Woolies unveils Christmas campaign starring Westlife

The ad carries on from the "More great news" theme of earlier this year, and features sheepdog news anchorman Worth cross to sheep roving reporter Wooly, who is taking a journey on an express train touring a Woolworths store.

The train hurtles through a "chocolate land", a "3 for 2 forest" and a "Toyland". It passes elves dressed in Ladybird dress-up, a giant present-wrapping machine and a giant robot dinosaur toy called a Roboraptor.

At the end of the ad, the train ends up in "Entertainment Land" where Westlife are singing 'White Christmas'.

Later, the train veers towards them and they jump out of the way, falling into snow. Westlife then throw a snowball at Wooly, but it misses and hits Worth in the face.

At the end of the spot, the Big Red Book opens to reveal a huge Christmas tree with a giant bauble on top. The bauble falls, burying Worth in the snow.

The campaign includes six TV executions, an in-store POS suite, press ads, flyers and a Christmas microsite. All will promote the Big Red Book catalogue.

Stephen Robertson, Woolworth's marketing director, said: "It's a return to the Woolworths advertising of old, which customers fondly remember as capturing the excitement of Christmas, but we've brought it bang up to date and made it relevant to Woolworths today with messages like online shopping, in-store ordering and tactical deals."

Media buying for the campaign was handled by ZenithOptimedia.

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