Berger XP Indiblogger meet presentation

#BergerXP Indiblogger Meet at Lalit Ashok, Bengaluru

Date: 10 December 2016

Probably the last Indiblogger Meet in Bangalore for 2016. This meet was held at the Lalit Ashok, a 5-star hotel near the Bangalore Turf Club, on a Saturday afternoon.

Lalit Ashok hotel Banaglore Karnataka
I first went to check out the hotel
Lalit Ashok hotel lobby Bangalore
I haven’t been to the Lalit Ashok in a long time
Swimming pool Lalit Ashok Bangalore
They should hold an Indiblogger Meet by the poolside one day 🙂

This Indiblogger Meet was sponsored by Berger Paint India, particularly to promote their Express Painting service.

Berger Indiblogger meet registration
Registration was delayed
Lunch buffet Lalit Ashok Indiblogger meet
So we were asked to have lunch first
Lunch plate Lalit Ashok Bangalore
The food was, sadly, nowhere near 5-star standards. The paneer gravy and the chicken curry felt watered down.

You would think the dessert would be a saving grace when it would be chocolate fudge, malpua + rabdi, and gulab jamun. But even the chocolate fudge felt watered down and lacked the necessary sweetness. The gulab jamun — yes the standard Indian dessert — wasn’t very good either. Jeez, how can a 5-star hotel not get gulab jamun right?

Anyway, enough about the food. It was time to enter the ballroom.

Berger colour mixer paints
I scanned the room and saw they had paints laid out on one table…
Berger beakers Indiblogger meet
…and beakers for mixing on another. The agenda did mention were going to get our hands messy! 🙂

The meet started the same every Indiblogger begins, with Anoop from Indiblogger leading the proceedings with an activity to get our bodies active and a round of introductions after that. When I was asked to introduce myself, I brought up the fact that it was rather unconventional of a brand like Berger Paints to be sponsoring a blogger’s meet. But at the same time it made me want to attend all the more since I’m always curious as to how well a marketing campaign can be implemented if done right.

Anoop agreed and the marketing head at Berger said the same thing when he took to the stage, that this was out of their traditional marketing efforts but the previous meet went so well that they wanted to do another in namma Bengaluru.

Berger Paint Indiblogger meet presentation
Much of the presentation was about Berger’s Express Painting service, where in a team of trained painters contracted by Berger come by and get the painting work done in a professional manner and a lot quicker because they use special machinery for the job
Berger Express paint machine tools
These are some of the tools. Auto rollers, spray guns and sanding machines that get the job done a lot quicker than manual labour — and with better finish.

Which is why Berger claims that using Express Painting can be done at “no extra cost”. It may appear expensive at first glance but they claim when you factor in the longer time taken by local painters doing everything manually, the cost and time savings, make it all the same.

After the presentation, there was a Q & A round with surprisingly many (good) questions from the bloggers.
The Berger head answered them well. I guess we all wanted to know about such services because either we have bad experiences working with local painters or are looking to possibly opt for such services like Berger’s Express Painting when it comes time to do our homes. My brother is doing interior work for his new apartment, so that’s why I was keen to learn more about this service.

Sanding machine Berger Express Paint
After the Q & A session, we were given the opportunity to check out the machines on display. This is the sanding machine. Usually, before painting can begin, the painters use sand paper to scrub off the rough spots on a wall/surface to smoothen it before applying primer. But the process of sanding produces a lot of dust. This machine has a vacuum built into it that sucks in the dust while the sanding is happening. But Berger were honest enough in admitting that it can suck in 80% of the dust and can’t guarantee a 100% dust-free environment.

The Berger folks explained how an apartment or house, even it is fully furnished, gets painted using Express Painting. On the day of the job, their team move any delicate items out of the way, then large furniture like sofa sets are covering in plastic sheets (which they bring) and only then do they begin with sanding process. The covers come off only after the paintwork is completed.

BergerXP Indiblogger meet Bangalore
Now it was time to paint!

We were shown how to mix paint and each assigned tables and canvas. Seven teams were made and each had to select a theme and present a painting that best describes the theme.

Paintings Indiblogger meet Bangalore
My team’s painting is the one on the extreme left. Our chose theme was ‘Faster, Cleaner, Better’ Bengaluru
Berger XP Indiblogger meet presentation
After which we were all asked to go on stage to present our paintings

My team didn’t win but that’s alright.

Aftermath BergerXP paint session
The aftermath of the team painting session

After evening tea was served, there was a final quiz for the audience. I won a voucher, which made my effort to jot down notes during the presentation all the more worthwhile.

In conclusion, this was actually one of the better Indiblogger meets. Maybe it’s because I had kept my expectation on the down low and it turned out much better than expected. Berger Paints made it an evening of fun when it could have simply been a boring “here is our product” presentation and “now go write about it”. And trust me, there have been lazy efforts by the sponsor at previous Indiblogger meets. So props to the marketing guys at Berger India for not letting a marketing expense simply go to waste.

For those interested in trying Berger Express Painting for your home, SMS XP to 56767 to get started.

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