What American brands can learn from the U.K. Xmas advertising bonanza

Imagine a world where a TV commercial garners blanket media coverage, millions of online views, and its release is its own cherished tradition that is inextricably associated with the biggest holiday of the year: Christmas. Each year, major brands delightfully seek to one-up each other with such seasonally appropriate ads that feature, say, an adorably animated carrot family reenacting Home Alone. Or that cleverly superimposes Will Ferrell’s Elf on a grocery store, or a dad-to-be going to great lengths in order to make a connection.

This world actually exists. It’s called the United Kingdom, and the ads described above are real and part of the 2022 canon of the Christmas advertising bonanza that is as much a part of the country’s seasonal celebration as Cadbury advent calendars.

These big-budget Christmas ads focus on emotional storytelling, highlighting the ability of brands, particularly beloved U.K. retailers, to tug at our heartstrings. The spots have become so popular that they’re now shared globally such that even American audiences know what a John Lewis or an Asda is. Yet, U.S. brands have largely yielded the December holiday season to more transactional, door-crashing Black Friday-style ads—and have in many ways missed an opportunity.

We don’t need full-on sadvertising, but as brands and advertisers fight aggressively to find any sliver of a chance to catch—and keep—our attention, is there an opportunity for U.S. advertising creatives, strategists, and brands to recreate this same kind of manufactured pop cultural event around a holiday?

Amazon found a way to make a paper shredder into a thoughtful gift. If McDonald’s could make Brits teary-eyed last year with an imaginary childhood friend, there’s no reason it couldn’t tap the same emotions over here.

For some global perspective on this, I called Agathe Guerrier, chief strategy officer for ad agency network TBWA/Worldwide, which includes Apple’s long-time agency TBWA/Media Arts Lab, and Amazon’s Super Bowl whisperers Lucky Generals. Guerrier says that North American marketing is incredibly seasonal, with the most intense period being between September and February. “All of these individual holidays have turned into full months of stuff, with home decoration, activities, color schemes, it’s just a whole new world that resets every other month,” says Guerrier.

“We’ve got back to school, followed by Halloween, followed by Thanksgiving, followed by Christmas and holidays, followed by Super Bowl, and then Valentine’s Day,” says Guerrier. “Advertisers need to pick their battles—and their budgets. Among that cadence, it’s difficult for the holidays and Christmas to stand out because it’s caught in that rhythm of seasonal switches.”

The U.K. Christmas ad season, which began with the retailer John Lewis’ 2011 ad called “The Long Wait,” has become Super Bowl-esque in its focus and importance to British advertisers. “It’s a part of popular culture in a way that every brand strives to be,” Adam&EveDDB chief creative officer Richard Brim, told me back in 2015. “Captivating and effective, without any follow-up ads selling turkey crowns or prawn rings (2 for £10.99). Now it’s a yearly race to be the most emotional and meaningful brand of the year. It’s taken on a life of its own.”

For Americans, a similar effect is the sheer amount of advertising oxygen inhaled by the Super Bowl. The NFL’s title game has become the marquee stage for American ads despite its lack of strategic placement on the calendar. “It’s a TV entertainment and broadcasting moment around sports, [but] it’s not actually a purchasing moment, like the holidays,” says Guerrier. “It makes sense to time your big commercial moment around your big commercial season. For many retailers, Q4 is where they make or break the year.”

There are cultural differences as well, in that American pop culture has largely embraced a more secular, diverse notion of the holidays in favor of not focusing on just Christmas. The U.K., meanwhile, is still very much a Christmas-centric December. “As someone who isn’t British but who lived in England for 10 years, it’s hard to overstate how much Brits love Christmas,” says Guerrier. “They just f**king love it. There’s this cultural obsession.”

Which makes me think that instead of focusing solely on Black Friday discounts, more U.S. brands could make Thanksgiving their Q4 Super Bowl.

Perhaps American brands and marketers can take a note from Apple, which has been able to balance between the U.K. Christmas obsession and producing holiday work for its U.S. audience that often has the same impact. This year’s spot, “Share the Joy,” is a more stylistic approach to winter, but the brand has told some great little stories over the years—from 2016’s Frankenstein to 2017’s lovely “Misunderstood.” Those spots are similar in tone to the emotional storytelling that the brand has also done around Chinese New Year in recent years.

For Guerrier, it’s not just about fun or emotional ads, it’s about what they can build. “If you look at the effectiveness, John Lewis or M&S [Marks and Spencer] show a really high return on investment during the Christmas period and beyond, making those big brand statements,” she says. “We’d look at it through that lens, that more broadly, investing in long-term brand building is actually a smart tactical thing to do, above and beyond the sales-driving, shorter-term activity.”

Now, let’s just hope someone pulls an Asda for Thanksgiving someday, and superimposes John Candy from Planes, Trains and Automobiles into a commercial.