The survey suggested that Indian women only get little time during the day to be by themselves — and bathing was one of these moments. The shower became the waterfall, and the idea became a memorable ad for decades.
Karen Lunel, the woman bathing and having fun in the ad, continued to be the ‘Liril girl’ for over a decade. She represented a new India, where wearing a bikini didn’t seem out of the ordinary, and girls could have fun. Lunel was unabashed and unapologetic about enjoying a bath outside, Bijoor said on how the ad became so popular.
Some in the industry said that the state-run television channel Doordarshan even refused to air it initially and then decided to fix time slots for the ad.
The ad became so popular that it became a blueprint for the company. Till 2009, Liril ads featured the waterfall and ‘Liril girl’ — Deepika Padukone and Preity Zinta have both starred in the ads.
“The jingles and the taglines were very carefully crafted, whenever you make an ad, it is absolutely critical to understand the psyche of the people,” Padamsee had told ThePrint in a telephonic interview in September last year. “Somewhere, you need to be a social scientist to understand what will work.”
This ability to connect with the audience was also seen in the Lalitaji ad.
However, many consider the Liril Girl his pièce de résistance. Karen Lunel didn’t know that stepping under a waterfall would change her life. Neither did Hindustan Lever, the creators of Liril, India’s first lime soap which became raging hit and spawned a thousand imitations.
There are times when a product can engage a viewer on an emotional level and Liril did that by becoming a synonym for freedom and freshness.
The concept is an audio-visual treat and one of the most popular YouTube videos even today, 44 years after its conception.
The ad was created by Padamsee along with Lintas executive Neena Merchant.
The blueprint proved so successful that Liril barely changed the format, showing just a girl playing in the water, diving, jumping and swimming under the waterfall and becoame a synonym for joie de vivre.
It became so popular that the Pambar falls in Kodaikanal became known as the Liril falls.
Despite being released in the mores of a time which was conservative and almost 15 years before the economy was liberalised.
He had said: “The beauty of the Liril Girl was that she appealed to the senses. People enjoyed seeing her, which is why she stood out. In other words, she wanted to escape. And her shower in the bathroom was symbolic of this, where she suspended her struggles as a housewife for some time and simply enjoyed her bath.”
Penny pinchers
What’s even more fascinating is the set of circumstances that created the Liril girl.
HUL actually wanted a soap that signified freshness and wanted a blue soap – one representing mountain breeze. That however flopped during initial product trials, and the team instead worked on a lime-based soap that was green.
Carrying out the brief was even harder, and they screened over a hundred girls before zeroing in on Karen Lunel. He had said: “Women could identify with her and many in our survey post-release said that Karen could be their daughter. In other words, our objective was not to make her look sensuous, but project her as a girl who was simply having fun. This is why I think she did so well and people, both young and old, male and female, liked her.”
Lunel remained the face of Liril for over a decade – from 1974 to 1985, the longest for any Liril girl.
Karen Lunel recalled in 2009, how Padamsee would pump her up before shoots. She said: “Alyque Padamsee would make time to build me up before we left on a shoot. It brought out the best, just knowing you are valued. “
He had told Telegraph: “That gave me the idea that we could create a fantasy where she could escape to emotionally when she was having a bath. As a young boy, I loved watching Tarzan films and his girlfriend Jane always used to have a bath under a waterfall and come out looking so fresh. I said why don’t we adopt that idea because we were looking to market Liril from the freshness platform. Most of the soaps of the time focused on complexion, getting rid of pimples and so on. We wanted to talk about a bathing experience that creates a fresh new woman out of you. That’s when we decided on the girl under the waterfall concept.”
Not that Padamsee didn’t have to explain his decision to bean counters and others.
In his book he recalls: “Why is the cost of the Liril film so high, when you don’t have any costumes, except a bikini, and you don’t have any sets, except a waterfall?!!” Being from the theatre, I had a ready reply: “A location shoot actually costs much more than a studio set, because of air tickets and hotel accommodation for models and technical crew, transportation of camera and lighting equipment and fees paid to owners of the location. Add to that, pre-trips (better known as ‘recce trips’) to find the right location. Would you like to come along for the ride? It will only increase the cost by another Rs. 10,000.” The poor product manager mumbled something incomprehensible and slunk away, my tale between his legs.”
The year of its launch Liril captured 25% of the market, and later tapered off as ‘freshness’ became a common USP for a lot of other soaps.
In 2015, HUL went back the original format, after experimenting with other methods. HUL’s spokesperson had explained: “Even after all these years, when we say Liril, people from all walks of life fondly recall the waterfall, the girl, her spontaneity and energy. They hum the jingle then and there. And these are the roots of Liril. They don’t change. And what we’re doing is paying homage to the Liril that we all know, bringing alive the very same elements that have been part of our popular culture through time.
