Christmas ads: 7 recent campaigns and the move a small brand can copy

Every November the UK gets a small season of its own: the Christmas ad launches. John Lewis, Aldi, M&S and the rest release films that people watch on purpose and argue about at work. The trade press reviews them like movies.

A list of the best Christmas ads that stops at "this one made me cry" is no use if you run a small brand with a Meta account and a few thousand to spend in December.

Below are seven Christmas ads from 2023, 2024 and 2025. For each one you get what it did, from the brand's own page or a named trade report, and the one move a DTC brand can copy without a TV budget. For the US calendar, Black Friday offers and shipping cut-offs, read our guide to holiday ads.

What makes a Christmas ad work?

A Christmas ad works when one small human moment carries the product, and the brand is impossible to miss. The mechanics underneath are cheap to copy.

Story first, product in the plot

In most of the ads below, the product moves the story. A pair of sled cushions gets three friends back on a hill. A vinyl record gets a dad dancing. A small brand can copy that with a script and a phone.

Consistency beats a new idea every year

Aldi and M&S both bring back the same character every Christmas. A DTC brand can do the same with a recurring format, a mascot, or the same opening line every December.

Which recent Christmas ads are worth studying?

All seven are well documented, and each one teaches a different move.

John Lewis, "Where Love Lives" (2025)

John Lewis's 2025 ad is a two-minute film by Saatchi & Saatchi, directed by Jonathan Alric of the French duo The Blaze, as The Drum reported. On Christmas Day a dad finds an unopened gift marked "Dad". It is a vinyl record of Alison Limerick's 1990s club track "Where Love Lives". He plays it, and the music takes him back to a 1990s club, where his teenage son fades into memories of him as a toddler and a baby. The two hug without a word.

The gift in the ad was a real product. Rough Trade at John Lewis stocked a limited vinyl at £14.99, with the original track on side A and a new version by Labrinth on side B, and all profits went to the John Lewis Partnership's Building Happier Futures program (The Drum, 2025).

The move to borrow: make the product the gift inside the story, then sell that exact product. If your ad shows a mug, a candle or a record, the link goes to that item, not to your homepage.

Aldi, Kevin the Carrot (2025)

Kevin the Carrot first appeared in 2016, so Aldi's 2025 campaign marked 10 years of him, according to Marketing Week. McCann Manchester made it. The campaign opened with a 10-second teaser: Kevin proposes to Katie the Carrot with cue cards, a nod to the doorstep scene in Love Actually. Longer ads followed, including a 20-second spot styled as a breaking news segment.

Marketing Week reports that the 2024 Kevin ad got the maximum 5.9-star rating from System1 for brand-building potential, the sixth year in a row that the Kevin ads scored above five stars, with consistency named as a main driver. The same report says Aldi had £1.6bn in sales in the four weeks to Christmas Eve 2024.

The move to borrow: run your Christmas idea as a series. A 10-second teaser, then two or three short episodes, gives you fresh creative every week from one concept, which is what Meta and TikTok need anyway.

M&S Food, the Fairy with Dawn French (2024)

M&S Food's 2024 campaign was a six-part series, per the M&S press release. The first ad ran in 90, 60 and 30-second versions. The first ad launched on 4 November. The other five were 30 seconds each, one per moment after that: gifting, party food, the big day, dessert and New Year's Eve. Dawn French voiced the Fairy again and appeared on screen as herself for the first time.

Each ad is built around named products, from Our Best Ever Slow-cooked Turkey to the Collection Nocciolato Panettone. Sharry Cramond, M&S Food marketing director, gave Marketing Week three principles for the campaign: a product focus, consistency and a broad marketing mix. Marketing Week also reports that the ads were made in-house.

The move to borrow: plan December as a calendar of short ads, one per buying moment, each with one product. A gifting ad in mid-November and a "last thing for the table" ad in the week before Christmas are two different ads with two different hooks. Our guide to advertising hooks examples has openers you can adapt for each.

Amazon, "Joy Ride" (2023)

Amazon's "Joy Ride" is a 60-second film made by Amazon's in-house creative team with the production company Hungry Man, directed by Wayne McClammy, as Amazon's own announcement says. Three older friends watch kids sledding. One of them orders padded seat cushions on Amazon. They arrive the next day, and the three race down the hill again. The music is an instrumental version of The Beatles' "In My Life", recorded with a 40-piece orchestra.

Amazon's UK site calls Joy Ride the company's most successful Christmas campaign to date, and says the ad returns in 2025 as part of its "Every Thing For Every Holiday" campaign.

Amazon did not publish the metric behind that claim. It did bring the same ad back two years later.

The move to borrow: show the product solving one small, specific problem for a buyer the viewer does not expect. A seat cushion for a sled is a dull product with a clear reason to exist. Find that reason for your own product and put it in the first three seconds.

Apple, "Fuzzy Feelings" (2023)

"Fuzzy Feelings" runs about four minutes. TBWA\Media Arts Lab made it, Lucia Aniello of Hacks directed, and Anna Mantzaris directed the stop-motion, as Campaign Brief reported. An office worker with a difficult boss makes stop-motion films about him at night, shooting them on an iPhone 15 Pro Max and editing on a MacBook Air. The music is George Harrison's "Isn't It a Pity".

