‘We have turned down three offers ’

Santosh Padhi, creative officer of Taproot India, the independent agency he co-founded with Agnello Dias, is an internationally-acclaimed art director. Yet, he is perhaps also the most soft-spoken guy in our advertising fraternity. After quitting Leo Burnett, where he was the national head of art, he's got the wheels chugging at Taproot India's humble office at Byculla, Mumbai since January.
Padhi, in this interview to DNA, fielded questions regarding the agency's existence so far — its work-culture, the latest Nirma ad by the agency and the approaches from international agencies for a merger. Excerpts:

Since Taproot launched some months back, how many international agencies have approached you for any kind of partnership or collaboration?
(Thinks) Three.

Are they all creative hot-shops wanting to make an entry into India?
Two of them are. The third is part of a larger network, which is already present in India. We've spoken to them, but decided against it, for the moment. We want to see how things work out independently. This is what we've wanted to. It is too early to rope in a partner.

How big is Tap Root?
We're about 11 people in one office at Mumbai.

From the head of art at Leo Burnett, you're now the owner of an agency. How actively are you involved in the on-ground work?
We started the agency because we wanted to actively do real work on clients. Initially, we spent a lot of time meeting clients, people in the industry. But I continue working on ads, like I did before. It's a small team, so I'm very much in touch with what's happening on the copy and art scene.

How different is it working with Aggie (Agnello Dias) now, compared to what it was at Leo Burnett?
Aggie and I have worked together for 4-5 years as a team at Leo Burnett. We know our strengths and weaknesses. Tap Root's formation is like the coming together of the best bowler and best batsman in the Indian cricket team. We now need to get hold of a couple of Rainas and Rohit Sharmas to support us. We're mature enough to understand our new responsibilities now.

After working with a large agency like Leo Burnett, you must have felt a sudden rush of freedom now that you're working in a small setup...
Initially, I was very-very excited and we began meeting clients to tell them about us. But we knew that once you start an agency, you also need to take care of all the different departments. So that was a bit stressful in the initial stages. But now the leadership feeling has sunk in.

How quicker is your decision-making compared to a larger agency?
Taproot is about one-tenth of the size of a smaller agency. A large agency takes about a week or more to come to an agreement about an ad or a campaign. Different people have different points-of-view there — right from the head of the branch office, CEO, COO, national creative directors to account managers. In a pitch itself, there are hundreds of slides to go through, and you end up with only one-and-half days to finish the creative.
But I believe, the quicker the call is taken on a brand, the better the creative product is. Now-a-days clients want to see creative as soon as they can. They don't want all the global gyan and the sea of Power Point slides we show. So, since we're a small setup, we can take decisions very quickly. That applies even to hiring people. Recently, a client suggested that we start an office in Delhi. We took just two days to respond that we can't open one there now.

How did you get the project for the Nirma TVC?
Nirma is a special project. The brand has an agency called Purnima Advertising, which did most of its media work. Purnima also has a creative department. They contacted us, we met the client and that's how things took off.

Some may still romanticise the old Nirma ads. Did you want it to come out of its decade-old image?
The client was very clear — there are some properties which Nirma owns — the jingle, the dancing girl. As a brand, they've never done too much with an ad. They simply wanted to do something which has a nice story, and has a modern look and feel to it. That's what we've done by taking the brand thought and modernising it through a contemporary look and feel. Nirma has been taking steps towards coming out of the closet in its past few commercials. The last one was shot in foreign locales, but nothing great in terms of idea and execution, though. In this commercial, the change is so drastic that everyone will notice the brand.

What are the few things an advertising guy should keep in mind while working on a heritage brand like Nirma? What are the things you can meddle with and the ones you can't?
It's important what elements of the core brand need to be retained. For example in Nirma, we had to retain the brand jingle, yet add elements which would re-invigorate the brand.

What more is Taproot doing for Nirma? Activations, digital advertising… is your agency equipped to provide these services?
At the moment, we're equipped to work on print, TVCs, outdoor. We've delivered on what we were asked to. For executing something in digital, activations and events, it’s better to collaborate with specialists and work things out. That’s the best way to do it.