Any "Christmas limited edition" actually wants to make money from you

Christmas is here, and of course, there will be holiday-limited marketing activities. But in the colorful holiday marketing, how can we capture consumers? What issues should we pay attention to during the activities? Let's take a look at the author's interpretation!

In recent days, the festive atmosphere of Christmas has become increasingly stronger.

Moreover, this atmosphere has gradually "spread" from buying Christmas trees and Christmas flowers to more areas. For example, Luckin Coffee and Coodi Coffee have launched Christmas limited drinks and peripherals, and Lay's has even launched a special edition of potato chips targeting party scenes.

As an important festival in the West, the influence of Christmas has spread from across the ocean to my country, and has gradually triggered a consumption boom. This festival full of joy and romance is not only an exchange of culture and customs, but also an important sales node for businesses in a year.

Whether it is due to holiday needs or the influence of the atmosphere, most consumers will increase their consumption expenditures.

1. Who seized the Christmas consumption season?

In the past few years, due to the booming consumption during the Christmas season around the world, the Merriam-Webster Dictionary has added a new word - "Christmas creep".

This term is used to describe the lively phenomenon that retailers launch many marketing strategies and themed products before Christmas in order to extend the winter shopping period, thereby increasing sales and seizing the market.

Many consumers are also affected by the spread of Christmas. According to the 2023 US Christmas Shopping Insights, 88% of consumers said they will celebrate Christmas in 2023. 48% of Generation Z said they will spend more on shopping this year than in 2022. In terms of the popularity of Christmas gifts, clothes and shoes top the list, with gift cards and electronic products ranking second and third respectively.

Source: "2023 US Christmas Shopping Insights"

As globalization progresses, domestic consumers have a deeper understanding of Christmas. Many brands and businesses are trying to tap into the market growth through the "Christmas spread".

Recently, food and beverage brands including Luckin Coffee and Algebraist, supermarket brands including Sam's Club and HEMA, and theme parks including Disney have launched Christmas season activities in an effort to boost consumption during the holiday season.

Luckin Coffee, which is already adept at cross-border marketing, will not miss any festival that can "make a fuss". Recently, Luckin announced that it will once again collaborate with "TOM and JERRY" to launch a new co-branded product "Christmas Sweetheart Latte". There is no co-branded paper cup this time, but the cup sleeve is printed with elements such as Christmas trees, cats and mice. At the same time as the "Christmas Sweetheart Latte", there are also 3 other drinks and 3 desserts.

Image source: Luckin Coffee official mini program

Luckin's rival, Kudi, is also not idle. Online information shows that Kudi has launched Christmas consumption activities in many cities. The activities include "9.9 tasting of Toffee Coconut Latte, Toffee Yogurt Latte, and Toffee Yogurt Rock Tea", "Purchase 2 or more drinks or 1 drink + food in a single order, and you can choose to receive a 'Spy Play House Officially Licensed Sticker'" and you can pay to purchase "'Spy Play House Officially Licensed Mouse Pad' and 'Spy Play House Officially Licensed Canvas Bag'" and so on.

Coffee brand Algebraist also launched a limited edition Christmas and winter series, including four products: Alpine cedar cocoa, Alpine cedar tea latte, apple cinnamon scones and raw chocolate mousse cake. In addition, Algebraist also invited artists to customize the oil painting "Warm Memories of Winter" with the theme of "Christmas Snow Season" and incorporate painting elements into the design of paper bags and cup sleeves.

In addition to food and beverage brands, there are also physical supermarkets and theme parks welcoming the arrival of Christmas. Sam's Club offers a variety of exquisite Christmas decorations, from Christmas trees, Christmas lights, to various Christmas ornaments and decorations, which can be purchased in one stop. Hema X Member Store launched a special version of Lay's potato chips in advance. This product uses a Christmas tree-shaped gift box, which contains 7 flavors and a total of 14 packs, which can basically meet the needs of a family.

Christmas-themed products in Hema X Member Store Source: Internet

The Christmas season at Shanghai Disneyland has already begun on November 23 and is scheduled to continue until New Year's Day. This year's Christmas-themed decorations extend from the main entrance through Mickey Avenue all the way to the Gardens of Imagination, and the glittering Christmas wreaths have made Mickey Avenue look brand new. The Disney Friends meeting points on Mickey Avenue will also be decorated with Christmas-themed backgrounds, providing visitors with a more immersive photo-taking experience.

In Shanghai, in addition to large theme parks like Disney, Christmas markets in various areas of Shanghai are also very popular. Data shows that different types of Christmas markets are held near more than ten Shanghai landmarks, including Hongqiao Tiandi, Jing'an Kerry Center, BFC Bund Financial Center, Tonglefang, MOHO MALL, etc. The longest duration can last from December 2 to January 2.

In this era of severe distraction, many brands and businesses are striving to grab consumers' attention during the Christmas season, thereby adding fuel to their year-end performance efforts.

2. The “two-sided motivation” behind the spread of Christmas

Why is there a consumption boom during the Christmas season? This can be analyzed from two aspects: consumer psychology on the C-end and merchant behavior on the B-end.

In Western countries, Christmas is the most important festival of the year, just as important as the Chinese New Year. Therefore, they also do some shopping around Christmas to prepare for the festival. For Chinese consumers, Christmas is more like a "Western festival" mixed with a variety of emotional needs. It is both a social festival and a ritual festival.

