Sainsbury for your Christmas shopping. They have earned it.

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24 years 2 months

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In cooperation with the Royal British Legion, a really good try at getting rid of all the fairies, bears and cutsie animals.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWF2JBb1bvM

They get my shopping pound this Christmas.

Moggy

Original post

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14 years

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A very clever piece of marketing.

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11 years 5 months

Posts: 11,141

They and their rivals certainly need clever marketing as they compete for top spot this Christmas......

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14 years

Posts: 4,996

I can see our local Sainsburys when I look out of our front window. Although we haven't done our main shopping there
for a few years now, preferring Lidl.
We can drive a mile and a half to Lidl, do our shopping and be home again, in the time it would take to get through
the checkout at Sainsburys.

I haven't watch the complete video yet, but am surprised that some find it in bad taste.

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11 years 5 months

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I would imagine that the large majority will stick with the store they normally use and few will be wooed away by a clever advert.

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24 years 2 months

Posts: 16,832

I'm sure it will make little difference to the majority. It is a battle of prices and connected loyalty voucher schemes.

But they would spend the money on promotion anyway, and I think in the centenary year that was a good use of that money, and we to whom it matters might think of rewarding them.

Moggy

Personally I do most of our shopping at Sainsbury Kings Lynn anyway, largely because it's a new store with massive wide aisles. This makes shopping less of a nightmare of weaving around obese women of both sexes stopping for a chat with their equally obese friends.

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I haven't watch the complete video yet, but am surprised that some find it in bad taste.

Maybe not 'bad taste' but I'm a little uneasy about combining the current heightened awareness of the First World War and the history of the 'Christmas Truce' in an attempt to get us to shop at Sainsbury's.

Not that the First World War hasn't been used in TV advertising before but it just seems a bit more cynical now.

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Personally I do most of our shopping at Sainsbury Kings Lynn anyway, largely because it's a new store with massive wide aisles.

Don't get too used to it, apparently the shopper doesn't like being in wide aisles since the feel too open and exposed. At least, that is what the marketing guys say, giving them the opportunity to reduce the aisle width and stick another coffee shop, launderette, shoe repair kiosk or MacKing burger counter in the newly available gap - which has happened in several of the larger supermarkets around my way. At least that makes it difficult to leave their flaming great stock trollies in the way of the baked beans or breakfast cereal.

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11 years 5 months

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It appeared last night during something my wife was watching. Yes, cynical exploitation was my gut reaction. But the big retailers are desperate these days - especially Sainsbury, Tesco and Morrisons.

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What's the betting that if Tesco had run this add, the media would have been on their backs straight away ?
Whereas Sainsbury seem to have gotten away with it.

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11 years 5 months

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"Gotten" away with it.....? Too much influence from our American members methinks!:)

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24 years 2 months

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I think the cynicism is in the mind of the viewers, not the creative team who devised it and crafted it so carefully, nor the client who signed it off. It is a superbly done little movie segment, dozens of times superior to 'Fury'

There's no 'getting away'. It is a moving piece (even if it had to cram in all the mini stories from that Christmas 1914 in one go)

Or should they just have trotted out more cute cartoon animals and CGI fairies like the rest?

Moggy

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11 years 5 months

Posts: 11,141

A cleverly judged piece of PR which will do the store no harm at all. But whether or not it will pull in more customers to spend more is another matter. If not, in advertising terms, it will have failed dismally. The shareholders will not be interested in some short term capitalisation on the season of remembrance unless sales and profits are up for Christmas and thus their share value.

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24 years 2 months

Posts: 16,832

Er yes.

So do you think cartoon animals would have been more likely to achieve those goals? Or just unfeasible Christmas lunches with a few dozen 'family' people round the table and one Aldi/Lidl turkey to share between them? (Can't remember which one is running this)

Moggy

PS: As a Sainsbury shareholder I approve fully.

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17 years 6 months

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I think the cynicism is in the mind of the viewers, not the creative team who devised it and crafted it so carefully...

I'm not disputing the quality of production but let us be clear about the motives of those that signed it off...

...they wanted to sell more baked-beans!

And it is slightly cynical to exploit the extra publicity that the 1914 Christmas Truce will get in 2014. The 1914-1918 war has been used in advertising before; in fact, in one of my all-time favourite TV adverts (yes, I am sad enough to have favourites) but that wasn't at a time when that particular war was so much in the media and at a time when it is being viewed with so much 'deference' (that's probably not the right word but I can't think of a better one right now). If this advert was for the Samaritans, or another worthy cause, I'd have no problem with it, but to sell more baked beans? Yes, I do think that's a bit cynical.

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14 years

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When all is said and done, it's a well made advert.
Whether or not it will pull in more customers, who knows ?

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11 years 5 months

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It's not my job to determine what will produce more footfall more profit and increased shareholder value.

If their exploitation of the anniversary succeeds you will be doubly satisfied.

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24 years 2 months

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Is it exploitation of an anniversary or recognition of a significant event in European history? I think being able to see two sides of the battle gives a little more human feel to what seems to be a one sided commemoration.

Maybe as a Sainsbury's shopper I should confess a little bias -however in the times we live where everything seems to get devalued and examined to the degree where the slightest emphasis on any group is viewed as as slight I enjoyed it -which I guess is why they fought the war!

We could of course use the example of Paul McCartney with the 'Pipes of Peace' which showed the same truce - the cynical amongst us might view that as purely a vehicle to sell records - the pragmatic might argue that if Sainsburys and McCartney wish to portray a tiny few moments of sense in the senseless carnage of young people it can only have a positive effect .

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14 years

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The fact that all signs of Christmas in Sainsbury's stores disappears on Boxing Day, speaks volumes for me.
You wouldn't have thought that Christmas had happened. (not that I shop on Boxing day).

They are now geared up for Easter, with a break for Valentines day in February.