Percy Pig comes alive in M&S Christmas campaign featuring Dawn French and Tom Holland

Even though Percy Pig has been around for 30 years and sells 16 million packs a year, Grey and Marks & Spencer are presenting 2021 as his first real Christmas for the purposes of their festive ad campaign.

Well, it’s the first year he’s been accidentally brought alive by Dawn French’s Christmas fairy, and voiced by Tom Holland of Spiderman fame. The duo take a tour of an M&S store in the dead of night, highlighting lots of the Christmas goodies as they go.

Grey London — no longer the retained agency on M&S Food — will be pleased to have won the Christmas brief and they’ve done a good job of lifting the brand while showcasing lots of product.

The clothing ad is also a notch above recent efforts. Like the food one, it showcases product in a more lighthearted way that in past campaigns. This spot is the best effort so far by agency Odd, and the “XM&S” touch is a clever one — surprising they haven’t thought of that before.

MAA creative scale: 6.5 apiece.