Rhea Chakraborty’s tee makes social media hyper

MUMBAI: A T-shirt, a slogan, combustible and creative partisans on social media — and maybe a smart business opportunity or a dumb business strategy.While broadcast media parsed every moment of actor Rhea Chakraborty’s arrest by the Narcotics Control Bureau on Tuesday, social media fixated on the slogan on her T-shirt: “Roses are red, violets are blue, let’s smash patriarchy, me and you”.Within minutes, the quote went viral on the internet — and attracted commentary from both those sympathetic to her as well as those supporting the arrest. Some changed their Twitter, Facebook and Instagram profiles to the slogan. And hashtags #smashpatriarchy #rosesarered were trending on Tuesday across platforms.Actors such as Sonam Kapoor Ahuja, Vidya Balan and Kareena Kapoor Khan shared the slogan on their Instagram accounts, as did directors Hansal Mehta and Anurag Kashyap.The ‘other side’ was active as well. One social media user, @SattanShivani, went — ‘Roses are red, violets are blue, accused had a gender, we had no clue’. Another social media user, @TheRightster, photoshopped a series of celebrity posts supporting #smashpatriarchy to turn them into different slogans.The Souled Store, the firm that makes the T-shirts, said these were launched a year ago along with an NGO to raise money for sanitary napkins for underprivileged kids.A BUSINESS OPPORTUNITYKashyap’s post was changed to: “Roses are red, violets are blue, let us share a pudiya (small packet, sometimes used to describe small quantities of narcotics), me and you.”Chakraborty was arrested by NCB for allegedly procuring and supplying narcotic substances.Among counter posts was one by Twitter user @preettyyhaha: “Roses are red, Violets are blue… Love how a woman with a spine, taking her stand has been able to haunt the collective conscience of these low-lying misogynists.”Amid all this social media hyperventilation, was there a business opportunity? Maybe. Maybe not. “We expect to sell 10,000 T-shirts in stock within 2-3 weeks. It’s a good number as we sell 150,000 T-shirts a month. A design is good if it sells 5,000 prints a month,” said Aditya Sharma, cofounder of The Souled Store, which made the T-shirt that Chakraborty was wearing.78030741FIGURING IN SEARCHESThe company figured in a few thousand searches on Tuesday and is hoping it isn’t a one-time phenomenon. “The T-shirts were launched a year ago along with an NGO called GiveHer5 to raise money for sanitary napkins for underprivileged kids. We have got in touch with the NGO again to spread awareness and the reason why the design was launched in the first place,” said Sharma.But does the buzz last, and is it a good thing at all for a brand? Brand experts said the opportunity size any trending topic provides is huge, but the window to tap the opportunity is tiny.Plus, there are some experts who see a controversy as a risky brand strategy. “Brand strategy is associated with message and medium. If you get one of the two wrong, the effect on brand appeal can be high or low. Good brands do not court controversy, but consumers, and brands have to move in line with consumers,” said Jagdeep Kapoor, chief managing director, Samsika Marketing Consultants.SENSITIVE CASE“Keeping in mind the sensitivity of this issue, we would not like to capitalise on this particular opportunity. We have voiced our opinion against patriarchy in the past and will continue to do so. But maybe this is not the right time to associate ourselves with a case so sensitive,” said Prabhkiran Singh, founder of Bewakoof.com, an online pop culture fashion brand.On Wednesday, of course, social media had moved on — to Kangana Ranaut and Shiv Sena.78009273

from Economic Times https://bit.ly/3bG0FkK
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