy takers but is now a full-blown multi-level marketing campaign with all categories jumping into the bandwagon," he pointed out.

To explain how festivals like Halloween are making their way into the Indian way of life, Lloyd Mathias, brand expert, named the major factors: increased globalisation, international travel and social media. "A couple of generations ago, the bulk of Indian consumers lived within the Indian geography. Now, there is so much more mobility, people are moving overseas, they're travelling, and they've got friends and relatives abroad," Mathias noted.

"Thanks to social media, a lot of these festivals are being amplified globally. It started way back with Valentine's Day and now Black Friday, Thanksgiving, Halloween, a lot of these festivals are beginning to be picked up and celebrated globally.”

Sumanto Chattopadhyay, former Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, 82.5 Communications, Ogilvy Group, and independent creative spoke about this opportunity for brands to capitalize on. He said, “For brands, this is simply a ready-made opportunity to sell more merchandise. Remember that Christmas celebrations, as we know them, were popularised by Coke in the US. Similarly, marketers in India will embrace not only our traditional festivals but also the foreign ones to piggyback on, to raise the salience of their brands and to make their cash registers ring," he added.

Bewitching the millennials and the Genzs alike

Most of the Halloween marketing is targeted at millennials and the Genz who have grown up consuming Western content on TV and OTT. They are more familiarised with Western festivals than the cohorts that came before.

GenZs are also becoming power purchasers, making brands latch on to them during these festivals, said Uniyal. She added, “As GenZs are early jobbers as well and are going to stay longer with the brand, brands are starting to get them.”

Sharing his view on why India is so keen on celebrating such festivals, especially the GenZ, Chattopadhyay said, “Thanks to the international programming that GenZ watches, they have become familiar with Western festivals like Halloween. English-medium schools have also started celebrating these holidays.”

“Gen Z’s are the primary audience but not to forget millennials as well, because millennials are also bigger spenders," reminded Mathias. "Gen Z’s are younger, and therefore they have a limited spending potential. Riding on these festivals allows for a wide range. I would say Gen Z's yes, but certainly a lot of millennials are also being targeted.”

Spook-tacular even in small towns
One may think Halloween has takers only in Indian cities, but small towns have also been taking a fancy to the spooky fest. Industry experts said that internet penetration has helped in fanning the flames of Halloween.

Capitalizing on the young audiences residing even in the interior parts of the country, Saini said, "Considering that such moments are more inclined to appeal to Gen Z and Millenial audiences in top-metros who are widely exposed to such trends, the medium for engagement is primarily digital/social media platforms along with some on-ground extension. In fact, the campaign has witnessed over 7 lakh site visits till now. That being said, we are now seeing an uptick for such events in Tier 2 cities as well and will continue to keep an overall check on how the sentiment evolves in India."

Talking about the mediums through which brands reach their target audience and how it is penetrating smaller markets, Samit Sinha, Founder and Managing Partner at Alchemist Brand Consulting, says, “The principal medium to reach GenZ is the smartphone and on platforms like Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat as well as on OTT channels. Smartphones are fairly ubiquitous in India and have high penetration even in the lower-tier towns and even some of the relatively prosperous villages.”

Uniyal said that in the age of social media, the geo-dynamics are diluting. People are not constrained to geographies anymore. She said, “Social media also plays a critical role, and as social media companies have become stronger, it has become easier to tap into different generations. We are going beyond markets, in the last three years the geo dynamics have changed and they will further dilute over time.”