Brand-alore: A new hub rises

Time of India

14-05-2025

Ad-man Ajay Gahlaut often posts on social media reminiscing his fondest memories as a young copywriter in Bengaluru in the '90s.
Here's something he wrote four years ago, recollecting the work he had done for
Pecos
, a popular pub: 'Bangalore is my favourite city in the world, but it isn't, and never was, the centre of the
Indian advertising
industry. As a young creative burning with desire to make a name for myself, I found hardly any avenue to do so. The Bombay and Delhi creative people had all the fancy accounts. They made the big budget films, worked on multi-crore
MNC brands
and wrote those fabulous radio spots. We Bangalore lads just did the occasional press ad and drank lots of beer.'
Though his work for Pecos was outstanding, the young Gahlaut had to move cities to find a stage worthy of his talent.
Fast forward to 2025. Would a similarly talented young copywriter have to shift base in search of fame and fortune? If anything, staying back has become more than a theoretical option today.
Much has morphed in the
Bengaluru ad
scene. Until the '90s, India's
advertising
lived out of South Bombay. Then Delhi (and Gurugram) muscled in. Now, with the explosion of startups, D2C and tech, this third metropolis has joined the high table of ad-mad cities in India.
About time, too. Bengaluru's rise as an advertising hub reflects the rise of the South as a crucial consumer market, with the buzz in Bengaluru seamlessly extending to Kochi, Hyderabad and Chennai. Driven by startups keen on developing a different grammar, the emergence of big brands, and by the nuances in consumer behaviour itself, Bengaluru could well be at the heart of Indian advertising's third wave.
Origin story
Strangely enough, the city took time to get to this juncture. As Rahul Vengalil, co-founder of creative agency TGTHR, points out, in the early 2000s, the southern ad market was largely dominated by traditional sectors. Fashion clients such as Tanishq, Allen Solly and Louis Philippe were prominent advertisers, alongside FMCG giants including ITC and Britannia, and established retail chains such as Lifestyle and Max.
Media buying was concentrated in Mumbai, which held a staggering 70% share compared to Delhi's 20% and 10% for Bengaluru. However, the late noughties marked the advent of the startup era. The emergence of e-commerce giants such as Amazon, Flipkart (which spawned Myntra), and later, the rise of other consumer-facing tech companies, injected a fresh wave of advertising spend.
The startup boom extended to ad agencies. In its early days when Flipkart wanted to make a splash, it turned to Happy Creative Services, an agency that was at a similarly early stage. The result: The 2011 to 2013 Flipkart Kids campaign that established the brand.
Later, the fantasy league sector saw the rise of the Mobile Premier League (MPL), while the cryptocurrency wave brought in players like CoinDCX, all contributing significantly to the advertising pie. The BFSI sector also witnessed growth with the emergence of insurance players such as Digit and Acko.
This influx of new advertisers began to shift the country's advertising dynamics. Today, the landscape looks markedly different than what it used to be. While Mumbai and Delhi remain the top two centres, their dominance has reduced.
A guesstimate suggests Delhi may even have a slight edge over Mumbai (with a 30% share each), Bengaluru now commands a substantial 20% share. The remaining 20% is distributed across the rest of India, including the burgeoning markets in Kerala and Hyderabad.
Search for a voice
There are several forces that led to this moment in the sun for Bengaluru specifically, and for the Southern ad-market — and yes, some of that does involve the question of catering to different languages and non-monolithic cultures.
The early attempts at catering to the South often involved superficial adaptations of 'national' campaigns. According to Bala Manian, founder of Opn advertising and a keen observer of the southern market, national advertising strategies often fell short due to a lack of understanding of the distinct consumer behaviour and preferences in the region.
'Earlier, 'South Indianisation' often meant just getting someone from Matunga to do a Tamil dub. Then they did the next best thing, which was to shoot the same ad in Tamil with actors wearing a veshti. But what people are discovering — maybe because something done specifically for the South did well for them — is that there might be something here,' she notes.
It helped that at least some advertisers became more sensitive to regional contexts, avoiding generic pan-Indian themes that might not resonate in specific southern states.
Consumer behaviour across the South Indian states — Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala — exhibits distinct characteristics. Barring the cosmopolitan hubs of Bengaluru and Hyderabad with their floating populations, each region boasts a unique language, culture and consumer preference.
Prathap Suthan, CCO, Bang In The Middle, says, 'As the region becomes a significant centre for global operations, the local population is exposed to a wider range of influences while still retaining a strong sense of their cultural identity. This reinforces the need for advertising that acknowledges and respects these local nuances.'
This has necessitated a tailored approach to advertising, moving away from one-size-fits-all campaigns. The evolution of South India's advertising landscape is a testament to the region's dynamic growth and the increasing sophistication of its advertisers in understanding and engaging with their diverse consumer base.
Bala points at a gradual evolution in marketing approaches, with some brands that opted for region-specific campaigns featuring local celebrities. These include global brands like Pepsi, Sprite and regional behemoths like Malabar Gold, which has different brand ambassadors for Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
Digital talent
This coincided with a shift in the nature of advertising itself. Bengaluru was well placed for the digital revolution that defined the 2010s.
A different kind of talent — young and digitally savvy — started converging on the city because of the emergence of a newer kind of business model in advertising itself. In 2007, buoyed by the success of IT outsourcing, cost-arbitraging of marketing functions followed. The first big move was Lenovo, moving the entirety of its global advertising functions to
Ogilvy Bengaluru
.
US retailer Target came right after, with the company working on everything from 'brand and packaging design, creative (including digital), media planning and activation, performance and insights, CGI and imaging, digital and marketing analytics, and project and program management' from its Bengaluru office.
Offshoring made digital intrinsic to the Bengaluru ad-story. So, when the dollars moved from print and TV to digital, and with the nature of marketing morphing with the changing consumer journey, it was obvious that the city with more digital talent than most would assume a bigger role.
Bold independent agencies
Take Yeshwant Miranda, CCO, Lyxel&Flamingo, who was among those who moved from Delhi-NCR to Bengaluru to build on the opportunity. As he points out, there was money to be made in the city beyond creative services — with a broader bouquet of digital marketing services — from paid-marketing to marketplace management to e-commerce funnel.
Some of that may be gobbledygook for old-school marketers, but the digitally-native talent's comfort with this complexity may have been critical in moulding the city's unique character in India's ad scene.
Sraman Majumdar, executive creative director, at ad agency Brave New World, certainly believes that digital, with its more acute need to catalyse consumer action in a world where attention is in the deficit, demands a different texture in language. 'Because of the transience of digital communications, you make a very quick point, you get the head to turn, and you move out,' Majumdar says. Having digital natives around also makes a difference.
The city's tech DNA, says Kaustav Das, CEO, Ralph&Das, has empowered a new wave of bold, independent agencies. He says this extends not just to their thinking, but also to their tools. 'Their familiarity and comfort with remote collaboration tools like Zoom, even before the pandemic necessitated it, have allowed them to operate efficiently and effectively across geographical boundaries. The rapid adoption of AI-powered tools for content creation and adaptation is also accelerating the pace of localised advertising in the region,' he adds.
What does all of this add up to? Well, for one, agencies in Bengaluru have an option now to do great, globally recognised work. Case in point: Dentsu Creative Bengaluru being named Cannes Lions Agency of the Year in 2022 — the first Indian agency to receive the honour. The core team later started the agency Talented.
Food for thought for the young Gahlauts mulling a move from Bengaluru.