BBH and main retail client Waitrose may have imposed their own self-denying ordinance this Christmas – preferring to expend Delia Smith and Heston Blumenthal on a charity pitch – but it’s wheeled out the fizz (non-vintage definitely) and christmas pudding (literally) for cheap and cheerful mail order high street fashion chain Matalan instead.
It’s a rather modest effort for an admittedly modest brand. But this is what the UK’s Christmas advertisers seem to be saying this year: you may not have much money but you can still enjoy yourselves (a bit).
A sign of dreary times without a doubt. And one think tank this morning forecast that ‘austerity’ would go on until 2018. Which would realise a lost decade to match that of Japan in the 2000s.
What do we want for Christmas? Taxi for chancellor of the exchequer George Osborne!