That John Lewis ad – magnifico?

It's very unlikely that any of this lot just killed a man...

Do not adjust your set. It is NOT Christmas yet.

It’s easy to see why you might be confused, though. It seems to have become an eagerly anticipated signifier that it’s OK to start the festivities when the John Lewis advert arrives.

So when one suddenly appeared on Tuesday during that other institution, The Great British Bake Off, it’s easy to see why some of us might have had a sudden hankering for eggnog and mince pies.

Although the lengthy spot, featuring children performing Bohemian Rhapsody as the centrepiece of the world’s most elaborate school play, had no branding until the very end, it was pretty obviously from the same people who give us the heartstring-tugging Xmas epics.

But this one had a twist. At the end were not one, but two logos. Different, new, logos. For John Lewis & Partners and Waitrose & Partners.

Brace yourselves, everyone – it’s a rebrand! As both are employee owned, the inclusion of ‘& Partners’ is aiming to make them stand out, and the ad uses phrases such as “for us it’s personal” and “when you’re part of it, you put your heart into it” to emphasise the extra care and quality of service this means they provide.

Apparently, the new logos work better online and for fashion branding too, apart from being “modern” and “progressive”. Interesting, as I’ve already seem them described as looking like the print you get on deckchairs, or the logo for a particularly bland solicitors.

Of course, one drawback will be that we’ll all carry on calling the stores what we’ve always called them – “John Lewis”, and “I went in a Waitrose when I went South once – they’re a bit like Booths, aren’t they?”

Is this a clever move then? Will customers, current or potential, actually care? Someone seems to think so – a rebrand on this scale is an expensive thing to do. With the likes of House of Fraser and Homebase struggling or being taken over, it’s tough times for bricks and mortar stores.

That John Lewis are apparently axing 270 of the very Partners they’re bigging-up (according to The Guardian), doesn’t exactly look like a promising start to their new look and selling-point.

Anyway, enjoy the advert – there are variations on the way, apparently – and join me in wishing it was the full nearly-six-minute version of the original Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen, including all the lyrics and instrumentation.

Happy Christmas... Dammit!

This post first appeared as my "A wry look at the week" column, In The Mail, on Friday the 7th of September 2018. They re-titled it as "John Lewis ad... but not that one" and used my title at the first line. Yeah, I know.

Once again, the column also appeared on their website, with the alarmingly high-contract version of my picture that makes me look at least as old as time itself.

I genuinely do like the ad, and being a Marketing Knob, I get the whole re-brand thing. I'm even cool enough to have seen the ad first thing in the morning, too. Go me.

I've always liked JL, ever since visiting the magical Heelas store in Reading as a kid. So many things! Shiny! Hi-fi section! Happy days...

(CD A-Z: A Christmas mash-ups compilation, compiled by dj BC, called "Santastic II". That's how I roll. Deal with it.)

Shouting in the social media mirror

It was always tricky to fit everything you wanted into the intentionally short character count of Twitter, especially when, like me, you tend to write ridiculously long sentences that keep going on and on, with no discernible end in sight, until you start wondering what the point was in the first place. The maximum length of a text message originally limited a tweet to 140 characters, due to it being a common way to post your ramblings in Twitter’s early days. Ten years later, we’ve largely consigned texting to the tech dustbin, and after a lot of angst, the social media platform’s bigwigs have finally opted to double your ranting capacity to 280. Responses ranged from “You’ve ruined it! Closing my account!” to the far more common “Meh” of modern disinterest. As someone rightly pointed out, just because you have twice as much capacity doesn’t mean you actually have to use it. It is, of course, and excellent opportunity to use the English language correctly and include punctuat...

A fisful of change at the shops

A recent day out reminded me how much the retail experience has altered during my lifetime – and it’s not all good. I could stop typing this, and buy a fridge, in a matter of seconds. The shops are shut and it’s 9pm, but I could still place the order and arrange delivery. I haven’t got to wander round a white-goods retail emporium trying to work out which slightly different version of something that keeps my cider cold is better. It’ll be cheaper, too. But in amongst the convenience, endless choice and bargains, we’ve lost some of the personal, human, touches that used to make a trip to the shops something more than just a daily chore. Last weekend, we visited a local coastal town. Amongst the shops selling over-priced imported home accessories (who doesn’t need another roughly-hewn wooden heart, poorly painted and a bargain at £10?) was one that looked different. It’s window allowed you to see in, rather than being plastered with stick-on graphics and special offers calling ...

Making an exhibition of yourself

Now and again, it’s good to reaffirm that you’re a (relatively) normal human being. One excellent way of doing this is to go to a business exhibition. Despite what you might have surmised from reading my previous columns, I am employable, and even capable of acting like a regular person most of the time, even joining in the Monday morning conversation about the weather over the weekend, and why (insert name of footyballs manager here) should be fired immediately. The mug! True, there are times, often involving a caffeine deficiency, where it is like having the distilled essence of ten moody teenagers in the room, but I try and get that out of the way when people I genuinely like aren’t around to see it. As part of my ongoing experiment with what others call ‘working’, my ‘job’ involves me occasionally needing to go and see what some of my colleagues get up to outside the office, and what our competitors do to try and make sure that they do whatever my colleagues do better than ...

grumpyf1

Search This Blog