Kathmandu, May 6:

Even as the summer season is witnessing record dipping temperatures, battle royal between beverage majors is hotting up. While Coca-Cola, Nepal (represented by Bottlers Nepal Ltd) the market leader in the soft drinks market, kickstarted the season with a refreshing ‘Coke Side of Life’ campaign, Pepsi known for steadily increasing its market share, is belatedly launching a mega campaign as a fitting creative reply to Coke.

Interestingly, this is the first time that Varun Beverages Nepal, the authorised bottler for Pepsi is coming up with an advertising campaign on such a massive scale. Till now the soft drinks company had preferred to keep its advertising on a low key note, focussing on below the line segment like its distribution network and supply chain.

It is from this year onwards, that the company has decided it’s time to invest in the Pepsi brand, confides Joydeb Chakraborty, head Thomson, Nepal, which handles the Pepsi account. Refusing to reveal the cost of the campaign, he concedes the Pepsi’s advertising budget had trebled this year, which speaks volumes about the company’s changing focus.

To begin with, Pepsi in Nepal has obtained exclusive rights for six international football players — Ronaldinho (Barcelona Football Club), Thierry Henry (Barcelona FC), Leo Messi (Barcelona FC), Cesc Fabregas (Arsenal FC), Frank Lampard (Chelsea FC) and David Beckham (Los Angelas FC).

The campaign called ‘Pepsi — Meet The Dream Team’ is designed as a unique concept to engage the consumers. Interestingly, it does not require people to purchase the product to participate. They merely have to watch Pepsi ad on TV and answer a question at the end to win weekly cash prizes for five weeks and even get to feature in the Pepsi TVC at the end. Moreover, the winner of a bumper lucky draw at the end of six weeks goes on a dream trip to Barcelona to spend three days with international footballers.