Youth: A Number or An Attitude?
By Saugato Bhowmick, Senior VP, Consumer Products, Viacom18 Media Pvt. Ltd Youth has no age - I happened to come across this brilliant quote by famous artist Pablo Picasso one day. Sometimes, the simplest words can have the strongest impact on you, compelling you to introspect about your way of life and the people around you. This one got me thinking – not just the brand enthusiast in me, who is constantly targeting the young audience, but also the 35-year-old holding on to his youthful aspirations every day. ‘Youth’ is probably the most used and abused one in marketing and brand conversations today. But what really is the definition of ‘youth’? I remember, during a casual conversation with young colleagues at Viacom18, I had announced my plans to buy a sports bike, when someone quipped “Midlife crisis already?” A harmless joke, but it struck a nerve. Yes, I am no longer in the ‘young’ age bracket – but is ‘youth’ just an age range? On one hand, I have friends on the wrong side of 30 who go on 2,600 km Harley rides in the US, leave well-established jobs for an experiential trip to Brazil, or to take up a new profession, or bungee-jumping. In any case, most live it up on the weekends, even with kids and mundane responsibilities. On the other hand, here I see many 25-year-olds in the corporate world who already seem to be in retirement mode – with achieving targets at work being their only agenda in life. So then what is youth – is it the number attached to our age or is it the attitude with which we live? I would go with the latter. Like many others, I belong to the first lot of MTV fans when the iconic youth brand launched in India. Even today, we have the same kind of passion and madness towards life that we had back then. Everyone talks of being young, but I do not think our madness and attitude diminish as age advances. For many, I feel the passion to experience and explore gets stronger. I don’t believe that a number can kill those youthful aspirations and values. Being young is about a person’s mental, emotional and psychological state – a 60-year-old could be running a marathon, while a 20-year-old could be lazing around in front of the television for months. It’s our spunk and drive for life which keeps us young. We are out of the ‘youth’ bracket once we lose that desire to live life to the fullest. We also need to keep re-inventing ourselves. There is so much in life that I want to explore. On the professional front, I want to bring even more whacky ideas to the table, launch many more exciting products, turn this business into an iconic House of Brands and take Viacom18 brands to unprecedented heights. My belief is further ratified by the realization that so many of our ‘kids and tweens brands’ like Peanuts, SpongeBob and Turtles are being bought more by adults than teenagers. When I took up this job, the ability to shape the brand outside Television and reinventing everything about the business was the high I got sold on, and I hope to keep that momentum alive. On the personal front, I want to get to my fittest level, travel across the world to lesser known destinations, get my long-awaited skydiving certification, drive across the country on my sports bike, learn the guitar, go on more ‘boy-trips’, watch an NBA season finale match at the Chicago Bulls stadium and more! And I intend to do all this with my five-month-old daughter. Be it work or life, it is new experiences that add to our youth quotient. We may not be part of the ‘quintessential MTV generation’ anymore, but we still need to have the MTV attitude within us. Feedback: Saugato.Bhowmick@viacom18.com
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