Epic, multi-million dollar, tear-jerking Christmas ads are all the rage globally. So why not in Australia?

WE’VE got the turkey, the tinsel, and even the festive jumpers. But there’s one Christmas staple Australia missed out on.

OF ALL the Christmas traditions Australia has borrowed from Europe and North America, from greetings cards depicting snowy scenes despite the fact we are in high summer to mulled wine and turkey, there is a modern custom we’re missing out on.

Along with a lack of Christmas TV specials, Australia has also failed to inherit the lavish festive TV ads which dominate screens, particularly in Britain.

And we’re not talking about a 30 second ad about how cheap prawns are. In the UK, the hotly anticipated Christmas TV ads are multi-million dollar affairs, created by Oscar winners, that chew up airtime and fill up the pages of newspapers and websites as an eager nations waits to see what yuletide epic will be offered up.

But Australian retailers are fighting back, with European style ads slipping into our commercial breaks.

$14M ADVERT

The big budget behemoth of TV advertising is UK department store John Lewis.

Every year, the retailer serves up a miniature movie often with a soundtrack sung by a famous musician. In 2013, John Lewis’ advert, a two-minute animation about a hare’s mission to help a grumpy bear enjoy Christmas, was so successful the accompanying song by Lily Allen went straight to the top of the UK singles chart. The profits of a range of merchandise that tied in with the advert was donated to charity.

This year’s $14m campaign, with a track by seminal UK indie band Oasis reinterpreted by Norwegian artist Aurora, featured a young girl’s interaction with a lonely man living alone on the moon and her efforts to bring him some Christmas cheer. It has been viewed 23 million times on YouTube alone.

A retail expert at Queensland University of Technology, Dr Gary Mortimer, said what was interesting about many UK Christmas adverts was that they are usually lacking any actual products.

TURKEYS

“It’s not about look at these turkeys at these prices,” he told news.com.au. “These big Christmas campaigns are creating a dialogue with customers saying we are about Christmas but it’s often the subliminal messages that creep through. They say that, at this time of year we help people out.”

Despite John Lewis traditionally taking out the Christmas honours for most loved advert this year it lost its crown to UK supermarket Sainsbury’s. Earlier this week, it was revealed a cool 26 million people had watched Sainsbury’s ad, voiced by actor Emma Thompson with music composed by Rachel Portman - both Oscar winners.

The supermarket has used a similar strategy to John Lewis of paring back on the hard sell and instead to aim for the emotional jugular while donating merchandise profits to charity. You don’t want to look like you’re cashing in too much, after all.

The ad details the troubles of a calamitous cat who manages to at once burn down the family’s house on Christmas morning as well as call the fire brigade to then help save the day.

German supermarket chain Edeka beat them all garnering 32 million views for it’s innovative 2014 Christmas ad featuring store registers beeping along to the tune of Jingle Bells.

Meanwhile homewares chain Robert Dyas got heads scratching in the UK for its ad featuring staff and customers revealing their sexuality and then saying how their products are good for both gay and straight customers. Which is reassuring, if nothing else.

However, in Australia, festive ads are far less expensive or lavish often focusing on price or the family sitting around the dinner table for Christmas dinner.

AUSTRALIA HAS A LONG WAY TO GO

“Australian retail ads around Christmas time have predominantly focused on produce and price,” says Dr Mortimer. “In comparison to UK retailers and how well they advertise Aussie retailers have a long way to go but we’re starting to see it.”

He singles out Myer’s Christmas TV effort. Created by Aardman Animations, the people behind Wallace and Gromit, it follows an neurotic elf, a sassy reindeer, a mouse and the Christmas tree fairy as they trek through a forest. Like UK ads, no product appears and Myer is only mentioned at the very end of the work.

“The Myer ad is really interesting as it taps into a northern hemisphere Christmas of snow and reindeer none of which appears in Australia.

He said it borrowed from the collective history of Myer’s famous Melbourne Christmas window displays. “When you start to see those images of snowmen and reindeer it brings it back going shopping with mum and dad as a child.”

Myer’s Chief Marketing Officer, Daniel Bracken, told news.com.au the thinking behind the campaign was to take a fun look at the fact that, “everyone comes to Myer at Christmas”, even the Christmas icons like Santa’s elves and reindeer.

“While Aardman is based in the UK, the idea was to bring some magic to our Christmas campaign this year in a whimsical way, but also in a uniquely Australian way,” said Mr Bracken.

Creating the campaign took four months that saw each of the four characters sculpted by hand and filmed frame by frame.

SURFING SANTAS

German retailer Aldi has been known for its off beat Australian Christmas ads, one of which notably featured surfing Santas. This year’s campaign, seemingly counter intuitively, looked at the stress of Christmas.

An Aldi spokesman told news.com.au the ads were meant to be irreverent and were unique to Australia.

“The gifts, the food, the pressure of shopping and the expectations of the season can make Christmas an extremely stressful period. But among the stress, panic and dramas, there are real moments of warmth and togetherness that make it all worthwhile.”

David Jones, however, has taken a very different tack. Despite an epic ad featuring former Sydney Swans player Adam Goodes released just months ago, the top-end department store decided to ditch a big budget Christmas TV ad campaign entirely. Instead, they focused on a series of portraits, seen instore and in print ads, depicting Australian personalities having fun together.

Models Jessica Gomes and Nicole Trunfio party on in David Jones’s print ads. Picture: supplied.

Richard Roxburgh is pictured with his wife Silvia Colloca while Jessica Gomes parties with fellow model Nicole Trunfio.

Dr Mortimer said David Jones’ move was curious and would lead to it having a lower profile in the media but their recent increased sales may have something to do with their decision.

“DJs is happy with its sales, so they may be saying we don’t need to flog ourselves to market because people are already coming through the doors.” But it was risky. “And it might backfire for them if they don’t get the sales this Christmas.”