Aldi takes effectiveness festive ad crown over John Lewis, O2, M&S and others

December 02, 2021

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Aldi takes effectiveness festive ad crown over John Lewis, O2, M&S and others

Kantar assessed 24 Christmas ads.

Aldi: its Christmas ad tells the story of Ebanana Scrooge

The most effective Christmas ad for 2021 has been named as Aldi’s “A Christmas carrot” campaign, according to new research.

Among 24 festive ads, the next best-performing spot was Coca-Cola’s “Holidays are coming”, followed by Lidl’s “Big on a Christmas you can always believe in”, the Kantar study revealed.

The final two ads making up the top five were M&S Food’s “Percy's first Christmas” followed by Celebrations’ “Lonely Bounty”.

A total of 3600 people were interviewed as part of the exercise, with each ad assessed by 150 consumers. The research also used facial-recognition AI technology to study people’s emotional responses to the ads.

Aldi’s ad, inspired by Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol and made by McCann, was scored against others across a series of criteria. It came out on top for long-term contribution, being meaningful, different from others and setting trends.

The campaign, which follows the story of Ebanana Scrooge and features a character called Marcus Radishford – voiced by England striker Marcus Rashford – also came out on top for being enjoyable, distinct, funny, shareable and purposeful, meaning it is showing the brand is making a difference.

When compared with all UK ads that Kantar holds data on, it scored in the top 6% for being both distinctive and enjoyable, as well as for sparking the most conversation.

However its closest competitor, Coca-Cola, saw its festive campaign score in the top 1% of all UK ads for being well branded.

Similarly, Lidl’s Christmas campaign scored within the top 4% for branding, while M&S Food’s spot made it within the top 15%.

Meanwhile, Celebrations’ campaign made it into the top 7% of all UK ads for being distinctive.

Lynne Deason, head of creative excellence at Kantar, said: “Aldi’s new take on a Christmas classic is a great example of how a brand can convey serious messages about purpose and social impact while still being great fun.

“Aldi uses humour effectively, something especially important in a year when we all need an extra laugh, but it also has a deeper sentiment. The clever inclusion of ‘Marcus Radishford’ highlights a worthy cause – the campaign to provide meals to those in need – without coming across as too sombre to viewers.”

She added: “Chocolate box specialist Celebrations took a brave and very different approach to its Christmas ad this year – consumers found the lonely Bounty’s search for ‘love actually’ to be the second-most distinctive of 2021’s festive campaigns and second in terms of being funny.”

“Overall it has been another tough year for advertisers to get right. This crop of ads made people smile, but less so than previous years,” Deason said.

The full list of 24 ads that were assessed are: