Vijayanand – Classic case of failed marketing?

On December 9, the first biopic from Karnataka, Vijayanand released in theatres. The film, about the founder of one of India’s largest privately-owned logistics firm Vijayanand Roadlines Ltd, Vijay Sankeshwar, has hit theatres in Kannada, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Hindi. Produced by Anand Sankeshwar, the son of Padma Shri Vijay, as a first venture for their newly-launched VRL Film Productions, was widely promoted, across the country. The film was promoted as an inspiring tale of a legend, given that Vijay Sankeshwar started with one truck and grew it into a massive establishment with close to 5,000 cargo and passenger vehicles. Yet, when the film came out, it was widely panned for being a one-sided account that was hardly inspiring.

On Saturday evening, Vijayanand was a major topic of discussion on a Twitter space run by a Kannada film handle, where its failure to attract audiences was attributed to the team’s inability to reach out to its core audience. Speaking during the discussion, someone from a Kannada film marketing firm said that going by the reports of Vijayanand’s marketing budget, they could have easily made another film. The Vijayanand team was flown across the country on a private chartered flight, and multiple Twitter emojis were purchased for the film and its leading man as well. According to them, the issue with Vijayanand was that while the team focused on talking about the film in different parts of the country, they did not ensure that their core audience in Karnataka was aware about the film. “Audiences here were not only unaware about the movie, but also the man, Vijay Sankeshwar, on whose life Vijayanand is based,” he reckoned. The moderators of the discussion concurred with him and added that the Rishika Sharma directorial is a classic example of failed marketing.