Best printers for Home

Best Mixer Grinder

Best wired Earphones

Best 43 Inch TV in India

Best Wi Fi Routers

Best Home Theatre in India

Smart Watch under 5000

Best Laptops for Education

Best Laptop for Students

<ul><li>Health, immunity and fitness have become one of the top concerns for Indian consumers post COVID-19.</li><li>Healthtech platform Cult.fit has had a pretty busy year so far. It acquired three platforms, revamped its business model and brand identity, closed another funding round, and has recently launched a new campaign to target India’s youth.</li><li>Naresh Krishnaswamy, Growth &amp; Marketing Head, Cult.fit speaks to us about the platform's growth trajectory, idea behind its latest campaign and goals for 2021.</li></ul>What is that image that comes to your mind anytime someone says ‘fitness’? Do you see a petite woman with flawless skin, voluminous hair, a perfect smile posing with a small piece of gym equipment or a muscular man pumping ridiculously heavy weights? If the answer is yes, it is not your fault. Our definition of fitness is formed by the unidimensional communication we have grown up seeing. When it comes to fitness, all brands have tried to sell an ideal, unreal body image to their customers. They hire obscenely thin women who are further skewed to look even more ‘appetizingly perfect’ or muscular men who are photoshopped with 6 packs. Just in one Google image search of the word ‘fitness,’ you would notice a pattern of photoshopped images and how flawed the overall communication in the fitness industry is. The imagery we have seen in fitness advertisements, whether on billboards, TV or social media, have created a perception that has made us feel under confident in our own bodies. And people who don’t meet these idealistic body standards, feel intimidated to join a gym. Healthtech brand Cult.fit has been consciously trying to move away from this, reminding its audience that fitness is for everyone and people should exercise to feel good, stronger, and happier. Cure.fit’s latest campaign ‘Fitness is not an option’ imitates iconic Bollywood scenes to show how they would play out if the actors weren’t fit. It reenacts famous running scenes from Bollywood like ‘The Train’ scene from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge and ‘The Bull’ scene from Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara but there’s a twist in the plot; the actors start panting and wheezing instead, reiterating the message that fitness is not an option anymore but an absolute necessity. Everyone should take fitness more seriously. While it has been appreciated on social media for its creativity, sense of humor and great execution, there’s another reason why it stands out. It doesn’t sell an idealistic body image to its target audience. <div type="Youtube" id="xAB3CZC1BcI" title="Fitness Is Not An Option (cult.fit)" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/xAB3CZC1BcI/mqdefault.jpg"></div> Naresh Krishnaswamy, Growth and Marketing Head, Cult.fit told us the genesis of the campaign. He said, “First, the idea was to go at a higher level and attack the barriers of the industry. Typically, you see a lot of fitness communication around building up muscles and looking more attractive, desirable and pumping weights, etc. We, with our communication, now and in the future, want to really drive this whole thought of fitness being really essential to life, something that you can no longer ignore and it is for everybody. Fitness can be anything from running, that you see in one of the ads, to working out in the gym or home, etc. So, the objective was to pivot communication to drive fitness as a lifestyle habit as opposed to what’s been traditionally talked about -- weight loss, muscle gain, etc. Secondly, we have significantly expanded our fitness offerings and we wanted to show Cult as a wide fitness option.” The core insight ‘fitness is not an option’ was brainstormed and finalised internally, further woven into scripts by freelancers and finally produced by <keyword id="3167731" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="supari-studios" source="Orion">Supari Studios</keyword>. The first TVC in the campaign has gone live on Cult.fit’s owned media channel, across all Sony TV channels and OTT platforms including SonyLiv. It was played during India vs England test matches and will extend into the IPL season which is set to resume on September 19. Unfortunately, Cult.fit’s first advertisement ‘Jaa Simran Jaa’ recently hit a minor roadblock. It has been taken down from YouTube after Yash Raj Films flagged it for violating copyright protocol. However, it is already back on Instagram. Krishnaswamy said that Cult.fit’s legal team is working to bring the film back. “We did our due diligence before launching that ad and we think it is completely in the clear. We are sorting a few things out and are confident that in a couple of days, it will be back up and running again.” ‘Fitness is not an option’ is Cult.fit’s first campaign after its brand revamp. In May 2021, Cure.fit was renamed to Cult.fit. Even before the revamp exercise, Cult.fit had tried to stay on top of social media trends. Now, with its latest campaign, it is trying to be an active part of pop culture. Telling us about Cult.fit’s marketing approach since its inception, Krishnaswamy said, “Right from when we started out in 2016, our objective has been to make fitness fun and relatable for individuals. If you look at our communication before the pandemic, our focus predominantly was to show people enjoying working out in a group with a smile on their faces. So no idealistic body types and showing extremely ripped, fit people. That’s been our ideology throughout. We now want to play a much larger category game and want Cult to be really associated with fitness. Our association before the revamp was with group classes, which is what we were offering before the pandemic, but now we offer every type of fitness. So, the evolution from there to today has been about the brand taking more of a humorous, quirky approach across channels. Before that, we were a little more functional -- a brand trying to tell you the benefits of working out. Now we are taking a lifestyle approach.” <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="Goals for 2021" text="Goals for 2021">Goals for 2021</cmsannotation> Health, immunity and fitness have become one of the top concerns for Indian consumers post COVID-19. After gyms shut down in 2020, fitness apps and on-ground gyms rose to the occasion by shifting their focus online and providing personalised services based on different body types. With this, the Indian healthtech space saw a surge in user traffic and became a part of the new normal. According to Valuates Report, the Global Fitness App Market size is expected to grow from $3,312.58 Million in 2019 to $13,016.77 million by the end of 2025 at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 25.61%. Cult.fit has also had a pretty buzzing year. It acquired healthtech platform Fitternity, hardware-at-home platform Tread and partnered with Disney+ Hotstar, Sarva and Brilliant Wellness. Commenting on the first half of the year and focus areas for the rest of it, Krishnaswamy said, “We have been very active this year. We have done 3 acquisitions, completed another fundraising round recently, we have pivoted into digital and gyms, the next six months is heads-down growth. We will continue to remain opportunistic with any acquisitions or any other inorganic opportunities to grow. But we have all the tools we need in our arsenal. So, the next six months would be about execution and campaign activity.” After the pandemic, Cult.fit added 2 million users and out of these 1.5 million, 1 million users joined the platform during the lockdown in April and May. However, this number slowly tapered off as it moved to a paid subscription model. Today, it has 1,50,000 paid members on its content product and with gyms coming back, 100,000 people work out in Cult.fit gyms every day. As per its regulatory filings, its operating revenue shot up 174% to Rs 496 crore during FY20 from Rs 181 crore earned in FY19. “About 50% of our gym members are back. Our revenue and MAUs are on a steep upgrowing trend now, with people using our gyms and online product and we only see ourselves continuously growing month-on-month as vaccination rates increase, and we add more supplies in our gyms and consumer sentiment picks up. We foresee that over the next few months, we should get back to pre-pandemic levels of general attendance and member activity,” shared Krishnaswamy. To accelerate the vaccination process in our country, Cult.fit is also offering free vaccination to its members and one of their family members. It would be focusing on improving its online group classes, upping gym safety, polish its hybrid model and consolidate local gyms under its network. Sharing the company’s vision, Krishnaswamy said, “We want Cult.fit to be completely synonymous with fitness. When you think fitness, you should only think of Cult. The second objective is that we want to be an iconic, youthful brand. We want people to really love Cult. We want to speak to them in a language that inspires them to get fit and not be in the annoyingly motivational zone, which a lot of fitness brands are. We want to be in the top league of fitness brands in India that really lead and define the category.”

