Blog.
How to maximise your media campaigns at Tesco this festive season
As Christmas draws closer, Tesco is encouraging brands and their agency partners to pitch their ideas for innovative, full-funnel retail media campaigns. In this blog, Georgia Goodall, Head of Media Insight, shares some useful insight on how brands can reach key audiences during this crucial trading period.
The kids are back at school, the leaves are starting to turn, and the nights are drawing in - which means that shoppers are starting to make plans for the rest of the year, Christmas included. And if September feels a little too soon to start thinking about the festive season, then it’s worth remembering that 41% of Brits believe it’s never too early for brands to start showcasing Christmas goods1.
That’s especially true here at Tesco, where shoppers start to get in the Christmas spirit a lot earlier than you might expect. Last August, for instance, we saw customers picking up their first packs of mince pies on August 30th. In fact, by the end of the following weekend, well over 100,000 mince pies had been sold!
It’s not just Santa’s favourite snacks that start flying off the shelves early, though. Again, looking back at 2023, a fifth of shoppers who bought their Christmas lights at Tesco did so right after Halloween. And—all told—more than half of the people who purchased lights from us had them home before the first weekend in December.
This fervour to kick Christmas off early is a big deal for brands - concerns around the cost-of-living continue to linger, meaning that shoppers are beginning to prepare for big events earlier across a range of non-perishables. As well as helping to spread the cost of Christmas, that advance planning also means that they also have the financial flexibility to “trade up” where desired.
That has an onward impact on media activity, too. Take the first release of our Christmas delivery slots for delivery savers in 2023. On November 7th, the day on which those sought-after reservations became available, hundreds of thousands of customers logged on to secure their own. That’s impressive enough in isolation, but that huge influx of visitors had a significant impact on purchasing behaviour, too with basket adds surging on this day.
The audience is there, then—and there early, too. So, what exactly does that mean for your media plans?
Unrivalled reach meets an unbeatable creative canvas
The first thing to consider here is the sheer scale of the opportunity on offer. Put simply, nowhere has more customers getting into the Christmas spirit than Tesco. Last year, 22m customers shopped either in-store or on Tesco.com between November and December, resulting in hundreds of millions of individual shopping trips happening at this time that culminated in a purchase. In context, that means that the average customer is making multiple trips per week over this period.
This huge footfall resulted in some stellar results for the brands that advertised with us. Like-for-like sales increased by 6.8%, online sales rose by 11.5%, and more than half a million Whoosh orders were placed. In fact, Tesco’s overall market share in the four weeks before Christmas stood at 27.9%.
In 2024, those figures are likely to be higher still. Our customer base has continued to grow over the past year, and—with Tesco being the #1 regular main shop for Christmas food2 — we’re expecting even more festive shoppers to step through our doors. And, when they do, there’ll be plenty of exciting things for them to enjoy.
That’s because, over the past few years, Tesco has done more than ever to help people get into the Christmas spirit. There’s the Christmas Market, which brought sampling and inspiration to 150 locations in 2023. Or the Grotto, where kids can meet Santa and receive a free toy. Tesco Marketplace makes gifting easy with thousands of products from third-party brands. And there’s tesco.com, with its Christmas Shop Zone pages and Tesco Real Food for festive recipe inspiration.
These new experiences aren’t just great for customers, either. They’re also helping to give brands a much bigger creative canvas to play with—one that can power much richer and more engaging opportunities for brand expression. And, this year, Tesco is willing to collaborate with brands in a deeper way than ever before.
Over the past 12 months, for instance, we’ve seen some incredible applications of retail media from forward-thinking brands. From Cadbury's extensive, multiphase full-funnel campaign to celebrate their landmark 200th anniversary to Hellman's Giant Mayo bottles in train stations, not to mention PepsiCo’s Tesco Wembley store wrap for the UEFA Champions League Final, we’ve seen some brilliant—and incredibly theatrical—brand activations at Tesco stores as brands have utilised Tesco’s growing creative canvas.
What’s on your Christmas list this year?
Gigantic scale, reach and an ever-evolving approach to brand expression? But those aren’t the only things that we can deliver on, we can help brands understand customers like never before.
As every marketer knows, campaign success isn’t just about being able to reach the most people—it’s about being able to reach the right people. 14% of Tesco shoppers don’t celebrate Christmas, for instance, which means that targeting the right customers is important if you want to prevent wastage. It’s here that our “Christmas Audiences” come into play, helping you zero in on the shoppers most likely to respond to your campaigns. This year, for instance, we have…
- Traditional Christmas
Those perennial hosts who adore Christmas, and love celebrating with all the bells and whistles. These big spenders go all out across Beers, Wines & Spirits (BWS), Décor, Gifting, Cooking at Home, and more. - Family Time
Looking to make the festive period special for their young ones, the focus here is on decorating, cooking at home, and lots of presents for the kids. For these second-highest spenders, key categories include Kids’ Toys, Décor, and Snacks & Nibbles. - Social Celebrators
Typically older, post-family customers, these shoppers may not beto be the main hosts—but still enjoy getting together with their loved ones. Our third-highest spenders focus on Gifting, BWS, and Cooking at Home. - Party Mood
Did you know that the largest Tesco customer segment is the younger, pre-family shopper? These customers look forward to going out and making the most of the holidays. Enjoying sharing drinks, exchanging gifts and most likely go out to enjoy the city. BWS and Gifting are key categories here.
Even better, because we know who these audiences are, we also understand how they shop and consume media, too. And that enables us to work collaboratively with brands to create highly tailored media plans.
If we know that an audience works to a pre-planned shopping list, for instance, we can use upper funnel channels like social media and Tesco.com to reach them when they’re planning and prime them to make a purchase. If we know they spend longer instore, we can use Connected Display Screens and In-store Radio to prompt them to buy. And if we know they shop mainly in large Tesco stores, we can use Point of Sale to make a campaign truly unmissable.
Whoever the customer, our deep insights—in combination with our unrivalled reach and extensive creative canvas—means that we can help you engage with customers in the most effective way. And if that’s not a good reason to get the mince pies open a bit early, then nothing is!
Want to create a cracking Christmas campaign of your own?
Check out our accompanying webinar for more great insights and advice.
Contact your media planning lead or complete the enquiry form to let us know how we can help your brand win this Christmas.
1 Christmas in July: 41% of Brits say it's never too early for brands to start showcasing festive items - Performance Marketing World
2 Sources: dunnhumby Shop and Kantar TGI