PhonePe brings Truck art to the fore with new marketing campaign

PhonePe, India’s leading digital payments platform has piloted a truck art campaign with a fleet of trucks on highways in Maharashtra, covering Pune, Nashik & Mumbai. With this campaign, PhonePe is promoting its two and four-wheeler insurance products, through catchy phrases on art canvases put up on truck tailgates. With this campaign, the company aims to engage with the target audience on highways in the A&B categories as per New Consumer Classification System (NCCS), who are in the age group of 22-40 years.

Truck art, often known as Phool Patti in Hindi and Urdu, has traditionally been a popular art form in India and other parts of South Asia. The trucks are lovingly decorated by their drivers, who spend their days and nights driving them through the length and breadth of the country. Decked in vibrant colors and bells, inscribed with romantic and often quirky couplets and even images of celebrities and famous personalities, each truck tells a unique tale. Trucks in India often have a beautiful display of interesting slogans, decorative articles and countless convoluted symbols. They are also a melting pot of the influences of different cultures, usually with a melange of color schemes, fonts, and symbols on display.

Interestingly, PhonePe discovered something unique that triggered the idea of promoting insurance products behind trucks. “We were surprised to stumble upon an interesting insight. In the decades gone by, trucks often used to have images of demons to ward off evil. We spoke to a few veteran truck drivers & truck art experts who said that drivers used to believe that these images of demons protect them from untoward incidents on the road. When insurance for trucks wasn’t well understood or adopted, this provided mental assurance and 'insurance' of sorts to drivers!", says Ramesh Srinivasan, Director Brand Marketing, PhonePe.

As a result, PhonePe decided to experiment with truck art as a medium to build awareness and preference for its motor insurance products.

"We believe that trucks are a great medium to educate consumers about the importance of two & four-wheeler insurance as the use for insurance is felt the most when one is driving on the road. We believe that this campaign will be very contextual and seamlessly extend itself on the back of these trucks which can be easily noticed by drivers of two & four-wheelers. This also helps in the message manifesting at the point of truth - highways and the roads,” adds Ramesh.

Traditional truck art is on the decline with the arrival of transportation companies and their large fleets of modern trucks with containers. Stickers, plastic and steel ornaments are replacing the tedious work of painting by hand and the next generation of truck owners are uninterested in learning the art of painting trucks.

In India, most of the insurance companies choose traditional mediums such as print, TV and outdoor for advertising. PhonePe is using quirky idioms that people love to read while driving on the highways in order to break the clutter and create an impactful campaign by choosing a rare and significant real estate to communicate the insurance message in a fun and quirky way. This also brings to life a forgotten art form and hopes to encourage other brands to consider this medium in their communication in the future.