Volkswagen spends Rs 6cr on 'talking newspaper': Sources

Excerpts from India Business Hour on CNBC-TV18 Watch the full show » Nifty BSE | NSE 31/05/12 Are Mutual Funds betting on Nifty?

A talking newspaper woke up 25 lakh readers of The Times of India and The Hindu across metros on Tuesday. We're talking about Volkswagen's latest media innovation for its luxury sedan, the Vento. Sources told CNBC-TV18's Animesh Das and Sweta Sriram that the company has spent close to Rs 6 crore on the exercise.

Volkswagen has done it again. The German automaker, which has been making a lot of media noise since October 2009, has managed to get everyone talking with this new campaign. 25 lakh readers across five cities were either fascinated or taken aback this morning, when their newspaper spoke to them, telling them about the Vento.

We hear each device costs around Rs 5. Add that to the base price of a full page ad on the ToI, along with other ancillary costs, and the price per paper comes out at around Rs 40. By these calculations, it appears that Volkswagen has spent around Rs 6 crore on just one day.

But people in the know including Divya Gururaj, MD, MediaCom, which is the media agency for Volkswagen India disagree.

The bottom line is that no one is talking about the exact spend. However, one thing is clear: The company has been stepping on the gas in terms of advertising campaigns-from its first-ever newspaper roadblock in October 2009 to tricks like a hole in the paper in March 2010 to a talking newspaper-each to drive towards firmly blipping on the Indian consumer's radar.