Here's Why You're Seeing Fewer Christmas Car Commercials This Year
Isabel Armiento
· 4 min read
Most years, there’s a storm of Christmas car commercials come December, as
automakers
scramble to prepare for their end-of-year sales events. This year, however, things are a bit different. If you’re someone who looks forward to creative Christmas car commercials, you just might be out of luck this holiday season. Why aren’t automakers running car ads this year? Primarily because of supply chain issues, including
semiconductor chip shortages
, that have led to lower volumes of cars—meaning that automakers aren’t so much concerned about hiking up demand right now as they are supply. 
Supply chain issues mean there are fewer cars to sell
The lack of car commercials this Christmas is due to supply chain issues, as automakers are currently at only a third of their regular production volumes, according to
CarBuzz
. It’s no surprise that automakers are choosing to wait until they have more vehicles on their lots before spending their advertising budgets trying to sell them. According to
Car and Driver
, through summer and fall of 2021 automakers have spent 10% less on digital commercials than they did pre-pandemic, cutting their ad budgets by around $24 million. TV advertising budgets have been slashed even further, by a whopping $57 million, representing a spending decrease of 5 percent as compared to 2019. Some automakers will still be running holiday commercials, such as Ford’s “Get Holiday Ready” ads showing off its new line of F-series or Lexus’s “December to Remember” campaign. Still, these ads will not be as well-funded as in past years, and the deals on offer will likely be much more paltry.
Lexus U.S. vice president of marketing Vinay Shahani explained to
Reuters
that for Lexus to not run its regular December campaign—which the automaker has been doing for over two decades—would have been a bad call. “It’s too important to the brand. It’s part of our DNA,” Shahani said. Nevertheless, he concedes that “the offers may not be as compelling” this year. Some iconic Christmas car commercials we’ll be missing this year
With this year’s shortage of car commercials in mind, let’s look back on some best Christmas
car commercials
from the past 10 years. According to DriveTribe
, there have been several strong contenders. Audi’s 2017 Christmas commercial is a good one, with a relatable scene involving two drivers battling over a parking spot. Mercedes’s 2018 “Not Another Christmas Video” also makes the list for teasing the automaker’s new A-Class racing vehicle.
Lamborghini’s 2019 “True Christmas Story” wins for most heartwarming, taking car-lovers back to their childhoods. Audi’s 2016 “Let’s Change the Game” wins for most socially conscious, as rather than hinge on tired masculine tropes, this car commercial
confronts sexism
in the car industry. BMW’s 2013 “Fastest Christmas Song in the World” wins for most creative, by doing exactly what the title says—trying to write the fastest Christmas song the world has ever heard. It’s gems like these holiday car ads that we’re missing out on this holiday season.
Chip shortages predicted to continue into next year
Chip shortages are
driving down auto volumes
and correspondingly, car commercials—but how much longer will it last? According to CNBC
, the ongoing chip shortages could continue to affect automakers
through 2022, as well as continue to hurt other industries such as electronics and appliances. However, a JPMorgan analyst told CNBC that the chip shortage should lessen in intensity starting in mid-2022, as supply chains begin to return to normal.
Gokul Hariharan, the co-head of JPMorgan’s Asia-Pacific technology, media, and telecom research division said to CNBC, “We are not expecting 2023 to be in supply shortage,” adding that 2022 will be “a bit more tricky” to predict.
“All the U.S. and European IDMs [integrated device manufacturers, companies which design and sell semiconductor chips] are also expanding their capacity—a lot of it is slated to come online from the middle of next year onwards,” Hariharan explained.
Hariharan added that he is optimistic about two areas going forward: the high-end compute segment and the Chinese semiconductor long-tail technology segment. He explained that “there is a lot of fragmentation” in the high-end compute space, which is “leading to faster growth.”
“We are expecting it to grow maybe double digit—15% to 20%—over the next three to five years,” said Hariharan.
