Yakult History by Venus Leung

Contents

Background Research Objectives Research Design / Research Methods / Data Collection and Analysis Research Proess and Findings / Background of Yakult / Timeline History of Yakult / Positioning of Yakult / Analysis of Yakult Advertisements Influence of Yakult Conclusion Critical Reflection Link of Video Reference

Background

The tagline “你今日飲咗未？” (Have you drink it today?) is well known among most of the Hong Kong people. Due to the TV commercials released over the 40 years in Hong Kong, Yakult has built a bold image in local people’s mind. It’s ads are legendary and memorable throughout the decades, in this case study, weunderstand what makes the huge success of Yakult’s campaign.

In this report, we studied about itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s advertising history and examine it critically from social, economic, political, lifestyle aspects. We will present our data collection of Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ads, and analyse the creative idea, positioning, and influence among different generations.

Research Objectives

To understand the historical development of Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s advertisements and its influence on people and society To understand how the change in society influence Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ads. To examine the advertising history of Yakult critically from social, economic, political, lifestyle perspectives.

Research Design

I. Research Methods

Qualitative research is the in-depth approach that is used to understand the underlying reasons, opinions, experience and motivations. In our case study, we used qualitative approach as our primary and secondary research. We intended to explore peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s impression and perception towards Yakult and the effects of Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ads put on local people.

We have did some literature review on the historical references, parallel associations and current market condition. The data collected helps us to gain a comprehensive knowledge of Yakult and its advertising positioning, also the approach used and its marketing results.

For the first hand research, we have conducted a street interview and also an in-depth interview. For the street interview, we randomly asks people from different age groups, focuses on the benefits of Yakult, impression and peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s view towards Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ads from the audience angle. For the in-depth interview, we are honored to invite Alfred Hau, the founder of the largest advertising production house in Hong Kong, who has directed over 200 TV commercials, to share his production for a series of Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s TV commercials in 2011.

II. Data Collection & Analysis

In order to collect more real and official information about the brand Yakult, we have arranged an interview with Alfred Hau, who has directed some famous advertisements for Yakult in the previous years. The following are the questions that we have raised to him based on the ads “朗拿度細路” and“外賣仔” in 2011.

In-depth interview Advertising Production Agency: Off-lo-hi Interviewee: Mr. Alfred Hau (Founder and Creative Director) Date of Interview: 26 Mar 2018 Duration: 1 Hour

Q: Where does your inspirations come from when creating the campaign for Yakult?

A: Yakult has long been a popular product, therefore the ads created cannot be too upmarket. For example, in the Ronaldo Kid (朗拿度細路 ) ad, we use a rooftop shack for the setting, this is something special and unique in Hong Kong which audience can easily associate with. If we choose a normal flat, it can represents that sector of people, but it is too common, there is no uniqueness with it. Although not everyone lives on a rooftop shack, but audience will know that it’s a structure in Hong Kong. Moreover, there are more space in front of the rooftop shack for production and shooting, therefore I decided to use that location. Another point of the campaign I did was the contrast between rich and poor(外賣仔 ), the idea is to express the situation that there is a very attractive opportunity and offer, but that person didn’t take it because he or she doesn’t believe it. We juxtapose this to the general public who don’t believe that Yakult has such huge benefits and advantages to our body. In this case, we have to put effort on the setting of the character, how grassroot or ordinary they are to not accept the offer as a truth.

Q: Is there any relationship between the ad created and the social phenomenon in Hong Kong?

A: I didn’t really think much about the connection on purpose, but I did add in some common spirit or characteristics of Hong Kong people. At that time, Hong Kong people have the perception of rich people monopolizing the society, and think that money is not everything. “Dislike the rich” is a quite special and interesting mindset of Hong Kong citizens. Therefore, the ad of local delivery worker (外賣仔) uses this perception as a background setting to further develop on the message which Yakult is so good that you won’t believe it. And the choice of using this character is to strengthen the local culture, as it is a very unique and typical job in Hong Kong.

Q: What is the advertising position of Yakult?

A: I think Yakult positions its advertisement based on the change of lifestyle and the market. It wants to emphasize the drinking habit of Yakult on children and families, which they should intake one bottle per day. By looking back to the past, Yakult has tackled different groups of people, and created ads of a wide range of themes.