First of all, many people celebrate Christmas to meet social needs. Giving gifts to each other is one of the most popular social activities at Christmas, which adds an excuse to go out and socialize. It can be a date between single men and women or a gathering among friends. What to buy and what to give are secondary, and the emotional connection is the key. Of course, this emotional connection invisibly drives consumption.

Secondly, many people celebrate Christmas for a sense of ritual. Nowadays, more and more young people celebrate holidays, not necessarily because they like the connotation of the holidays, but because they like the sense of ritual in the holidays. A survey released by the Social Survey Center of China Youth Daily and Questionnaire.com showed that 90.9% of the young people interviewed would take the initiative to create a sense of ritual in their daily lives, and 63.5% of the young people interviewed believed that a sense of ritual is an important way to express emotions.

Many people are willing to pay for a sense of ritual. According to a consumer psychology study conducted by Nielsen, a market monitoring and data analysis company, 53% of people agree that consumption "requires a sense of ritual". Among consumers' reasons for purchasing, 82% focus on "emotional value".

There are also some people who have neither social needs nor ritual needs, and are more inclined to follow the crowd. Although many consumers now consider themselves rational, they often become irrational in groups. A simple example is the hot-selling products such as Jiangxiang Latte and Zibo BBQ. Because they are so popular that almost everyone is discussing them, consumers can't help but pay to try them. This kind of herd consumption has become the norm. The book "The Crowd" states that when an individual is an isolated individual, he has his own distinctive personality characteristics, but when he integrates into the group, all his personality will be submerged, and he will become emotional and irrational.

Therefore, with the overwhelming marketing promotions of businesses and the influence of people around them celebrating the festival, many people also celebrated Christmas. Maybe they just watched a movie or had a hot pot, but they also contributed to consumption.

Behind the surging Christmas trend, the consumption psychology of C-end consumers is the foundation, and the actions of B-end merchants are the driving force.

Although the actions of various businesses are different, they all grasp the same core - scene consumption .

The so-called consumption scene is to integrate products or services into a specific scene to give them emotional value. An excellent consumption scene can enhance consumer participation and experience, drive other consumption within the scene, and stimulate consumption vitality.

For example, Luckin Coffee's "Christmas Sweetheart Latte" not only follows the Christmas hot spots, but also creates a "nostalgic" scene. "Tom and Jerry" is a childhood memory for many young consumers. Some consumers will display the "Christmas Sweetheart Latte" on social platforms after buying it, thus satisfying their own social needs. Some people are fans of Tom and Jerry. They DIY stickers on coffee cups, which not only brings pleasure from memories but also satisfies their own personalized needs. The "double buff" has stimulated consumers' desire to buy.

Disney is also a master of "scene consumption". The same scene construction and clothing accessories as in the animation make consumers feel like they have walked into that fairy tale world. In order to welcome Christmas, Shanghai Disneyland has been decorated with new decorations, including handicraft workshops, entertainment performances, food, accommodation, etc., all decorated with Christmas elements, creating a huge scene that combines fairy tales and Christmas.

Therefore, scene is the killer weapon for businesses to seize the Christmas shopping season.

3. Beware of "Christmas fatigue"

A philosopher once said: "Everything is changing, the only thing that remains unchanged is change itself."

The “Christmas spread” will not last forever. While some brands are seizing the domestic consumption season, they must also be wary of “Christmas fatigue” after the “Christmas spread”.

One data shows that so far this year, the number of online mentions of Christmas has been lower than any year since 2020, with the number of mentions in November this year falling by nearly 2 million times compared to the peak in 2021.

Not only do consumers in some countries not want to mention Christmas, they are even more reluctant to spend money on Christmas. According to a survey on this year's Christmas, 77% of online sentiment about "Christmas spread" abroad this year is negative.

The direct reason behind this is that some consumers do not want to be disturbed by Christmas theme songs, food and movies for a long time. They are already tired of it, that is, "Christmas fatigue" occurs.

The more fundamental reason is that they hate the strong commercial atmosphere of Christmas and the large amount of aggressive marketing by businesses.

To solve these problems, on the one hand, we need to reduce the commercial atmosphere in the festival, and on the other hand, we need to inject more emotions into products or marketing to bring value beyond material things.

For example, the British candy company Cadbury has launched the "Secret Santa Mailing Service" activity for many years. This activity helps consumers mail free chocolates to their relatives or friends, allowing them to feel loved and blessed. In this activity, Cadbury not only did not make consumers spend more money, but gave them more discounts. This activity also made Cadbury gain more favor from consumers and continued to grow its performance. Last year alone, Cadbury's annual revenue increased by 261 million pounds.

Regardless of the festival, emotion is the best weapon for businesses to impress consumers. Conversely, when consumers have a differentiated perception of businesses, it can also help boost business growth.

According to the "First Law", the core principle of "Positioning Theory", a brand can achieve better long-term development by differentiating itself from its competition in the minds of customers and becoming the first in a certain field, thereby leading the business operations.

Christmas fatigue is a new challenge and an opportunity. This phenomenon reminds us that we need to pay more attention to consumers' emotional needs. In this special holiday consumption season, brands should not only pursue sales growth, but also pay attention to consumers' emotional experience to win their hearts.

References:

[1] “2023 US Christmas Shopping Insights”, Weizhuo

Author: Zhu Ming, Editor: Tang Fei

Source: Public Account: Value Planet (ID: ValuePlanet), discovering company value and telling capital stories.