Dreaming of an orange Christmas

Coca-Cola has a Christmas campaign every year. Its usual focus is on Santa Claus with an old-fashioned theme, taking us back to the days when children were happy to find an orange and an apple in their stockings and weren’t pestering their parents from September about what presents they wanted. They want to give us that warm, nostalgic feeling, for us to associate it with their company and buy their product during the Christmas period. Seems successful enough. Coke is, after all, still one of the world’s favourite soft drinks.

When Irn-Bru was considering what type of message to project in their first Christmas campaign then, did they think about emulating this successful strategy? Erm… No.

In true Irn-Bru style, they opted for humour. We wouldn’t have expected anything else.

Their first 60-second advert in ten years, “Phenomenal Christmas”, is based on the famous seasonal song “Walking in the Air” from 'The Snowman' animated film. The boy begins by flying happily in the air with his new friend, the snowman, but finds himself on the wrong side of the frosty character when he refuses to share his Irn-Bru. He still ends up flying through the air, yet it is on his drop to George Square after the snowman steals his beloved drink.

Gerry Farrell of the Leith agency, who developed the ad, stated “I think it’s Barr’s plan that the advert comes back Christmas after Christmas”. “We’re hopeful that it’ll become a well-loved Scottish classic.”

We hope so too! If you haven’t already seen the ad, watch and laugh! And, if you feel like singing aong, here are the lyrics:

“We're walking in the air,
I'm sipping on an Irn-Bru,
My chilly snowman mate says he would like some too.
I tell him "get your own",
He looks like he is going to cry,
I tell him once again, the Irn-Bru is mine.

Now I'm falling through the air,
I wonder where I'm going to land.
He nicked my Irn-Bru and let go of my hand.”