Auto Expo 2012: Mercedes Benz's Debashis Mitra talks about the brand's new strategy in India

Luxury car manufacturer Mercedes-Benz used the Auto Expo 2012 to launch their new brand initiative, 'mb. inspired'. The initiative looks at targeting the youth of the nation with the launch of new cars for their new target audience. The tagline, 'mb feel it' explains the new thought and calls the youth to come experience the new launches.

For the initiative Mercedes Benz has brought in Farhan Akhtar, Chetan Bhagat, Irfan Pathan and Masaba Gupta as 'reflections of the brand'.

Commenting on the new initiative and their choice of their 'reflections', Debashis Mitra, director, sales and marketing, member of the board of management, Mercedes Benz India said, "Through the initiative we wanted to communicate that we're going to grow by many folds in the near future by targetting the youth. Part of the growth will be through the launch of our new small cars and the rest of the growth will happen through the market growth. Our initiative 'mb inspired' talks about the new design language of Mercedes. We wanted to get in faces of the youth to just talk to the youth and that's why we brought in the four 'reflections'. The four of them demonstrate the philosophy of 'best or nothing' in their own fields and spread inspiration in their peer groups. The four of them are not brand ambassadors, they are just a face for Mercedes for the youth. We needed to target the youngsters as the average age of the consumers in India is lesser than Japan and China."

In India, Mercedes Benz's advertising agency is RK Swamy BBDO, while MEC handles the media duties for Mercedes.

The German based car manufacturer has also tied up with the Buddh International Circuit to launch a performance driving academy in India. Called the JPSI-AMG Performance Driving Academy, the academy gives a chance to racing enthusiasts to have a lap around the Formula 1 circuit in a Mercedes AMG vehicle.

Commenting on the association, Mitra said, "We have 125 years of history of racing and are on of the most important racing brands globally. In India people are not aware about the performance image we share globally and so we launched this academy. We have been very serious about racing and once the Buddh International Circuit came in we got the infrastructure to launch our performance drive."

Currently, the basic training course is available In India. In this course, racing enthusiasts can drive an AMG Mercedes around the track with the help of professional instructors from Germany. The instructors will train the enthusiasts to take the safest and quickest lap of the circuit. The training course is offered to enthusiasts for Rupees 75,000 per participant.