A year ago, we were all talking about inclusiveness as if its future was certain. Now the world is more divided than it has been for decades. Headlines such as “Norway tightens mosque security after right-wing terror attack near Oslo,” and “Poland’s shift to the right continues as it honours Nazi collaborators,” (both Sydney Morning Herald , August 12) remind us that it’s going to take a lot more than the advocacy of brands to create racial harmony. Perhaps, too, we have become immune to brands with purpose?

Absolut Vodka India and Lowe Lintas have, though, come up with a wonderful dream, the idea of a racial battle in which each side throws paint balls, colouring everybody in a way that camouflages their skin. The point – the hope – of the campaign called Born Colourless is that it will make people remove superficial differences like colour as filters through which they judge people.

The film’s voiceover asks, “Colours. How did they inherit such palaces? Powers that can make us shun, shiver or shake our opinions about a walking, talking and breathing person? How can being a shade apart mean being worlds apart?”

The film, which was directed by Brazilian director, Pedro Becker, and shot by three times Academy Award winner, Robert Richardson, features thirty-one Pernod Ricard employees of different nationalities and ethnicities.

https://youtu.be/ikAAC-deqm0

Kartik Mohindra, chief marketing officer at Pernod Ricard India, stated, “With our new campaign, Born Colourless, the brand wants to drive the message that a colourful world is a colourless one where people need to drop their biases and look past superficial differences. It gives us immense pride to see our own employees and real people from across the world come forward to be a part of the film, to drive these beliefs.”

Janmenjoy Mohanty, regional creative officer at Lowe Lintas, added: “It isn’t often that a core product truth and a human belief come together cohesively to present before the world a compelling point of view that is, unarguably, the need of the hour.

“That’s what Born Colourless is all about. An idea born out of the creative tenets of the Absolut worldview, aimed at creating a better tomorrow. The idea is also a tribute to a client who backed this courageously and in full measure – going as far as getting employees from across the world to feature and play many roles in the commercial. All of which makes this idea very special for us.”