Ad History - 2

Ad History is a new feature I started in this blog last month and this is the second installment. I would like to share some old ads which I have been able to lay my hands on and as I mentioned in my earlier post (Ad History -1) the ads featured here are not necessarily memorable but are pretty interesting.

This Cinthol Soap ad was scanned from a magazine called Star and Style published by Indian Express, if I remember right; it appeared in many other publications in the 1970s.

The above ad features young film director and actor Shakher Kapur, if you wish to know more about him please click here.

Year:1963

Year: 1981

Television was introduced in Bombay on October 2, 1972; TV at that time was black & white. If I remember right Weston TV was launched sometime in the late 1970s. Television ads those days usually talked about the basic features like good sound and picture quality. None of the television brands of that time exist today.

I do not recall the year of the above Wills press ad, the fact that it features young Mohd. Azaruddin and Anil Kumble may indicate that this ad appeared sometime in the early 1990s.

The above Zenith Computers ad appeared in the year 1995. It is rather difficult to believe that personal computers those days came with RAM of 1 MB and 4 MB.

I will try to share more vintage ads next month.

Ad History - 1

I won't be reviewing any ads here but would like to share with my readers some of the old ads I dug up. I have randomly selected some ads, these are not necessarily memorable or path breaking ads but to me they definitely are part of Indian advertising history.

Premium Soap: Perspectives 1993

Perspectives was a supplement of Metropolis on Saturday, Bombay edition - published by The Times of India, it does not exist now.

Colgate Baby Powder: Filmfare June 14,1963

Half a century ago Colgate-Palmolive tried to get into the baby care business but was unsuccessful, perhaps Johnsons & Johnsons was too strong a competitor for them.

Halo Shampoo: Filmfare June 14, 1963

Halo Shampoo was a product of Colgate-Palmolive and was among the top selling even in the 1980s, the sales declined when several new multi-national brands entered the Indian hair care market. I wonder if the company lost interest in the brand.

Coca-Cola: The Bharat Jyoti, Sunday, March 25, 1973

The Bharat Jyoti used to be the Sunday edition of The Free Press Journal, Bombay. 

Perspectives: November 1993

Robin Blue: Bombay Times June 23, 1995

I have loads of old ads in my collection, some dating back to the 1950s, I will try and share as many of them as possible in my future posts.