We don’t want to show idealistic body types and extremely ripped, fit people in our ads: Naresh Krishnaswamy of Cult.fit

<ul><li>Cult.fit’s latest campaign ‘Fitness is not an option’ gives a hilarious twist to famous Bollywood scenes.</li><li>However, its ‘Jaa Simran Jaa’ advertisement has been taken down from YouTube after being flagged by <keyword id="36603" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="yash-raj-films" source="Orion">Yash Raj Films</keyword> for violating copyright.</li><li>In a statement sent to Advertising and Media, Cult.fit says that the advertisement was produced and released after all due diligence. </li></ul>Cult.fit’s latest advertisement that introduced a hilarious twist to the iconic scene from Shahrukh Khan and Kajol starrer <keyword id="88064" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Dilwale-Dulhania-Le-Jayenge" source="Orion">Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge</keyword>, has been taken down from YouTube. It featured a reenactment of the ‘train scene’ from the film. The video was flagged by Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge’s Production Company, Yash Raj Films for violating copyright. YouTube’s error reads, “The video contains content from YRF, who has blocked it on copyright grounds.” In its campaign, 'Fitness is not an option', the female protagonist, who reenacts Simran from DDLJ, can be seen running towards the hero, only, she is too unfit to get onto that train, something many of us leading such unhealthy lifestyles will relate to immediately. As Simran makes a dash for the moving train, she starts panting and wheezing. She gives up and tells her partner that she will catch the next train to meet him the next day. Cult.fit has also deleted the advertisement and announcement posters referencing DDLJ from Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. The campaign is produced by Supari Studios. However, Cult.fit said that the advertisement was released after all due diligence. "At Cult.fit, our focus through various marketing campaigns has been to resonate with our audience and create something relatable and memorable. We often lean on popular culture which has time and again proven to be impactful. We've taken a similar approach for our latest campaign - ‘Fitness is not an option’. The ad was produced and released after all due diligence done from our end. The response to it has been exceptional overall and we amassed over a million views on Instagram in less than 48 hours," Cult.fit's spokesperson told Advertising and Media Insider. The same campaign also puts a twist to Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara’s (ZNMD) last scene ‘The Bull race.’ It features comedians Rahul Subramanian, Aadar Malik and Rahul Dua as Hrithik Roshan, Farhan Akhtar and Abhay Deol. <div type="Youtube" id="xAB3CZC1BcI" title="Fitness Is Not An Option (cult.fit)" thumbUrl="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/xAB3CZC1BcI/mqdefault.jpg"></div> Although, the once-bitten brand played it safe this time. Despite clear resemblance with ZNMD characters, it added a disclaimer that says, “The production is only for promotional purposes and all characters herein are fictitious and similarity with an actual person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.”

