The Elf on the Shelf readies for its best Christmas ever
BRANDORA Editorial Staff - June 2020UK brand research confirms continued growth for this festive favourite brand
With less than five months to go until families across the world welcome The Elf on the Shelf® back into their homes in the run up to Christmas, Rocket Licensing, the property’s licensing agent in the UK and Eire, is looking forward to the brand’s best year ever following a phenomenal 2019. With Google Trends (May 2020) revealing that The Elf on the Shelf® had significantly more searches in the UK last Christmas than its brand rivals, the stage is set for the fun-loving Scout Elf™ to continue capturing the nation’s imaginations as a festive favourite.
From 2017 to 2019, The Elf on the Shelf® saw a 50 per cent growth in UK sales, with The Elf on the Shelf®: A Christmas Tradition box set averaging a 40 per cent growth on Amazon, and the Claus Couture accessories seeing an incredible 500 per cent growth from 2018. Overall, there are now over 2,500 adoption centres (stockists) for The Elf on the Shelf® in the UK.
Brand partnerships executed last Christmas helped put The Elf of the Shelf® in front of consumers in a range of ways, including via animated specials from Universal. An Elf’s Story was the top Christmas DVD title in the UK in 2019, while the newly released Elf Pets: A Fox Cub’s Christmas Tale ranked third. For the second year running, the The Elf on the Shelf® entered homes on millions of cereal boxes in one of Kellogg’s most successful Christmas co-branded promotions ever, and greeted visitors to Hyde Park’s Winter Wonderland.
Brand awareness among consumers is also at an all-time high with the brand now firmly established as a favourite family Christmas tradition. Brand Tracking Research conducted by MMR on behalf of CCA and B, LLC in 2020 showed that almost one in two United Kingdom parents surveyed have top of mind awareness of the brand – second only to Santa– and half of those celebrate The Elf on the Shelf® tradition. The research also showed that The Elf on the Shelf® came in third in children’s top festive traditions, ahead of Christmas movies.
Robust, fun interaction with the brand continues to build with the online traffic to the brand’s websites and social media. Over 8.2 million video views on The Elf on the Shelf® YouTube channel come from UK viewers and over 400K visits made to the UK’s Santa’s Store site in 2019. The Elf on the Shelf® app has seen 225K lifetime downloads in the UK, and there were 235K minutes of Scout Elf™ and Elf Pets® games and activities played online in 2019 in the United Kingdom
The Elf on the Shelf® has firmly established itself as a UK Christmas tradition and now has 17 UK licensing partners in key categories including apparel, confection, publishing, games and health and beauty. Multiple new product categories will be launching across a wide range of retailers for Christmas 2020 in what is to be the biggest year yet for the brand.
Rob Wijeratna, Joint MD, Rocket Licensing, comments: “There is just no stopping The Elf on the Shelf® in the UK. The brand continues to grow every year, in every way. 2019 saw incredible results and we are confident that this year will be even better, with new partnerships, promotions and products further establishing the brand as one of the UK’s favourite family Christmas traditions.”