Asda focused on “bringing the joy and optimism” to consumers with its festive advert as the cost-of-living crisis threatened to cancel Christmas last year, according to acting chief customer officer Sam Dickson.
Despite predictions that a Covid resurgence and inflation would dampen Christmas 2022, Dickson told this year’s Retail Week Live that “customers are super, super savvy and there was no way they’d risk not having Christmas for their loved ones”.
“Last year was such a dire year we knew we had to help uplift consumers – bringing the joy and optimism – they don’t want to be saved.”
The advert – which starred Will Ferrell’s Buddy The Elf character causing havoc in a branch of Asda – was regarded a major success, hitting 1m YouTube views in just over 24 hours of going live.
According to global marketing research company System1, the supermarket’s advert hit the ‘millennial nostalgia sweet spot’ right on the head, garnering a ‘hugely positive’ audience response. Asda’s ad was its highest-scoring festive ad last year, scoring a maximum 5.9 stars on the company’s Test Your Ad scale.
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Coming up with the idea to use the famous Buddy in the advert was clearly a stroke of genius.
Dickson said it came about as the supermarket looked at one of the nation’s favourite pieces of Christmas media and thought “how could we use that and bring it to Asda?”
“We had to get people to love going to Asda and love being with us and trusting us with those final buying moments at Christmas time. As soon as we had the idea we knew it was absolutely right for the Asda brand. We had to do it – it was the right thing for customers and was Asda through and through.”
Dickson also revealed that the supermarket had not realised quite how much the advert “was going to galvanise the whole business around Christmas”.
Discussing the supermarket advertising strategy she stressed the importance of “getting up close and personal” with customers and listening deeply in order to unpick how those insights will work for your brand.
“Make sure you work with customers to co-create and develop what meets their needs instead of just test-marketing,” she added.
“Always stay focused on your brand and what your brand can do for you.”
