How one FMCG giant's complaint changed how IPL advertising works

About this episode

The episode discusses how Hindustan Unilever's consumer complaints about repetitive ads led to significant changes in IPL advertising practices.

In November 2024, one of India's biggest FMCG companies, Hindustan Unilever, started getting a barrage of complaints from its consumers, who said they were seeing the same Dove and Surf Excel ads repeatedly on OTT platforms during a single watch session. Some of them were shown the same ads as many as 150 times within a week. With IPL around the corner, HUL — which spends nearly Rs 4,000 crore on ads annually — couldn't afford to ignore these complaints. So what followed was a series of investigations. And what they discovered has opened a real can of worms for not just JioHotstar, the platform streaming the IPL, but OTT platforms in general. The big issue is a serious mismatch between what was promised and what's actually being delivered for ad campaigns, according to seven insiders from HUL, Disney, and other industry rivals who spoke to The Ken. So what happens when a big spender starts feeling like it's not getting what it signed up for during the biggest streaming event of the year? The Ken reporter Rounak Kumar Gunjan speaks to Daybreak hosts Snigdha and Rahel. This episode was first published in February 2025. We're re-airing it now because IPL 2026 is live, and the…

People in this episode

Hosts: Snigdha, Rahel

Guest: Rounak Kumar Gunjan

Topics covered

• advertising
• FMCG
• OTT platforms
• consumer complaints
• IPL
• ad measurement

Keywords

• Hindustan Unilever
• JioHotstar
• advertising complaints
• IPL 2026
• ad measurement
• OTT platforms
• FMCG

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Hindustan Unilever, JioHotstar, Disney

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