The archive · Advertising · Marketing decision · 2015
John Lewis 'Man on the Moon' makes a lonely man the gift — 2015's most-watched ad
Adam & Eve/DDB had a girl send a lonely moon-dweller a telescope for Christmas; the film became YouTube's most popular ad of 2015.
John Lewis
What it had to solve
John Lewis's Christmas ad is a national event in the UK, and each year's film has to beat the retailer's own previous ones. For 2015 John Lewis also wanted the campaign to say something about elderly isolation, so it partnered with the charity Age UK.
How it works
Every November, John Lewis's Christmas ad is treated as a national event in the UK, and the retailer's own past films set the bar. For 2015, John Lewis partnered with Age UK and wanted the campaign to raise awareness of isolation among elderly people.
Adam & Eve/DDB's 'Man on the Moon' opens on six-year-old Lily, who uses her telescope to find an old man living alone on the moon. She tries various ways to reach him and finally floats him a gift by balloon: a telescope, so he can look back and see her — and everyone — on Earth.
The film was set to Aurora's cover of Oasis's 'Half the World Away' and supported by a wider campaign with Age UK, in-store gifts and social activity built around the line 'Show someone they're loved this Christmas'.
The ad was the most shared of its week — 192,370 shares on Unruly's viral chart — and ended the year as YouTube's most popular ad of 2015. Beyond the numbers, it made the loneliness of older people a mainstream Christmas conversation.
Why it lands
- It inverted the ad's usual logic: instead of a gift inside the ad for the viewer, the film's hero gives a gift to a stranger, which is the behavior the brand wants Christmas to be about.
- The story needed no words — the telescope-and-balloon gesture carried the whole emotional argument, so it translated across audiences.
- Pairing sentiment with a real cause (Age UK) gave the emotion weight and a reason to exist beyond selling.
- The film's shareability was engineered: a simple, retellable gesture ('send a gift to the moon') gave viewers something to pass on.
What it did
It became the most shared ad of the week in the UK — 192,370 shares counted by Unruly — and topped YouTube's year-end ranking of the most popular ads of 2015. The campaign also put elderly loneliness on the national Christmas agenda through its Age UK tie-up.
What you can take
Give the audience a gesture they can repeat: sending a gift to the moon let the film's sentiment travel with viewers, and the charity partnership gave the emotion somewhere to land.
Since then
The campaign led the UK's viral chart with 192,370 shares in its launch week and ranked as YouTube's most popular ad of 2015, ahead of Sainsbury's 'Mog's Christmas Calamity'. John Lewis's partnership with Age UK drew attention to elderly isolation during the festive season. For the industry, the film cemented the John Lewis Christmas ad as a media event and showed that an emotional story tied to a genuine cause could outperform spectacle.
Sources
- John Lewis "the man on the moon" by Adam & Eve/DDB
- Campaign Viral Chart: John Lewis back on top as Christmas ad leads most shared
- YouTube's top 10 most popular ads of 2015
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