For instance, the black society, families, student’s love stories etc. The change in Yakult’s advertising positioning is to cater the market demand and evolve. Although there are no direct competitors in the market, Yakult still have to settle some misconception among the society. For example, people thought Yakult was very expensive as there are huge advantage for drinking it, so we did an ad to eliminate the misconception, and emphasize how affordable it is.

Q: How Yakult locolizes its ad and brand image in Hong Kong?

The creative idea didn’t give us details on how to localize its brand, but you still get the feeling of what they are trying to deliver. As in the ad about the local deliver worker (外賣仔), there is also a rich man (有錢 ), these two identities are unique in Hong Kong, because it creates a huge contrast in the society. The key is the chemistry produced among the two characters, this is also a phenomenon in Hong Kong.

Q: How Yakult stregthens the sense of localization through production?

A: Not only in the location and setting, but also the costume and styling, we have chosen a very Hong Kongish and local style. This is essential as the target audience is local people. In the production of Yakult Ronado series, the creative storyboard that we received was mainly focusing on the storytelling, with the set happening in the football field. As a team of production, we have to think about something more practical and with more details, so as to maximize the sense of localization, in order to allow local audience to associate with the advertising deeply. Therefore, we have changed the location and background of the scenario, such as replacing the football field with local housing estate rooftop. In this way, Hong Kong people can immediately fit their minds into the advertisement, as it is one of the collective memories and common impression of this crowded city.

Q: What do you think about the ads of Yakult in the recent years?

A: Yakult has continuously changing on its ads. At first, we are doing it in a humorous way which is more popularized. But in these two year, Yakult started to tell their founding story. As I know, the new ad is not that well received by general audience, it is not as easy to associate as it was in the past. We were doing funny and humorous ads back then to be more approachable to the audience.

Q: What do you think about the future advetising of Yakult?

A: Yakult has realized the effectiveness of the ads in these two year, and as I know, they are shifting back to sell its product by a humorous way. The direction of advertising will go back to the connection with our daily life, addressing to the working class other than selling to mother class. This is because this sector of people rarely drink Yakult, they think that Yakult are for kids only. Therefore we can see that the creative ideas actually follows the change in market, and the needs of people from different sectors.

Q: What do you think about the target audience of Yakult?

A: The main target of Yakult is mother and their child. The tagline “你今日飲咗未？” is based on a family background, the campaign that my team did was also targeting on mom and children. Yakult won’t target on successful people or men, because everyone think Yakult is sweet and fat. In fact, Yakult has to be sweet, because the probiotics are most active under the certain amount of sweetness.

Research Process & Findings

I. Background of Yakult

Nearly 100 years ago, Japan had yet to achieve economic prosperity and unsanitary conditions caused large numbers of children to die from infectious disease. Deeply concerned about these conditions, while still a medical student, Dr. Minoru Shirota set his sights on the field of preventive medicine.

In his research, he discovered that lactobacilli were effective in improving the intestinal health. He later became the first person to succeed in strengthening and culturing a strain of lactobacillus that reached the intestines alive. This strain is now known as â&#x20AC;&#x153;Lactobacillus Casei Strain Shirotaâ&#x20AC;?(preventive medicine, the idea that a healthy intestinal tract leads to a long life and offering products at a price anyone can afford). In 1935, a fermented milk drink using this strain was introduced commercially under the brand name Yakult, which embrace his desire that a healthy intestinal tract leads to a long life and offering products at an affordable price. Later on, Yakult became popular in Japan because of its cheap price. In order to keep the freshness of the lactobacillus, Yakult launched Lady home delivery system to deliver the product directly to the customer's home in 1960s. Until now, Yakult has been found for 80 years. It has been a pioneer in the field of probiotics, providing that contribute to good health. Today, Yakult has played an active part in the food and beverage market.

II. Timeline of Yakult History

Over the history of Yakult, there are many interesting discover and milestones that helps the brand to become a successful one. The timeline illustrated Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s history from 1930s-2000s, including its development and story that are inspirational and fascinating.

1930

A Japanese scientist Dr.Shirota cultivatied a unique strain of bacteria called 'Lactobacillus casei Shirota'.

