The art of the Christmas advert
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 23 December 2025
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
We look at what makes a great Christmas marketing campaign. From a budget-friendly advert based around coffee cups, to multi-million dollar epic commercials featuring Hollywood A-list celebrities.
We unwrap the secrets behind the world's most iconic festive advertising.
If you'd like to get in touch with the programme, our email address is businessdaily@bbc.co.uk
Presented and produced by Elizabeth Hotson
(Picture: A woman and a man wearing Santa hats, sitting in front of a TV with Christmas tree, candles and food. Credit: Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts. |
| 0:08.7 | I'm Elizabeth Hotson and welcome to Business Daily from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:14.9 | On today's programme, I'll be looking at the highly charged world of festive advertising, |
| 0:19.7 | and I'll be finding out why a catchy tune from |
| 0:22.2 | a soft drinks company now signals the start of Christmas. Coca-Cola is a very old American brand |
| 0:29.7 | going back to the 1890s. And they had from their very inception, this very long-term goal of being |
| 0:36.8 | associated with happiness and wholesomeness. |
| 0:40.1 | How coffee cups have become prime advertising real estate. A cup for a brand, that's our |
| 0:47.5 | own media space, right, where we can put our Christmas campaign that fits literally right |
| 0:53.5 | under the nose of a consumer. |
| 0:55.4 | And why social media has transformed the way brands, gift audiences, their festive ads. |
| 1:02.1 | You would have to skip the rapping part and give the audience something that excites them right away, |
| 1:07.8 | which can be quite challenging. |
| 1:10.4 | You'll be hearing all about that and much more in Business Daily from the BBC. |
| 1:22.0 | For many of us, this song signals their start of Christmas. |
| 1:27.9 | And in an ironic twist, for those of us who lament the commercialisation of the festive season, |
| 1:34.0 | it's an ad for a fizzy drink. |
| 1:36.4 | In fact, Coca-Cola's catchy campaigns have become so ingrained in Christmas culture that it's sometimes falsely claimed, |
| 1:43.5 | that the red and white outfit of Santa Claus himself was invented by the soft drinks company. |
| 1:51.6 | The holiday season is so important to the advertising industry that it's known as the Golden Quarter. |
| 1:58.2 | And this time round, it's set to shine even more brightly because according to |
| 2:02.6 | the industry body, the World Advertising Research Centre, spending on advertising globally |
... |
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