Cult.fit's 'Jaa Simran Jaa' advertisement taken down from YouTube after Yash Raj Films flags it for copyright infringement

In the inaugural list of top "promising young leaders and game changers" under the age of 30 in Asia from the prestigious <keyword id="6373044" type="CITY" weightage="100" keywordseo="Forbes">Forbes</keyword> magazine, <keyword id="487" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Sania-Mirza">Sania Mirza</keyword>, <keyword id="6354486" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Virat-Kohli">Virat Kohli</keyword> and <keyword id="30618" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Saina-Nehwal">Saina Nehwal</keyword> are leading the pack of over 50 Indians. 
 
The Forbes '30 under 30 Asia' list includes 300 "young and driven entrepreneurs and game-changers" from countries including India, Indonesia, China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Pakistan, Vietnam and Australia who are contributing to their industries in a significant way. 
 In this list, one would find 56 Indians, with Kohli, Mirza and Nehwal along with 26-year old Bollywood actress <keyword id="89958" type="PERSON" weightage="100" keywordseo="Shraddha-Kapoor">Shraddha Kapoor</keyword>. 
 
"At the top of India's crickculture is batting prince Kohli, who led India to clean sweep in their Twenty 20 series against Australia in January," Forbes said of Kohli. He was also named among India's highest earning celebrities in 2015, standing at USD 11.3 million. 
 
Talking of Mirza, Forbes said that she has been the "most successful female Indian tennis player ever" and one of the highest paid and highest profile athletes in the country. 
 
About Nehwal, Forbes described her as a "role model" and "Indian badminton queen". 
 
The list has a total of 10 categories, covering consumer technology, enterprise technology, arts, healthcare and science, media, social 
entrepreneurship, finance, industry and retail. 
 
Arunima Sinha, the first female and first Indian amputee to climb Mt Everest in 2013 and Chaitanya Tamhane, the writer and director of the critically acclaimed movie 'Court' also found place in the entertainment and sports category. 
 
Raghav Verma, the co-founder of Indian tea chain 'Chaayos', Mehul Agrawal, the cofounder of automotive e-commerce site 'Cars24' and online furniture store 'FabFurnish', Kanika Tekriwal, the cofounder of 'JetSetGo', Ritesh Agarwal, founder and CEO of 'OYO Rooms', Ankit Bhati, cofounder and CTO of 'Olacabs', Pooja Dhingra, owner and executive chef of 'Le15 Patisserie', photographer Vicky Roy, Advait and Akshat Gupt, cofounders of 'Supari Studios', Sattvik Mishra, CEO of 'ScoopWhoop Media', Manju Bhatia, joint Managing Director of 'Vasuli Recovery', Anshulika Dubey, cofounder and COO of 'Wishberry.in', Paras Chopra, founder and CEO of software company 'Wingify', Dinesh Goel, founder and CEO of 'AasaanJobs', Faith Gonsalves, founder of 'Integrated Development Education Association', Smriti Nagpal, the founder and CEO of 'Atulyakala', Chinmay Malaviya, cofounder and vice president of 'Foodpanda', Arun Chandru, cofounder and MD of 'Pandorum Technologies', Neha Sinha, cofounder and CEO of 'Epoch Elder Care' are the other names in the list. 
 
<a href="http://images.teamtalk.com/09/03/800x600/Sania-Mirza-Indian-Wells-2009_1997550.jpg">Image source</a>`

Sania Mirza, Virat Kohli and Saina Nehwal amongst 56 Indians in Forbes' Asia list

You Searched For "supari studios" and got 3 results

We don’t want to show idealistic body types and extremely ripped, fit people in our ads: Naresh Krishnaswamy of Cult.fit

Karuna Sharma

Cult.fit's 'Jaa Simran Jaa' advertisement taken down from YouTube after Yash Raj Films flags it for copyright infringement

Karuna Sharma

Sania Mirza, Virat Kohli and Saina Nehwal amongst 56 Indians in Forbes' Asia list

BI India Bureau

Popular Keywords

Buying Guides