1989

Yakult launched the healthy by-product “Striker”.

1971

Yakult in HK followed the plastic bottle design of Japan.

1993

1994

A new capacity design of Yakult (1 pack with 5 bottles) is appeared on the market with a price $1.4

The Yakult’s factory in Kwun Tong moved to Tai Po Industrial Estate to increase the production.

1935

1964

Yakult Honsha Co. Ltd was found and started launching lactic acid drink.

Yakult established the first overseas brandch company in Taiwan.

1969

Hong Kong Yakult Co., Ltd. was officially established at Kwun Tong. The drink was designed in glass bottle with 90cc, while the price was $40 cents in HK dollars per one.

1996-98

2003

The sales of Yakult in Hong Kong boosted drastically under the help of the advertisements.

The branch companies of Yakult are spreaded all over 22 countries, including Hong Kong, USA, Thailand and so on, while keeping the same formula of Yakult but

III. Position of Yakult Across Generations (70s-00s)

As time changes, the market situation and the social culture shifted into different focus. In order to build up a successful brand and strengthen its market share, Yakult has adjusted its position from time to time, so as to fit into the rapid changing community.

70s-80s

From established, Yakult positioned as a healthy brand. Since the 70s, the ad of Yakult emphasized on selling the product advantage that was good to the intestinal health. In order to promote the message widely, it made good use of the celebrities to attract the audience, such as it featured some famous Hong Kong star in the ad at that time like 何守信. In this ad, he held Yakult and even showed his thumb to promote the benefit of Yakult. While in the 80s, the position of the brand was similar to the 70s. The famous headline “你今日飲左未” was officially introduced by promoting Yakult as a daily habit. It still utilized celebrity endorsement in its ad, such as invited 余文詩 as a spokesperson for couple years to build up the healthy image of the brand. Apart from using celebrity endorsement to promote the product advantages, Yakult also promoted message like “ 令你活力多多” and“帶動流行享受” in some of the ad, which tried to positioned Yakult as a energetic and popular brand. Moreover, Yakult produced one of its classics - an animated ad in 1985. The ad simply used some motion illustration to brings out Yakult’s discovery on the probiotics, which is beneficial to humans intestinal health. The tagline “為你健康不斷努力” emphasize the effort of Yakult in cultivating this healthy drink. This also builds the brand image of Yakult being a responsible and enterprising brand.

the 90s

In the 90s, the ads of Yakult became more interesting because of the theme “Happy Family”(開心家庭), other than promoting the benefit of the drink. Yakult tried to establish a friendly brand image and localize its brand through portraying the relationship of a local family. It especially highlighted the daily bonding between the Dad and son in a humor way, such as telling a series of funny story at school, home and supermarket. As most of the ads are daily related which had created many noises among the Hong Kong people at that time. Yakult has stabilized its standing in the healthy beverage market through their ads in the 90s. The popularity of the ads helped Yakult attaining its first “Most Popular TV Commercial Awards” at that time.

the 00s

In the 2000s, the brand image of Yakult became humor and fun. Instead of promoting the benefit of the drink in a simple and straightforward way, Yakult promoted this message in a vivid and interesting way in that period. It introduced with more diversified and more creative in contents to help the audience understand the advantage and function of activated lactobacillus in the drink more easily and specifically. For example, it created interesting and resonant stories like the following ads as metaphors to conduct the message:

AD: 三角關係 2010 Related dialogue: “酸, 好酸, 真係好酸” Explanation: It uses a metaphor to demonstrate the feeling of a girl being a third party in a relationship is like the taste of activated lactobacillus, which is sour in taste and its sourness can resist the stomach acid.

Ad: 多仔婆

2010

Related dialogue: “要懂得不斷繁殖先能

抵抗外敵入侵”

Explanation: It uses the lady keeps giving birth to prevent his husband from peeping on other women as a example to show the idea of activated lactobacillus can help resist the bad thing in the stomach as well.

Ad: 外賣仔 2011 Related dialogue: “有d野真係好到你唔信” Explanation: It highlights the honesty of a food delivery boy whose behavior is too good for people to believe (he returns 5 cents back to the rich customer). Just like the function of activated lactobacillus, it is really good for the intestinal health.

