Creativity We Like: John Lewis Christmas Ad 2011
– By Luis Miguel Messianu | President & Chief Creative Officer –
Just in time for the holidays comes this gem from UK retailer John Lewis. It’s a beautifully simple and human idea that touches on life’s emotions and makes us believe again in the power of creativity and humanity.
Truth is that the concept of time changes as you age. Remember how slow life seemed when you were a child? It has to do with the raw principles of math. If you’re only 5 or 6 years old (like the star of this commercial is) time seems to move very slowly since it’s proportionally a large portion of your life. When you grow up it seems like time flies, since the older we get, every year becomes only a minuscule part of our life.
The element of surprise comes when we realize that what the kid was impatiently awaiting to do was to experience the joy of giving. What a beautiful notion!
The idea is incredibly well crafted and conveyed in such a relevant and credible way that it engages us from beginning to end. Amazingly, given that the spot is 90 seconds long, is the perfect length to make the use of time truly conceptual. The perfect gift for the advertising buff!
