The past two years, adam&eveDDB has crafted sarcastic odes to selfishness in its holiday spots for English department store Harvey Nichols, with “Could I Be Any Clearer?” and “Sorry, I Spent It On Myself.” Now the agency is back with another similarly-minded campaign, “Avoid #GiftGace.”
The campaign is built around the agency’s term for false-gratitude and a 60-second spot showing a woman straining to appear happy and grateful while receiving gifts such as an English dictionary and an ugly sweater. After being told to try on the later, she whirls around, revealing her true reaction when not facing her family. The spot ends with the tagline, “Avoid #GiftFace.” By now, the approach is familiar and inextricably associated with the brand, but the execution falls a bit flat when compared to the agency’s past successes. Still, the annual celebration of the selfish side of Christmas has become a tradition for the brand and viewers are unlikely to forget who the ad is for, even if it does resemble AMV BBDO’s “Spare the Act” campaign for Currys PC World in its approach. Plus, “#GiftFace” is a pretty clever term (and hashtag).
“This year we wanted to help people avoid #GiftFace and ensure our customers give their special somebody a gift that truly hits the mark,” Shadi Halliwell, group creative and marketing director of Harvey Nichols told Adweek. “We worked closely with adam&eveDDB to create yet another compelling and comical campaign that we know the British public can relate to. We’ve all been there!”