Moreover, the ads of Yakult also help eliminate the misconception of consumers toward the product, such as the following example clarifies the affordable price of the product and of misunderstanding of lactobacillus:

Ad: 貧賤夫妻與醒目仔 2009 Related dialogue: “街口士多有新野賣，幾粒腎咋” Explanation: It portrays a story of a family in the old era. It emphasize on the sad feeling of the mother that she thinks Yakult is too pricey for curing her son’s ailment. This ads tries to clarify the price of Yakult is affordable to everyone, even is the grass-root class.

Ad: 社團叔父 2009 Related dialogue: “有菌喎! 誤會姐, 誤會姐!” Explanation: It tells a story that a group of elderly are being arrested by police because they are selling Yakult which contains bacteria. This funny example tries to correct the misunderstanding of lactobacillus that it is not a harmful bacteria, instead is a good bacteria that help improve your intestinal health.

By analyzing the positions of Yakult through 70s-00s, we can see that Yakult positions its brand with a healthy, friendly and humor image through advertisements. Its advertisement are created based on the change of lifestyle and the demand of market in Hong Kong. It tries to cover large group of target audience, from children to elderly, by connecting with the background in Hong Kong as well as introducing with diversified themes to attract the audience.

IV. Analysis of Yakult Ads

In order to cater the Hong Kong market, Yakult uses different creative strategy with Hong Kong style to promote the brand message. As the content of the ads are daily related, it somehow helps the target audience resonate with the brand more easily. Most importantly, the ads of Yakult are not simply utilizing a humor strategy to deliver the message and attract the audience, it reflects the historical background and social issue in Hong Kong which causes resonance to the Hong kong people.

Yakult keeps the tagline of ”你今日飲左未？“ in almost every ad to emphasize on daily drinking habit. From our street interview, this tagline is the first impression of people when asked about Yakult’s ad. It is obvious that Yakult had been successful in indoctrinating this concept to the audience, trying to change consumer’s habit that Yakult should be intake daily. It also acts like a reminder to people, especially kids, when they saw the ads everyday.

Campaign：“有d野真係好到你唔信” Year: 2011 The Ad: 外賣仔, 朗拿度細路

These two ads are originated from the same campaign, with the emphasizing on the message of “something that is unbelievably good, just like Yakult”. This campaign tackles the mindsets and interesting qualities of Hong Kong people being suspicious towards good things. Though the benefit of Yakult is famous for keeping our bodies and intestines healthy, some people will still think it is too good to believe in. Therefore, the advertisements chose to use some unique characters which only can be found in Hong Kong to strengthen the association between audience and the TVC. Audience can therefore easily project themselves into the story and trigger their interest with the creative message. Another unique personality of Hong Kong people is disliking the rich people as they think they monopolized the society with money. Taking this special quality of the public, they made use of the plot of illustrating a local delivery worker receiving a great amount of fortune given by an unknown rich customer. With the young worker refused to take the fortune, this ad has reflected how Hong Kong people think about unusual good things and how they refuse to believe it. The tagline at the end explained how Yakult being the same with the “unusual good things”, that Hong Kong people should start

The location and background in the advertisement are something interesting to look at when discussing on localisation. With such a strong message on emphasizing the local mindsets in Hong Kong, the location setting of the stories match well with a “local” touch. Local housing estate rooftop is chosen to be the background for the Ronaldo ad, as it is one of a strong image of Hong Kong, a highly populated city. Old style TV sets and furnitures are also appeared in the ad to enhance the sense of localisation of the brand. These all elements combined to elevated the ad, from a creative storytelling into a visually-satisfied and localised one, making the message of “Yakult being unbelievably good to your health” popped out.

