When the brand Shah Rukh Khan started losing its sparkle, a couple of years ago with back-to-back movies that weren’t as big commercial successes, the world somewhere started to believe that maybe the ‘King Khan’ era had touched its peak and that there was no going back.
Little did they know that the name that has, over the years, become synonymous with charisma, talent and cinematic magic, was about to strike back and revive the Bollywood industry which was on a downward spiral during Covid.
According to Duff & Phelps’ celebrity valuation report, Khan slipped out of the top 10 celebrity list (in terms of brand value) in 2021, when his brand value was $46.3 million. However, in 2022, he re-entered the top 10 charts with an increased brand value of $55.7 million. He has over 43 million followers on Instagram as of this date.
Khan most recently was seen endorsing Coca-Cola’s Thums Up in its campaign called ‘Thums Up Utha India India Macha’, to mark the beginning of the World Cup season this year.
However, the 90s and early 2000s kids would also remember watching the actor in various ads for Pepsi as well! One of the most iconic ads came out just as Karan Johar directed Kuch Kuch Hota Hai was set to release in 1998.
Ad agency JWT (now VML) was handling Pepsi’s account back then and adland veterans like Rohit Ohri (now with FCB Group) and Anuja Chauhan had worked on the ad featuring Khan, Kajol, Rani Mukherjee and Shahid Kapoor.
Khan later also featured in Pepsi’s ads alongside Sachin Tendulkar.
Apart from the beverage category, other brands that Khan had iconic associations with for long periods were Hyundai Santro, LG, Lux, Dish TV, Fair & Handsome, to name a few.
2023 has already seen brands like Myntra and Realme rope Khan in as their brand ambassadors. Myntra onboarded Khan for its 18th Edition End of Reason Sale, under which he became the face of a series of ad films that were promoting the sale.
Realme’s ad with Khan was to promote the smartphone brand’s realme 11 Pro Series 5G. The ad has to date garnered over a million views on YouTube.
Khan was also featured alongside Amitabh Bachchan, for Everest Masala’s latest ads.
Rungta Steel, which already signed Alia Bhatt and Ranbir Kapoor, onboarded SRK this year.
The three also starred in an ad inspired by Jawan.
The actor also teamed up with his wife Gauri Khan for a D'Decor ad.
He also teamed up with Alia Bhatt for the brand's upholstery fabric products.
Hyundai Motor India appointed SRK to launch its one-stop mobile application ‘myHyundai' in 2022 end.
Sunfeast Dark Fantasy teamed up with the star for its ‘Har Dil Ki Fantasy’ campaign, offering fans a chance to share a screen using Generative Artificial Intelligence Technology (“GenAI”).
SRK also starred in a five-film campaign with Prabhuji Sweets and Namkeens alongside Rashmika Mandanna.
The year also saw the actor teaming up with Thums Up.
Shah Rukh also lent his heft to Deepika Padukone's skincare brand 82°E, starring in a promotional video for the same.
However, with fame comes its cons. 2021 was not a pleasant year for Khan and his family when his son Aryan Khan was accused of allegedly being involved in a drug-related case.
This was also a time when Khan was very much associated with edtech brand Byju’s, which has of late been under the waters for various unrelated reasons. As negative hashtags related to Khan and his son started trending on social media, Byju’s decided to halt the ads featuring Khan. But soon after this move, the brand resumed the ads. The clear reason behind the pause and resume is still unknown.
Industry experts have suggested on several occasions in the past that brand SRK is too big to be dented by such controversies. To elaborate, this controversy coincided with the time when Mondelez International released its Diwali campaign for that year, featuring Khan. Despite the #boycottsrk tags, the campaign went on to receive global accolades, winning awards at Cannes Lions.
Khan’s next movie Dunki is slated to release on 22nd December 2023.
