Tesco Ireland / BBH Dublin 'Become more Christmas' activation

Tesco Ireland gifts neighbourhood a Christmas surprise

The campaign, created by BBH Dublin, highlights the community work of Seán White from Palmerstown, Dublin

By creative salon

06 December 2023

Every neighbourhood has that one person who takes their Christmas decorations to a different level. In a local community in Palmerstown, Dublin, one man has been lighting up his street for the past twenty years. This year, Tesco Ireland and BBH Dublin joined forces with his neighbours to help return the festive favour.

Local hero Seán White creates a Christmas light display for the community every year, supported by his family and friends, and to raise money for a local boy who has cerebral palsy.

In a mission to superpower the efforts of a man who embodies the meaning of ‘Become More Christmas’ and builds that festive cheer from the moment the Halloween decorations are down, Seán’s wife Lorraine worked with Tesco Ireland and BBH Dublin along with Back Up Marketing to put on a showstopper light display, not just at Seán’s house, but also for his neighbours’ houses.

Seven houses in his neighbourhood were decorated to Christmas perfection with different themes including Winter Wonderland, Santa’s Grotto and a wildlife theme. The surprise was completed with music live from barbershop choir, The Ramparts along with mulled wine and mince pie sampling.

Sam Caren and Aubrey O’Connell at BBH Dublin were the lead creatives across the activation.

Sam Caren, Creative Lead at BBH Dublin said: “Seány has been making his neighbour’s lives more Christmassy, and pulling pranks on them for 20 odd years now, so it was a lot of fun to help them show Seány what they’ve learned from him and return the favour by helping him Become More Christmas for a change.”

Cathal Deavy - Customer Director Tesco Ireland added: “It is really special to be able to celebrate Sean and give something back to someone who does so much for his community. Sean truly embodies what it means to ‘Become More Christmas’ and works tirelessly every year to spread Christmas joy, so we are delighted to be able to transform his street into the ultimate winter wonderland for him to enjoy. At Tesco, community is extremely important, so being able to work with Sean’s family, friends and neighbours to pull off this surprise was nothing short of Christmas magic.”

The activation is part of Tesco’s wider Christmas campaign, 'Become More Christmas', to help get everybody into the festive spirit.

The wider Tesco Christmas campaign kicked off with a film that captured the moments that bring on that Christmas feeling in a weird and wonderful way, tapping into the insight that for many of us, Christmas is about so much more than the big day. While there will always be the ‘Big Christmas Shop’, the need for festive goods and festivities in general starts a lot earlier than the 25 December.

In fact, a recent survey by Tesco found that almost half the nation (47 per cent), gets that Christmas feeling when they put up the Christmas tree, followed by the day the lights get turned on in town (16 per cent), so there’s no doubt that the Christmas feeling was abundant in Palmerstown this weekend.

BBH’s Felipe Serradourada Guimaraes was the campaign’s deputy executive creative director, and Elliott White and Will Maxey were the lead creative team. The film was directed by Alaska (Marco Lafer and Gustavo Moraes) through Iconoclast. Media was handled by Mindshare.