Campaign：好壞勢不兩立 Year: 2012 The Ad: 出軌, 出

The ad “好壞勢不兩立” in 2012 ostensibly tells a message that good and bad are irreconcilable. However, it projects some social problem in Hong Kong at that period. Such as one of the ads tells a story about a man discover that his father-in-law cheating and he reported him. It is actually a reflection of Tang Ying-yen‘s affairs. At that time, Tang Ying-yen was the Chief Executive candidate. He issued a statement through a public relations company and first confirmed that there was an "extra-marital affair." (SCMP, 2012) This news had became a major news event in Hong Kong and all the medias were competing to report it. Besides, there was a big issue happened in that year. Donald Tsang Yam-kuen, our Ex-Chief Executive found that he was bribed. He suspected of receiving benefits during his tenure of office, he concealed to accept the lease of Shenzhen Donghai Garden luxury residential units, and was charged with one count of the Chief Executive accepting the benefit. According to the prosecution's Queen's Counsel, the luxury residential unit has an area of 6,700 square feet and the owner is a company owned by Wong Cho Bau, Bill. During the incident, the unit requested the “tailor-made” according to the Tsang couple’s preferences and stayed after the defendant stepped down. All decoration and design expenses were paid by Bill (skyscrapercity, 2012).

The message of these ads is an irony of the chaotic issues in that year. In one of the ads we can see there was a girl cheating on her dictation. Although the boy is falling love with her, he still peach her to the teacher. This series of ads are telling to the audiences, Yakult is at the good side and they are a party to justice. Therefore, their consumers no need to worry about Yakult will produce bad products and doing something not illegal.

2012 Political issue The bribing case of Donlad Tsang

2012 Political issue Henry Tang having an affair with his assistant

Campaign：為生命堅持 Year: 2015 The Ad: 80週年為生命堅持

In 2015, the ad 為生命堅持 has really matched the situation in HK at that moment. 2015 is a year which makes people panic and flurry. Ebola virus invasion in the world and broke out in South Africa. Due to a fatality rate as high as 50% to 90%, WHO once declared the outbreak as an “International Health Emergency”. The initial symptoms of the patient include fever, severe burnout, muscle pain, headache, etc., followed by vomiting, diarrhea, and punctate papules on the skin. Described as "Black Death in the New Century" caused more than 10,000 deaths. The Ebola virus has been ravaging western Africa for two years, has spread 10 countries, infected 28,638 people, and killed 1,315 people (Passi, 2015). Also, In Hong Kong, the chickens which supplied by Mainland were found H7 bird flu virus. The government took countermeasures to prevent the spread of the virus, they stopped the live poultry suspension to Hong Kong. It arouse the attention of Hong Kong people to live chickens which entrance by the Mainland (SCMP, 2015).

In 為生命堅持, there were many taglines want to encourage people that we could fight back against the disease, like "Prevention is the most fundamental method", "Adversity can change by us". It just like Yakult will stay with us no matter the situation is good or bad. Yakult will fight back with us and support the whole social of being a healthy product. Another key idea of the ad is to tell the story of how Dr. Shirota persist in investigating the way to fight against bad things in our body. The founding story of Yakult brings out the message of “逆境可以改變”, it highlights the belief of Dr. Shirota as the belief of Yakult, and how the brand insist in producing the best product for the mass public.

Campaign：365日 Year: 2017 The Ad: Motion Graphic

After two years, Hong Kong Yakult has finally released a new ad - a 3D motion graphic style ad. The main message of this ad is to express the working class is so busy throughout the year, “365日日日做到無停手” indicates the bustling life of Hong Kong people, which they do not have the time to take care of their intestinal health. Followed by the benefits of Yakult, the ad has once again repeat the main focus of its product and the iconic tagline appears at the end. In terms of target group and market, Yakult decide to make this change in its advertisement to continue increase sales and to expand its target sectors (Statista, 2018). Yakult has long been selling this legendary product to the mass Hong Kong people, but if we look deeper into the ads, it can be seen that the major focus is on family, especially mother and children. This is because of the social background in the past, which female is the character to deal with the whole family’s health and which many mothers are housewife. Therefore, the decision of a children buying or drinking Yakult is actually made by the mother. But today, as the role of family in our society have changed, targeting only on family is not enough to maintain market sales.

Yakult has realize this situation and adjust their target sector to the working class. Through our interview, we got the fact that youngsters and adult nowadays do not drink Yakult anymore, they think that Yakult is a childrenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s drink and it is too sweet and fat. Thus, this new ad aim to promote the benefits of drinking Yakult to the working class. Also uses the 3D motion graphic approach to give consumers a sense of freshness, and intended to ingratiate this generation (Infoscout, 2015). From the two ads in 2015 and 2017, we can see that Yakult has continuously changing their theme and advertising positioning. No longer in a humorous and daily way, Yakult seemed to be more experimental in doing its advertising. The very big twist in mood and tone intended to bring a new image to the audience, and adjust according to the market evolve. However this approach and theme are not well received by general public, it is reflected from our street interview which over half of the interviewees does not know or seen these two ads before. In addition, Alfred Hau explains that they were doing some humorous and more approachable ads back in the 00s, which allow audience to relate to the real life situation more easily.

