Christmas advertising is now as much a battleground on social media as it is on TV, and this year the UK’s supermarkets have invested heavily in influencer partnerships, festive stunts, and emotional storytelling. While Waitrose may have captured hearts with its cinematic Keira Knightley and Phil campaign, the data tells a different story: Tesco has emerged as this year’s social media champion, dominating engagement, creator partnerships, and earned media value (EMV).
The headline numbers
In terms of earned media value, Tesco leads the pack by an enormous margin:
- Tesco: £2.6 million
- Asda: £856,000
- M&S Food: £811,000
These three supermarkets have formed the top tier of Christmas 2025 social performance.
Waitrose: hearts won, but not the metrics
Waitrose delivered the most emotionally resonant Christmas content with its romcom-style love story becoming a seasonal talking point and achieving 105,000 Instagram likes on its hero ad.
However, the brand’s influencer strategy was comparatively modest. Waitrose worked with just 81 creators, a fraction of Tesco’s army of 286. And while the ad itself struck a chord, its supporting content did not achieve similar traction. The “How to Say It With Food” reels featuring Gavin & Stacey’s Joanna Page and Mathew Horne have generated surprisingly low engagement, peaking at 13.7K likes.
Tesco: the relatable influencer marketing giants
While Tesco’s TV ad “That’s What Makes It Christmas” may have seemed underwhelming at first glance, pulling in a modest 6,278 Instagram likes, the supermarket has built a creator ecosystem that takes festive food content, gifting moments and season-specific hacks and spreads them through the nation’s most engaged micro-influencers.
Influencer depth and breadth
Tesco worked with:
- 286 influencers in total
- 64 on TikTok
- 222 on Instagram
This scale alone dwarfs rivals, demonstrating Tesco’s understanding that Christmas is not a one-message season, but a cascading set of behaviours: gifting, hosting, decorating, cooking, planning and coping.
The engagement crown
Tesco didn’t just appear everywhere; it dominated engagement:
- 188.4K Instagram interactions
- 41.7% Instagram share of voice
- More than 100K interactions ahead of Sainsbury’s (84.7K)
- And vastly ahead of Waitrose, which trailed with just 2.5% of share of voice for engagement
Tesco’s success came not from celebrity cameos but from everyday creators whose content feels authentic, achievable and fun.
Several standout influencers propelled Tesco’s reach far beyond its owned channels:
- @laurenscravings, with 180K followers, delivered 3.17 million views for her Yorkshire Pudding Toastie reel
- @thehomethestimsonsmade generated 1.54 million views for a Tesco reel with a following of just 9.9K.
Lidl: the unexpected earned media titan
If Tesco dominated engagement and Waitrose delivered emotion, Lidl won the award for the smartest brand idea.
Their Lidl Wrapped concept, a playful, Spotify Wrapped-inspired campaign using shopper data to design bespoke wrapping paper based on the most-bought items in each city, was a huge hit with –
- £385K EMV on Instagram
- 6.99 million views on Lidl’s own account
Lidl extended the concept into the real world with a free gift-wrapping tour visiting cities across the UK until December 11th.
Creators such as @thedarcytwins added momentum, generating 51.8K views showcasing the designs. Meanwhile, celebrity couple
Joe Swash and Stacey Solomon fronted the “Your 2025 Shopping Experience Wrapped” series.
M&S Food and Asda: quality and consistency
M&S Food delivered one of the most recognisable ads of the season, leveraging Dawn French once again to build on festive familiarity. The brand:
- Worked with 274 influencers on Instagram – the highest volume of any supermarket
- Generated 28.5K likes on its main festive spot
However, despite this scale, M&S placed third in EMV. Without the viral hooks of Tesco or the novelty of Lidl’s Wrapped concept, the campaign landed well, but didn’t dominate.
Asda, meanwhile, drove £856K EMV, fuelled by TikTok-friendly activations such as @daniellemsands23’s 4.3m-play reel about the supermarket’s festive movie night, evidence that Asda understands TikTok’s family-based, entertainment-driven culture.
Sainsbury’s: the BFG returns, but audiences don’t quite follow
Sainsbury’s brought back the BFG for a second year, but while the advert has warmth and character, the numbers were underwhelming on owned channels, with just 1,751 Instagram views.
However, Sainsbury’s creators picked up the slack. Influencer @kimberlys_journeyy alone earned 1.22 million views for a Sainsbury’s festive reel, proving that creators are the real engine of social media reach.
