Sainsbury’s has been quick off the mark this year as the first UK supermarket to launch its 2024 Christmas advert featuring Roald Dahl’s beloved character the BFG.

Ahead of the ad’s TV debut at 7pm tonight across ITV, Channel 4 and Sky, Grocery Gazette sat down with Sainsbury’s head of campaigns Emma Bisley to discuss this year’s theme, why it’ll resonate with shoppers, and what else we can expect from Sainsbury’s campaign this Christmas.

Finding the right balance this Christmas

The advert follows the BFG and Sainsbury’s colleague ‘Sophie’, who is played by a real employee, travelling the country in search of great tasting food, sourcing fresh produce from the supermarket’s suppliers, including salmon, Brussels sprouts and Stilton cheese.

It ends with a dining table full of Taste the Difference and Sainsbury’s dishes, before Stephen Fry invites customers to seek the retailer’s expertise, asking “Want to go big this Christmas? Ask Sainsbury’s. Good Food for all of us”.

Bisley says that this year, Christmas comes when “times are tough”, with many still feeling the effects of the cost-of-living crisis. However, she adds that Sainsbury’s spends lots of time talking to customers and knows that they still want to treat themselves for the big day.

“People want to feel familiar, and warm and cozy and excited and feel connected with their family and friends. It felt like the right combination of things for us this year, a lovable character which has such a place in people’s heart, but a real colleague to bring some authenticity and then Taste the Difference food, which is brilliant quality and really well crafted.

“It felt like the perfect time to help people understand how they can cover a really big Christmas with Sainsbury’s.”

Bisley says that one of her proudest moments of the entire process is “showing colleagues that someone like them has done this amazing job” by having a real-life employee starring in the advert.

“Colleagues are the absolute fabric of our brand, and they’re what helps us stand out. There was never any question that we wouldn’t use real colleagues and I think customers really resonate.”

Connecting with shoppers through the ad was really important to Sainsbury’s, from the BFG’s friendship with Sophie to the final scene which sees an entire Christmas dinner secretly delivered to a family’s home, an addition which she believes “really makes Christmas”.

However, at the core of the advert is Sainsbury’s 2024 Christmas food range, with dishes such as its roasted Carrot Galette, Smoked Salmon and Maple Terrine, and a Golden Forest dessert featured.

“I hope people resonate with the way that all of our fresh produce is collected across the country and then the transforming of that into Taste the Difference food,” Bisley says. “What that’s meant to depict is the love and the care and the attention that everyone in Sainsbury’s has about food.”

Beyond the big screen

“When we see an idea we like, we have to be confident that it will work. Now more than ever, it’s not just about TV,” Bisley explains.

This year, the advert will first go live on Sainsbury’s social media channels and website at 8am “because that’s where people are going and looking these days,” she says.

Bisley notes that this year’s social strategy will be about “igniting joy and love” but with food “at the heart” as the grocer looks to showcase the range of products and the details gone into creating them.

“This year we really wanted to show the love and care, and the effort that everyone at Sainsbury’s puts into good food,” she says.

But of course, it’s not just food but the BFG that is sharing the limelight this year and Bisley says the much-loved fictional character will “pop up in lots of places” across the festive period.

“You’ll hear him on radio when a customer asks a question”, she teases in a move that looks to bring “humour and joy” to stores.

The idea of humour, which is “really important” to Sainsbury’s also translates across social media and the TV advert itself.

A short clip from the end of the ad, which was posted to social media in the run up to the premiere, showcases a large footprint left by the BFG in the sand on a beach, while an unknowing individual with a metal detector appears baffled at the sight of it.

“We don’t want people to be crying, but to feel warm about us as a brand. A bit of humour is a really great tool to do that and I think we’re a brand that has permission to be a bit funny.”

With a warm and nostalgic feel to this year’s campaign, Sainsbury’s is certainly going to get viewers into the Christmas spirit.