V. Influence of Yakult

From past to now, Yakult has been regarded as a influential brand. Its impact has been spread widely in the society. We have classified the influence into few different stages and aspects, including the past, present and future with cultural and social influence in both positive and negative ways, the market, as well as consumer behaviour.

the Past

Cultural As Yakult launched the Lady home delivery system during the 60s, it actually pioneered the idea of independent female worker. As this delivery system aim to deliver the drink directly to the home of customer which was to keep the freshness of lactobacillus, a large groups of women are hired as delivery worker at that time. Even under the control of the patriarchal society in Japan at that time (Robertson, 1998), Yakult still adopted this service which was a bold act in the cultural aspects.

Present

Postive Social Influence Through the ads, Yakult not only bring its brand image into community, but also bring the knowledge about probiotic products to consumers . The advertising headline “你今日飲咗未？” holds a special place in the heart of HK people. It becomes a catchy quote from the age 3 to 80, and also acts a daily reminder to Hong Kong people to pay more emphasis on health, such as during the outbreak period of SARS, Yakult is treated as a medicinal drink that can prevent sickness and viruses. From here, we can see that Yakult receives positive response from the Hong Kong.

Negative Social Influence

However, due to the huge benefit that yakult had projected to people, it is linked to some negative issue in the society. It has once been exaggerated to be a drink that can enlarge breast and prevent cancer in mainland China. Rumors like this are spread in the society, creating a panic buying phenomenon such as the parallel traders are scrambling for Yakult, which causes Hong Kong people feel negative about Yakult at that time.

Market For more than 20 years, yakult have dominated the market of Lactobacillus drinks. As it is a pioneer in health drink using “probiotic” to enhance human defense mechanism and medical prevention, it is crowned as an innovative brand. That’s why there are many products copying its concept in the market nowadays (All Answers Ltd., 2017). Even though Yakult doesn’t encounter strong direct competitors in Hong Kong, it has already built a good reputation in the public’s mind. The another reason why Yakult can hold a special place in the heart of Hong Kong people is because it is a intimate brand. It localizes its product for the hong kong market which the size and taste are different from that in Japan (Japan is keeping up with tradition that persists with the original flavor and certain capacity). In order to cater the taste preference of Hong Kong people, Yakult produces with white sugar instead glucose in the local product. In fact, white sugar is much cheaper than glucose which can see that localization adjustment can reduce costs, increase sales and satisfy local consumers as well (Pepper, 2018). Apart from localizing the product under the need of the market, the creative ideas of Yakult’s ads also follows the change in market, and the needs of people from different sectors (Hau, 2017). Even Yakult does not have direct competitors in Hong Kong, it is still important for the brand to tackle their target audience and allow audience to be more associated, thus strengthens the position and good impression of Yakult.

Consumer behavior Under the help of continuous advertisements, nearly every Hong Kong family owns Yakult in their fridge. As Yakult can be brought anywhere, such as in convenient stores, supermarkets and street stalls, consumer perceive buying Yakult as a habitual drink. Apart from the high exposure, the cheap price of Yakult also increase consumerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s buying desire as it only sells around $2.6 per bottle. Although some of the consumers in Hong Kong may not perceive Yakult as a healthy drink because of the amount of sugar, it becomes a better choice for kids rather than coca cola and other sweet drinks in the perspectives of mother. It is because the ads mainly focus on the family as target audience and promote the message that Yakult is good for intestinal health. It somehow influences the mindset of the mother when buying drink for their kids. (Hau, 2017)

Future

“We contribute to the health and happiness of people around the world through pursuit of excellence in life science in general and our research and experience in microorganisms in particular.” said by the president of Yakult. In the future, Yakult will practice this idea by responding even more carefully to customer expectations through such means as enhancing their research, development, and technological capabilities; creating products that are safe, offer peace of mind, and contribute to people’s health; and offering high-quality service.

