“Our conversations with the community provided us with new perspectives and shed light on a market gap in which same-sex couples were excluded from family floater health insurance coverage,” she said. Ruchika Malhan Varma, chief marketing officer, Future Generali India Insurance, which launched an OOH campaign showcasing real LGBTQIA+ couples, also said positive representation validates and gives voice to the entire community.

This can only be done when queer people are themselves employed or consulted with.” Without making the effort to actually understand the realities of queer lives. Tejaswi Subramanian, digital editor and curator, Gaysi Family, said, “A lot of the times, brands open up their offerings for queer people They can create more jobs for the community, offer more donations for their education, help bring down crime against them, lobby for legalisation in different states or countries, the list is very long,” Raghav said.īut to truly go beyond tokenism, it is important to see queer people as creators and business-owners, instead of just a consumer demographic.

Mainstream conglomerates can do even more. For instance, along with the ‘Pure as Love’ campaign, which came out three years ago, Bhima Jewellery also put out employment alerts for the community. “Now is the time to go beyond beautifully cinematographed films and do real work on the ground. Consumers expect more from brands and have moved beyond woke advertising. Brands that come out waving the pride flag in June, but without any substantial or positive narrative, run the risk of being cancelled. Sheetal Raghav, creative director, Animal, who worked on Bhima Jewellery’s ‘Pure as Love’ campaign, said there is thankfully no more of the cliched ’90s Bollywood-style depiction of the community.

But it’s still a learning curve for brands on what they have to do, and more importantly, what they shouldn’t be doing.

Advertising link