What: John Lewis has unveiled its 20th Christmas advert, a Saatchi & Saatchi campaign with the tagline "Don't give up on giving", featuring Dame Kristin Scott Thomas and Paul Whitehouse voicing Pickles the dog.

Why it is important: John Lewis is building its golden quarter message around shoppers' confidence in choosing gifts rather than around product or price, the same theme as its Gift List vodcast and its early Christmas shop launches.

John Lewis has unveiled its Christmas advert for 2026, marking the 20th year of its high-profile seasonal campaigns. The ad, created by Saatchi & Saatchi, focuses on consumers' lack of confidence in choosing a Christmas gift and seeks to bring people together across generations in a spirit of seasonal joy. It centres on "rediscovering the joy in gifting" under the tagline "Don't give up on giving".

It features Dame Kristin Scott Thomas, with Paul Whitehouse voicing Pickles the dog, set to a Sam Fender soundtrack of the Rolling Stones' "You Can't Always Get What You Want".

Marketing and loyalty director Rosie Hanley called the advert a beloved tradition that the team wanted to feel extra special this year, with a storyline many customers will relate to. She said she has resorted to putting cash in an envelope for fear of getting a gift wrong, and hopes the campaign restores the nation's gift-giving confidence.

The ad first aired on John Lewis social channels, including YouTube and Instagram, from 7.30am on 3 November, and runs on TV during Coronation Street and The Great British Bake Off that evening.

IADS Notes: The advert follows an early start to John Lewis's festive season: the online Christmas shop opened more than 100 days before Christmas after searches for "Christmas" on johnlewis.com rose 33% week-on-week following the World Cup final (Retail Week, August 2026), and the in-store Christmas shops opened 93 days ahead of the day, with gift-wrap searches up fivefold (Retail Week, September 2026). The gifting theme also runs through the six-episode Gift List vodcast, hosted by Angela Scanlon with celebrity guests and framed as entertainment rather than promotion, which is distributed across YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts and johnlewis.com alongside social cutdowns (Fashion Network, September 2026). The campaign arrives as John Lewis holds 3.09% of UK fashion and retail brand searches, up 0.03 percentage points year on year, while online-first players such as Shein, Very and ASOS lost share (Retail Times, October 2026).

John Lewis unveils its 20th Christmas advert

What: El Corte Inglés has put a new managing director, hired four months ago from Karl Lagerfeld, in charge of Sfera, its fashion chain of more than 500 stores, while reorganising the group's fashion division.

Why it is important: El Corte Inglés is rebuilding its fashion organisation around executives from fast fashion and international brands, as fashion becomes the group's main growth driver.

El Corte Inglés has hired Paula Jiménez Tamayo as managing director of Sfera. She joined four months ago from Karl Lagerfeld, where she spent seven years and rose to vice president of sales. She started at Inditex, with more than seven years at Tempe, before moving to Mango and then Converse in the Netherlands.

Sfera turned twenty-five in 2026 and is the group's main fashion brand, the only one with an independent distribution network. At the close of FY2025 it had 547 stores: 167 owned, 309 franchised and 71 corners inside El Corte Inglés. It operates in around twenty countries, mainly in Latin America, Asia, Europe and the Middle East.

The appointment coincides with a reorganisation of the fashion area. Elena Lazcanotegui now leads external and own women's brands as a single unit. She reports to Laura Moreno, head of home and fashion purchasing, alongside the men's, children's, intimates and swimwear, and Sfera directorates.

Fashion sales reached €5,882 million in FY2025. The group posted consolidated revenue of €17,247 million, up 1.14%, and net profit of €628 million, up 22.8%.

IADS Notes: The Sfera appointment follows a run of management changes at El Corte Inglés under chairperson Cristina Álvarez. In March 2026 the commercial side was reshuffled: Enrique Hidalgo was promoted to sales management director, a new country manager was named for Portugal and the purchasing department was split (Modaes, March 2026). In June, Javier Catena returned as CEO, the seventh leadership change in recent years, with every business unit now reporting to him (Modaes, June 2026). Fashion is the division being reinforced. Fashion sales rose 3.1% in FY2025-26 and the segment is described as a key growth driver, alongside a €3 billion investment plan through 2030 (Press Release, June 2026). Sfera is the group's main international vehicle. It closed FY2024 with 529 stores, owned in core markets and franchised abroad, and was preparing to launch its renovated format in Mexico. Its store and expansion strategy has been led by Ángela Goitia since late 2023 (Modaes, November 2025).

What: SKP's founder Ji Xiao'an draws on his love of literature, fine art and opera to shape the luxury department store's design, programming and community, according to a panel of its architect and cultural partners.

Why it is important: As the group expands from Beijing to Wuhan and Guangzhou, a coherent design language and cultural programming give SKP a consistent identity across very different sites.

At a talk moderated by Kering's president of Greater China, Cai Jinqing, three speakers discussed how art, opera and fashion shape SKP: Sybarite cofounder Torquil McIntosh, iSing! Festival founder Tian Hao Jiang, and Wu Hongliang, president of Beijing Fine Art Academy and chief curator of Wuhan Biennale 2026.

Sybarite began working with SKP in 2012 on its logo, then extended that visual language across retail surfaces, interiors and architecture. McIntosh described the founder's original vision as transforming a mall into departments where brands sit comfortably. Each city has posed a different challenge, from an underground space in Chengdu to an existing building in Wuhan.

Tian's connection began when his autobiography, recounting his career at New York's Metropolitan Opera, led him to SKP Rendez-Vous, its in-house bookstore, and then to Ji himself. Their friendship brought the iSing! festival, which has recruited more than 400 young artists from over 38 countries in 15 years, to Wuhan. Tian argued that opera, like fashion, is about human stories.

Wu said the Biennale chose "walk and talk" as its slogan to bring art closer to the local community through chance encounters, inside the museum and beyond.

IADS Notes: SKP's developer-managed, experience-driven model is also delivering commercially: group turnover rose 15% in 2025, with SKP Beijing returning to growth and Louis Vuitton and Miu Miu opening mega-flagships at SKP Wuhan (WWD, February 2026). Wuhan keeps attracting first-time entrants, with Chanel choosing SKP's K Avenue promenade for its first store in the city (WWD, October 2026). Sybarite is designing the group's next project, a mixed-use complex in Guangzhou's Tianhe District that combines retail with residential, office and cultural spaces (WWD, March 2026). The architecture firm's own research argues that leading luxury retailers stay competitive through adaptability and immersive, personalised experiences (Sybarite, November 2025). In Europe, Le Bon Marché and Galeries Lafayette are pursuing a comparable cultural strategy, using artist collaborations and partnerships with institutions such as the Centre Pompidou-Metz to turn their stores into cultural destinations (Le Figaro, March 2026).

How art, opera and fashion shape SKP