Moreover, Yakult aims to raise their corporate value by working to bring solutions to social issues, such as by contributing to the realization of a health society and the creation of job opportunities for women. While In advertising, continuing from 2017, Yakult will make efforts to enhance the value of the brand. In TV commercials, it will use the core message to convey the merits of their products and brand and their advantages over competitors in a more easily understandable manner. The style of the ads may keep selling the product in a humor way and connecting the content with the daily lives of Hong Kong people. (Yakult Annual Report, 2015) & (Hau, 2017)

Conclusion

For nearly half a century, Hong Kong Yakult has produced numerous ads based on the change in market and society. In reverse, it can be seen that Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s legendary ads has influenced the lifestyle of Hong Kong people and the society. Over 30 years, Yakult has attempted in different approaches, directions, as well as styles in its advertisements. Yakult added in various major characters with diversity in age and social class in order to target multiple audience and potential customers. This helps to built up Yakultâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s brand image and market positioning. This household brand not only becomes well-known by the locals and gained tremendous success in advertising history, but also dominated the probiotic health drink market in Hong Kong.

Critical Reflection

LEUNG Tsz Wan 17020973D At the beginning of the course, the name â&#x20AC;&#x153;advertising historyâ&#x20AC;? gives me an impression of something informative, and frankly less interesting subject. Indeed, part of the lessons did provide us with quite a lot of factual information about the history in the advertising industry, such as the rise of famous agencies and introduction of some of the advertising guru. Though these parts might be quite dull, to me, I think it is a good opportunity for me to build up my basic understanding and knowledge of the industry. The materials and outline of the course condensed the long history in advertising into 10 lessons, and it is actually helping me to familiarise advertising culture and changes across the years in a very effective and easy way.

Meeting one of the best directors in Hong Kong, Alfred Hau, is one of the most valuable things throughout the subject. Other than providing information we need for the Yakult project, which he filmed few years ago, he also gave us a lot of insight in producing a good advertisement. He shared his view on the importance of localising an advertisement, and how director treatment can affect the whole storytelling, elevating the ad through a more engaging and finer approach. Getting the chance to interview with the guru in the industry is exciting, and actually changed my perception of “first-hand research is boring and time-consuming”! The shooting of the video for presentation is also an enjoyable experience for me. As the preparation started from researching the history of Yakult, to analysing the relationship between the advertisements to the reality, the script and flow of the video were built from zero. The process of brainstorming how to deliver the message, advertisement and history of Yakult was difficult, yet fun. We came up with many ideas and character and ended up with choosing the epic characters “Suzuki” and “Weak Keung” as the highlight of the video. It is definitely an enjoyable learning experience afterall. The sleepless nights and hardship were well paid off after seeing the final product of our team.

MAK Wing Han 15064047D I think this course is quite enjoyable because I have a good experience there. It lets me know more about the rich history of advertising in different perspectives, improves my learning skill and even provides me a valuable chance to meet more new people. Firstly, I gain more understanding on advertising history. To be honest, I don't have great interest in advertising history at first because I perceive it as long and tedious information. However, this course changes my mind as it presents the history in a precise and vivid way, such as it divides the history into different categories and makes good use of example for better explanation.

I also really enjoy the guest lecture which helps me understand that even a garment in an ad can makes big difference to the message telling. Now, I realize the historical development of advertising and its effect on people and societies. As the relationship between advertising and society are interrelated, I learn that if we want to hit the target when doing an ad, we should focus more on background research instead of just thinking creative idea. Secondly, I have a lot of fun in producing a video for the brand Yakult. Although we have some difficulty when preparing the content and the flow of the video at first, we communicate well with each other to solve the problem. We are having a great time when doing street interview because we can design our own story plot and set the questions for interviewees. Moreover, as I donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have much experience in video making, I feel challengeable to deal with this project. Luckily, under the help of my groupmates, I have learnt many editing skills which helps me a lot in the upcoming projects. Last but not least, I feel honored to have a chance to interview Alfred Hau, who is one of the big person in the advertising industry.

