Once again, it’s that time of the year. December has finally arrived, so park yourself on the sofa and prepare yourself for an abundance of epic festive advertisements!
While Christmas is still the season to be sentimental – 2020’s merry offerings display more thematic diversity than previous years – ranging from the heartwarming to the outright hilarious. In this week’s blog, we’re rounding up the best adverts of the year, thus far!
There’s lots of great festive offerings at Aldi every year. From their affordable Christmas hampers to their great selection of festive food – but each year, the nation waits to see what will happen in their annual Christmas advert.
Taking influence from the upcoming Top Gun movie, Aldi initially launched a teaser campaign for this year’s Christmas advertisement starring their beloved mascot, Kevin the Carrot. The 40-second piece served as a mini-prologue to the brand’s festive ‘feature’ – quite literally plunging the anthropomorphic vegetable head first into 2020’s death-defying tale.
Later in the week, the supermarket chain released the full commercial, in which, Kevin – lost after a dramatic ejection from his fighter jet, teams up with a hibernating hedgehog to help him get home to his family in time for Christmas celebrations. It has delighted fans on social media, with one describing it as the ‘best Christmas advert I’ve seen’. Although it easily makes the top five for us – Aldi’s festive gift for 2020 is definitely more of a stocking filler than an absolute Christmas cracker!
After the epic explosion of imagination that was their 2019 commercial – the Danish toy brand have returned with an equally as ingenious short film. Using extravagant set pieces and seamless computer generated effects, the company masterfully depicts the way in which children envision greater things as they are building with Lego bricks.
Set to the tune “What a Wonderful World”, albeit with new lyrics that reflect the brand – the advert was named the most engaging commercial of 2020 by Unruly. It also gained an “intense emotional reaction” from 39% of viewers.
The most remarkable thing about Lego’s ad is that it achieves such a strong response without any hint of ‘sadvertising’.
– Rebecca Waring, global VP of insights at Unruly
We love this year’s effort from Lego’s in-house creative team – the company have once again captured the colossal scale and sheer wonder of their autumn 2019 campaign. Despite not making number one, this colourful exploration into the mind of a child remains one of this year’s crowning achievements in video marketing.
It’s simply not Christmas without John Lewis and their annual festive advert. Due to the economic uncertainty caused by COVID-19, the department store’s television tradition seemed increasingly unlikely for 2020. Thankfully, the holiday season was salvaged on Friday the 13th of November as the brand’s showcase of kindness adorned our screens.
Coinciding with World Kindness Day, the advert depicts random acts of goodwill in a variety of scenarios where humans and animals alike are supporting one another. Set to a poignant soundtrack performed by British singer, Celeste – the beautifully serene song amalgamates with the visuals to perfectly incapsulate the spirit of Christmas.
Interestingly, it has no mention of coronavirus as some viewers speculated, and the retailer revealed that shoppers wouldn’t want to be reminded of that after such a challenging year. The company also supports two important charities; Home-Start and FareShare.
The brand conveys important themes through the utilisation of different animation techniques, such as traditional 2D drawn animation, as well as clay stop-motion and CGI animation – each bringing its own unique artistic style to the production. Following in Christmas tradition, John Lewis’ 2020 commercial is as sentimental as it is ambitious – even if it doesn’t quite reach the high bar set by previous years.
As we experience Christmas in the grip of the novel coronavirus, many people are relying on online retailers to deliver their gifts. Amazon has witnessed exponential growth and emerged a pandemic giant – a household brand synonymous with the “new-normal”.
Much like their 2020 revenues, the company’s festive commercial also broke new ground, telling the story of a dancer whose Christmas show was cancelled as a result of the ongoing pandemic.
However, her sister and local community work together to create a stage for her to perform for her neighbours.
Guaranteed to warm hearts this festive season, this advert aims to reflect the tenacity of the world as people work to overcome and adapt. It features an arrangement of The Show Must Go On by Queen, and was directed by Melina Matsoukas, who’s worked on music videos for Beyoncé and Rihanna.
Thematically daring and visually spectacular – Amazon’s effort is one of the few advertisements to explore the impact of COVID-19 on individuals. Carried by raw emotion, the online retailer’s festive marketing campaign stands as one of this year’s best.
Tugging at our heart strings once again, this three minute advert centres around a much-loved Mickey Mouse toy, which we see being gifted to a young child by her father in 1940. With each passing year, Mickey comes to symbolise the woman’s childhood and a present day connection to her granddaughter, ultimately inspiring a festive surprise on Christmas morning.
UK musician Griff collaborated with Disney on the advert, with a song entitled “Love is a Compass”. It is currently available for download, and proceeds from each sale will be donated to Make-A-Wish Foundation. To celebrate the theme of festive family traditions, Disney is also encouraging fans to head to Facebook, Instagram or Twitter to share their own past and present festive memories using #LoveFromDisney – for each special memory shared, Disney will donate $1 to the aforementioned children’s charity.
Not only is this year’s advert a wonderfully crafted, heartwarming tale that could easily stand alongside Pixar’s short films – it is also helping a great cause over the Christmas period and beyond. For these reasons, we believe that the brand that shines the brightest this festive season is Disney.
Whilst they may differ greatly in regard to content; each Christmas advert succeeds in its ability to convey the essence of the brand. At Cordis, we understand the importance of brand representation during 2020’s festive season. As a full service marketing agency, we offer social media management, copywriting, event organisation, graphic/website design and videography – more than enough to make your business sparkle this December!