Basics Life says 'Shop Like a Man', online

Chennai-headquartered Hasbro Clothing Company, which has a retail presence through 90 exclusive stores and 400 multi-brand outlets, has taken the e-tailing route with online portal basicslife.com.

Basics Life is a menswear range comprising three brands - Basics 029, Genesis and Probase. Besides being available at the eponymous outlets in South India (and a few in the rest of India and abroad), and MBOs, it has also been available on fashion e-commerce portals like Myntra and Jabong.

The website basicslife.com has been functional for a little over a year, and was primarily promoted at the stores and on the Facebook page. With the nitty-gritties weeded out and supply chain (said to be) put in place to deliver across the country, the founders of Hasbro, Hanif and Suhail Sattar, felt they were ready to go national with the promotion campaign.

To that end, Happy Creative Services has come up with a campaign to spread the word, based on the thought ‘Shop Like A Man’. 

“The central idea was to promote shopping for men like never before. We latched onto the idea ‘Shop like a man’ working out of the insight that online shopping could only have been invented by a man,” said Kartik Iyer, chief executive officer and executive creative director of the agency.

Taking the shape of an 'anthem' called the ‘The Man’tra’, one of the verses in the ad is about how the protagonist hates standing in queues and hence shops at home to save time. While the full length video can be seen on YouTube, shorter  25-second edits will be seen on niche and news channels. The budget for the campaign overall across mediums is about Rs 5 crores, according to Iyer. 

“Our dream of being the one-of-a-kind lifestyle retail fashion destination for men is finally showing signs of coming of age. The range in the store and the store itself was testimony to that fact, now the communication and the reach with this new creative will put us on the map in the country,”said Hanif Sattar.

In addition to television, the campaign will also comprise radio spots, activation, digital/social and viral engagement programmes. On the digital agenda, Iyer said, "On social media, engagement programmes like contests and content creation activities have been planned. QR codes have been used at the store that shall direct people to the website and with the gratification of downloads like the full version of the song itself."

Credits

Brand: Basics Life
Client: Hanif Sattar, Suhail Sattar
Agency: Happy, Bangalore
Chief executive officer and executive creative director: Kartik Iyer
Chief creative officer: Praveen Das
Lyricist: Kartik Iyer / Mikey Mccleary
Strategic planning: Ravi Bhat
Copywriter: Athul C
Art director: Viduthlai Raj M
Account management:  Neelima K, Ajaykumar
Production house: Hello Robot
Producer: Kitisha Gaglani
Director: Barney Howells
Director of Photography: Edward Goldner
Music director: Mikey McCleary
Art director: Sid
Media agency: MEC