As he used to direct some of the advertisements of Yakult, we would like to interview him for collecting more real and official information about the brand. He not only shares his point of view about the position of Yakult, but also tell us the importance of localizing advertisement. Most importantly, I realize that a good advertising production actually can help elevate the message of the ad and the image of the brand. I have learnt a lot from Alfred and, undoubtedly, this is the most exciting first hand research that I have ever done. All in all, I have a great time during this course and I would like to know more about the history of advertising in the future.

Kwok Tsz Wai 15113881D When I was in secondary school, history was the most boring subject to me. I was not interested because I thought that what happened in the past had already happened and would not do my future any good. I thought understanding history in depth was unnecessary. Hence, when I was in Advertising History for the first time, I had such perception towards this lesson. Yet, I slowly began to discover that understanding history is a very important issue. History is a mirror of reality. Studying history could help is to reveal the development of society and foresee the future.

By learning the history of a brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s advertisements, we can know more about their previous market position. These previous advertisements could also reflect the social culture, economy, etc. at that time. Understanding these things is indispensable for us to learn how to conceive a new advertisement or even to establish a future brand image. I remember Vincie had told us in the tutorial that as long as you understand how to study the brand's advertising history, you can use it in the future. I believe that what I learned this time will be very useful to me in the future. As a design student, we often think that creativity is the most important thing. Yet, studying advertising history is also an important source of our inspiration. Last but not least, I would like to thank my groupmates. This report is the result of our efforts. The cooperation process this time is really interesting, especially during our shooting. I also want to thank our tutor Vincie. Knowing that our class is often late and skip lessons, she is still very patient and teaches us with heart. Thank you so much Vincie!!!

Wong Yuen Ting 15070185D I assume most of us thinks that â&#x20AC;&#x153;historyâ&#x20AC;? is a very boring course to study, especially for design students. Although I am never interested in history, I tried my best to attend all the lectures and in fact it was not as dull as I expected. When the history is well divided into different topics like in terms of agencies development, it is more easy for us to digest and learn from it. One of the most memorable topic for me is how the inventions of technology affects the way of advertising, although this knowledge seemed to be fundamental, the professionalism and crafting skills of Advertising people in the past should be admired.

For the group project, it is a very good opportunity for us to study about a legendary brand and its advertising history. We learnt that a having comprehensive understanding of a brand’s advertising history is important before carrying out any creative idea development. To study deep into the background and classic ads of Yakult helps us to recognise the influence of social issues on its advertising positioning and direction. There is no doubt that Yakult’s ads have built a strong image and impression in every child’s mind, but never did I investigate on the reasons behind. Our group is honoured to invite Alfred Hau for an interview, I found his view on Yakult’s advertisements very inspiring, which offers us a new insight on the production of the campaign and how to apply elements to emphasise localisation in the ads. I think this interview not only provides us the first hand data for our research, but more on how to apply treatment in production based on the background of a brand. This is valuable for us to know how to do creative according to the past, and foresee the future. Making the video is fun to present our findings and analysis of Yakult’s ads. I am so thankful that I finally have a very good team to work with, all of us have put a lot of effort in producing our video, trying to create a humorous video just like how Yakult’s ad tackle the audience. We did have a lot of fun shooting the video and carry out a street interview, especially having VL to act out the most iconic scenes of Yakult’s ads, brings the video to its climax!

Last but not least, I am surprised with the learning outcomes of this course, it provides me a new insight towards the importance of understanding and examining a brandâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s history prior creative thinking. I will never forgot what Vincie and Robert told us on the day of tutorial, the value of us being Advertising Designer are not solely on our creativity, but the ability to evaluate the market in order to come up with the best execution that can gain the best results. This is not just a course to make us do some simple research, I really treasure this experience.

Issac Yuen Ting 15070185D I assume most of us thinks that â&#x20AC;&#x153;historyâ&#x20AC;? is a very boring course to study, especially for design students. Although I am never interested in history, I tried my best to attend all the lectures and in fact it was not as dull as I expected. When the history is well divided into different topics like in terms of agencies development, it is more easy for us to digest and learn from it. One of the most memorable topic for me is how the inventions of technology affects the way of advertising, although this knowledge seemed to be fundamental, the professionalism and crafting skills of Advertising people in the past should be admired.