The term ‘Papa Jaani’ has been associated with Molty Foam for the longest time, with their communication focused on the relationship between a father and his daughter, who is presented with a Molty Foam mattress at the time of her wedding. The daughter (often referred to as a nanhi pari) then thanks her Papa Jaani before waltzing into marital bliss. Molty Foam’s main competitor, Diamond Group (DG) decided to use the term Papa Jaani in their recent campaign for their premium brand Diamond Supreme Foam (DSF), featuring Mehwish Hayat and Ali Zafar. The campaign, which achieved a significant amount of talkability, did not go down well with Molty Foam and DG received a legal notice asking them to cease using the phrase Papa Jaani.

Speaking about this, Agha Alijan, Director Marketing, DG, says that “the Diamond Group fully condemn the malicious prosecution by Master Enterprises and we are strongly contesting the Stay Order of September 19, 2019 according to which, we cannot use Papa Jaani or focus on a father-daughter relationship for commercial purposes.” The matter is now with the courts and the TVCs have been taken off air, although they can be viewed online.

Speaking about the campaign, Alijan says the objective was top of mind awareness for DSF. The timing (October) was important because this is when the wedding season begins. Another objective was to highlight the fact that DSF mattresses have a 12-year warranty and can be ordered online.

“We saw a window for humor and plugged it in; we arrived at the concept organically,” adds Yar Mohammed Bashir, Group Account Director, Orientm McCann (DSF’s agency). “We used the concept to target independent girls, whose goal in life is not marriage and when it does happen, they don’t take a mattress with them.”

“Within the fun husband vs. wife banter, we embedded the functional benefits of the product. It was emotive in the sense that it showed a slice of a couple’s life and the way they make decisions regarding what to buy for their first home,” says Zehra Khawaja, Creative Group Head, Orientm McCann.

According to Alijan, “in time, some jingles such as Molty Foam’s “Nanhi pari naye ghar ko challi or DSF’s Kaam kaam kaam, araam ka hai naam Diamond Supreme Foam” managed to gain so much equity that they became synonymous with the brands. Moving away from this jingle was a bold step and we did so in order to connect with new consumers in a humorous vein that would resonate with them.”

The campaign was executed across all media; the TVCs centred on Hayat and Zafar’s dynamic, the billboards and print ads mostly featured an exchange of ‘notes’ between Hayat and her father. The digital assets were a combination of the ATL components.

The two celebrities, Khawaja says, “were chosen to give an aspirational element to the campaign. Both Hayat and Zafar are icons among young people and share good on-screen chemistry. Each TVC was created like an episode of a TV serial. In the future, we may take the concept further and include the couple’s children.”

Another aspect to the campaign was that all the furniture seen in the TVC is available at Dolce Vita Homes (a sister company of DG). In order to publicise this, a separate digital and print campaign was executed by Dolce Vita to encourage customers to visit the store.

According to Alijan, “the response has been mainly positive. When you do something bold, you should be ready for bold responses. The concept was such that digital media virality was 90% organic.”

Alijan says that the mattress segment has seen an annual growth of 15 to 20% in the last three years and holds tremendous potential. (Molty Foam, the market leader, has a 30 to 35% market share and DSF has 25%). To exploit this potential further, DSF are widening the scope of their marketing efforts and recently introduced a health section on their website, which provides content on sleep hygiene and a new range of sleep related products such as pillows.

“We have a sleep lab in our Dolce Vita Homes showrooms so our customers can experience the comfort of our mattresses,” says Alijan.

In addition to their premium brand, DG have a second-tier brand called Englander, which was introduced 18 months ago and which, according to Alijan, has already captured eight to nine percent of the market. He adds that Englander’s main competitor is Master Enterprises’ second-tier brand DuraFoam and that both brands cater to SECs C and D in urban and semi-urban areas. Englander also faces competition from smaller regional brands and unbranded mattresses sold in semi-urban pockets across Pakistan and which are significantly cheaper than branded ones.

Given that mattresses in Pakistan have a market penetration rate of approximately one percent, Alijan believes this is a timely moment to invest in growth strategies. In his opinion, branded mattresses are witnessing a “healthy growth” in semi-urban areas and therefore DG’s challenge is to “tap into semi-urban and rural markets, where mattress penetration is low and the potential is huge.”