The move to borrow: show a real customer making something with your product. The film is a story about a person, and the product is the tool in her hands. For a DTC brand this is a creator video, filmed on a phone, of someone using what you sell for a gift or a ritual.

Disney, "The Boy & The Octopus" (2024)

Taika Waititi directed Disney's 2024 holiday short, made with adam&eveDDB, according to The Drum. On a seaside holiday a boy finds an octopus stuck to his head. At home, he shows it life on land. The music is a version of "Part of Your World" from The Little Mermaid, recorded by a 60-piece orchestra and mixed at Abbey Road. It ran across EMEA on YouTube.

The move to borrow: use your own assets. Disney reused a song from one of its own films. Your version is a line from a five-star review, your best-selling product, or the joke your customers already repeat in the comments.

Coca-Cola, "Holidays Are Coming" made with AI (2024)

In 2024 Coca-Cola remade its 1995 "Holidays Are Coming" ad with generative AI, and it ran on TV over Christmas, as Marketing Week reported. The same report says the AI version scored the maximum 5.9 stars on System1's Test Your Ad, and that it reportedly cost a tenth of a traditional remake. It also drew public criticism for using AI. Coca-Cola made two new AI versions for 2025.

AI made a famous idea cheaper to remake, and the test score held. Viewers still noticed, and some complained.

The move to borrow: if you use AI, use it to make more versions of an idea that has already worked. Do not use it to invent a new Christmas idea from nothing.

Christmas ads compared: what a DTC brand can copy

Every fact in this table comes from the sources linked in the sections above.

How do you turn a Christmas ad idea into Meta and TikTok creative?

Copy the move and leave the film. A small brand cannot shoot a two-minute short, and does not need to. In the feed, a Christmas ad has a few seconds to stop the scroll, so the idea has to show up in the first frame.

Cut the story to one frame and one line

Write the story in one sentence, then find the single frame that tells it. For "Joy Ride" it is three friends on a bench, looking at the hill. For your brand it might be the gift being opened, or the product on the table on Christmas Day. That frame becomes your static ad, and the first second of your video.

Simple, product-first creative like the Graza ad above is what a December feed needs. The bottle and the name are readable at a glance. Our guide to static ads covers how to build them.

Plan a series of short ads

Aldi and M&S release in stages, and on Meta and TikTok that is also how you avoid ad fatigue. Plan four to six short ads from one concept before you shoot anything, and release a new one every week or two.

What does Christmas do to ad prices?

Ads cost more in the weeks before Christmas, because more retail brands bid in the same auctions. CPM, the cost per thousand impressions, is the number that moves first.

Check last December in your own account

We have not found a primary source with a clean Christmas CPM figure for small brands, so we will not quote one. The better check is your own account: take last December's spend and impressions, and compare the CPM with a normal month.

If your CPM rose a lot last December, the creative has to work harder for each thousand people you pay to reach. A clear product in the first frame, and a fresh ad every week or two, give each expensive impression a better chance.

How Selzee makes Christmas ads for small brands

Selzee researches your market, your customers and the ads running longest for other brands, then recreates the winning ads for your brand with your products, logo, fonts and colors. Every ad comes with the angle and the insight it is built on. In December, check each ad against the moves above. The first question is whether the product sits inside the story.

The comic below is an ad Selzee made for itself. It uses the move from Amazon's film at a much smaller scale: one character with one specific problem, and the product as the way out.

Christmas ads: FAQ

What is the best Christmas ad of 2025?

There is no single official winner. Aldi's Kevin the Carrot is the best documented on effectiveness: Marketing Week reports the 2024 Kevin ad got System1's maximum 5.9 stars, the sixth year in a row above five stars. For a 2025 film to study, John Lewis's "Where Love Lives" shows how to sell the exact gift the story is about.

When do UK Christmas ads come out?

The big UK Christmas ads usually launch in early November. In 2025 the trade press covered Aldi's campaign on 3 November and John Lewis's on 4 November, and M&S Food started its 2024 series on 4 November.

How long is a typical Christmas ad?

The hero films are long: John Lewis's 2025 ad runs two minutes and Apple's 2023 film about four minutes. The campaigns then cut shorter versions: Amazon's film runs 60 seconds, M&S ran 30-second episodes and Aldi opened with a 10-second teaser. For Meta and TikTok, plan around the short cuts.

Can a small brand make a Christmas ad without a big budget?

Yes. The moves that make the big ads work do not need money. A product inside a small story costs nothing extra, and neither does a recurring character. A phone-shot creator video or a single strong static ad can carry both.

Should Christmas ads use AI?

AI can make more versions of an idea that already works. Coca-Cola's 2024 AI remake of a 1995 ad scored 5.9 stars on System1 and reportedly cost a tenth of a traditional remake, but it was also criticized for using AI. Use AI on a proven idea, and check every version before it runs.

Start with the move

Pick one move from the table and build four ads from it: one static ad and three short videos. Launch them before the auction gets crowded.

If you want those ads researched and made in your brand, see how Selzee works on your own brand.