Meet ​Santosh Desai

​Santosh Desai is a columnist, media critic and the author of ‘Mother Pious Lady: Making Sense of Everyday India’. In his professional life, Santosh is the MD & CEO of Futurebrands, a brand and consumer consultancy company and has previously headed an advertising agency. Santosh’s principal area of interest lies in examining the evolving nature of consumer culture in India. Thought leader in understanding the relationship between culture and brands and the consumer as a product of his or her cultural context Author of ‘City City Bang Bang’, a weekly column in The Times of India.

​Santosh Desai is a leading ad professional. He says he has strayed into writing entirely by accident, and for this he is “grateful”. “City City Bang Bang” looks at contemporary Indian society from an everyday vantage point. It covers issues big and small, tends where possible to avoid judgmental positions, and tries instead to understand what makes things the way they are. The desire to look at things with innocent doubt helps in the emergence of fresh perspectives and hopefully, of clarity of a new kind.

Santosh has the ability to explain the most complex concepts through the simplest, everyday references. Connecting culture and marketing, Santosh is the very definition of ‘brand guru’. A lively speaker, he enjoys connecting and sharing ideas with a variety of audiences across a multitude of platforms.An IIM-Ahmedabad graduate, Santosh served as the President of McCann-Erickson, one of India’s premier advertising agencies. Having spent 21 years in advertising, he is a veteran in the domain and has been involved in strategically building many key brands for numerous local and multinational organizations.He has served as a guest lecturer at various national and international universities and has addressed global management boards of global companies including Microsoft, Philips, Hershey’s, Unilever, Coca-Cola and Reckitt Benckiser. 

Speaking Topics

• Branding & Design
• Understanding India

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