Exclusive | Food, Coffee & Conversation with JWT's Mythili Chandrasekar

Times are changing and we now live in an age where consumer behaviour differs vastly from person to person. Various factors influence their habits and thoughts. JWT’s first initiative ‘Food’ reveals three fundamental drivers which impact the choices people make with regard to food. They have initiated a unique journey to research on connections between consumers and brands. JWT rebranded themselves a few years ago and have come out with a new logo which represents the colours of Juniper, Wheat and Tobasco (a herb, cereal and spice).

 

Adgully caught up with Mythili Chandrasekar, Sr.VP and Executive Planning Officer, JWT  to find out more about  their latest initiative Juniper, Wheat and Tabasco which helps them to find connections for brand positioning and understand opportunities for different food portfolios. In order to do this they looked at cases, analysed ads, read up on Indian food psychology, and spoke to consumers to find patterns.

 

Mythili Chandrasekar explained the reasons for initiating this research viz. Juniper, Wheat and Tabasco. She said, “JWT Planning is always at work, curating its learnings’ and adding new insights to funnel it back into the system. Foods is the first of the verticals we are deep diving into as we have many leading food brands in our portfolio.” They found the need to evolve new perspectives to their brands. It was important for them to know why their brands were given preferences over other brands. Hence she said that this initiative has been taken mainly   for the benefit for JWT planners and creative and for clients.

 

There is an extraordinary ability to see connections between consumer and brands at JWT. The human emotions, rationalizing of food choices and a path to behavioural change these are some of the links which connect the two.

 

The initiative by JWT took off by doing research using Brand Chakras and they came up with three fundamental drivers Mythili Chandrasekar said that they were “ The drive for power, the need for love and care, and the search for pleasure are the main factors which drive the choice of consumption for an individual.

They delved deeper into ten benefit spaces termed “packticons” which drive all food choices. and by decoding these spaces they researched on new trends and new opportunities for brands.

 

The main drivers of eating habits can be broadly categorized into:  drive for power, need for love and care and search for pleasure. Drive for power can be further divided into three smaller factors such as body power, mind power and social power.

 

An emotional angle can also be seen with regard to food consumption. This is especially seen when an emotion is involved in its preparation. Mothers today not only nourish the family’s body but also the spirit. In this way they see that there is complete growth for her growing child.  “Food is fundamental to our lives, as the title of the movie “Eat, Pray, Love” says. We eat, we pray, we love. Behind every food preparation, sharing or serving occasion lies a human emotion.” said Mythili .  She also said mothers are now becoming very creative to make food more nourishing, like making “junk food” at home, or making different dishes out of oats.

 

Foods which deal with mind power are diets which are in the form of ayurvedic and satvik diets and help to make the mind stronger. With regard to this  Mythili said , “To be health conscious itself is to be more sophisticated. If you start exercising or going to the gym for example, there are certain foods that go with it.” People nowadays are careful of what they consume and try to balance their meals and form healthy eating habits. They balance heavy and light meals to keep themselves fit.

 

Social power leads to indulging in food as per one’s economic status. Social power leads to consuming a wider and expensive range of foods and this is becoming a trend with the new generation since cuisines from all over the world are easily available and affordable by them.

 

Another fundamental driver of food is sub-divided into the category of ‘search for pleasure’. Such foods now have a new connotation they are termed ‘comfort foods’ for different mood swings.

 

The Planning team of the agency has also launched another new initiative called ‘Coffee & Conversations’. Mythili elaborated on this and said ‘Coffee & Conversations’ is a new property created by the corporate communications department of JWT and is aimed at creating engaging and interactive sessions with the media to showcase the insights that we at JWT have across various disciplines.” This initiative aims to bring forth changing trends and new opportunities  that lie ahead of brands, capitalizing on its experience and knowledge in various categories and mining  information which is being shared across platforms.  It also involves analysis of different categories of business and presenting on blogs and social media and this in turn helps in creating differentiated communications for brands. According to Mythili “This a proposition and idea generating tool, and it will be used as stimulus for thinking.”

 

JWT’s initiative on Foods as a category can be considered as  a ‘creative interpretation of a strategic framework’. Whatever Planning does it has to finally input brand propositions and creative ideation. Hence this is a proposition and idea generating tool for food brands that Planning and Creative have co-created at JWT.

 

Commenting on further scope she sees in terms of research that can be carried out, with regard to people’s food habits, Mythili said, “We will be exploring various facets of tipping points to adoption of branded food practices.”