The past two weeks have seen the launch of the most coveted Christmas ad copies from the likes of John Lewis, Amazon, Disney, M&S and Coca-Cola alongside the launches of short films from less anticipated brands such as ALDI, Sports Direct and TKMaxx.
Sports Direct sees famous sporting faces including Emma Raducanu, Jack Grealish and Maro Itoje get together for their ‘Go All Out’ campaign alongside grime artist Big Narstie. This short ad copy has been hailed by critics as hitting the spot for targeting Gen Z with lots of young people taking to social media to ascertain where exactly they can purchase Grealish’s coat.
Disney’s new film, ‘The Stepdad’ sees a blended family celebrating Christmas, and follows the journey of the Stepdad being accepted into the family by the son, Max, in a heartwarming sequel to last year’s film ‘From our family to yours’.
One of our personal favourites, ALDI’s film, marks the return of Kevin the Carrot in an emotive allusion to a famous Christmas Carol. ALDI branded character Ebanana Scrooge is shown the true meaning behind Christmas by Kevin while meeting other personas along the way including the utterly punnily brilliant, Marcus Radishford (whoever did that needs a raise). Tag line ‘to be happy you have to be kind’ aligns with the supermarket’s CSR partnership with Neighbourly, where they have pledged to donate 1.8million meals to families in need this Christmas.
When asking our community which ad had won in their hearts, however, there was still a strong love for Coca Cola with nearly 40% citing it as their winner so far for 2021. Coca-Cola’s two and half minute film this year shows a young boy piecing together cardboard boxes to make a chimney so that gifts can still be delivered – as clearly not everyone in the modern age has a chimney. His mission sees the community club together to donate boxes – something very prevalent at the time of the Covid 19 pandemic.
Amazon fared pretty well too, with 20% of our community respondents citing that they loved this year’s instalment from the mass e-commerce brand.
Perhaps it is a brand affinity to Coca-Cola, or maybe it is the iconic nature of their ads that have our Gen Z consultants excited about their films year-on-year. Either way, there is a definite trend in wholesome, relatable and emotive storytelling coming through in this year’s favourites.