By Laurie Wilson

WestJet’s latest “Christmas Miracle” spot is a refresh of the campaign’s first incarnation, by Studio M, in 2013, in which travellers in Toronto spoke to an on-brand blue Santa about their holiday gift hopes. To their surprise, flyers found their wishes waiting for them upon landing in Hamilton, thanks to WestJet’s “Real-Time Giving” team of employees.

In this year’s spot, entitled “Parents’ Wishlist,” the gift ideas come from children who tell Santa what they think their parents will want most for Christmas, before flying from Toronto to Calgary. The WestJet employees then took on real-time gift shopping duties during the 4.5-hour flight, racing through stores across Calgary to gather all of the requested gifts and wrap them just in time.

“We definitely brought a new spin to an old concept,” Jennifer Callegaro, WestJet’s director of marketing, tells strategy. “So it was a fun juxtaposition of something old but new, which kind of mirrors a little bit of where our brand strategy is going, as well right now.”

For the campaign’s 2024 iteration, WestJet’s AOR Rethink also teamed up with the airline’s employees in front of and behind the cameras.

Gift ideas from the children ranged from a lone avocado to a trip to Italy, and those who struggled for ideas were offered gift suggestions supplied by WestJet partners, such as tickets to next year’s CFL Grey Cup, gift cards from Skip and electronics from Telus.

Callegaro says the campaign aims to bring levity to the WestJet flying experience while highlighting the company’s customer-service bona fides and the workforce’s storied connection to the airline’s business plan.

“When we think about ‘Christmas Miracle’ as a campaign in general, we always aim to make it about making the impossible possible,” Callegaro says. “And so there needs to be an element of, well, what do our guests think is impossible, and how can we rise to the challenge and make that happen?”

Rethink’s ECD Don Shelford says working on an unscripted real-world production can be “frightening,” but that the right mix of participants and improvisational urgency makes the spot stand out. “I think by using children… we were kind of hoping for the curveballs,” says Shelford, adding that “the more strange the request,” the more humorous and fun the spot became.

“Parents’ Wishlist” represents the first holiday offering for WestJet’s recently launched new brand platform. Three-minute and 15-second versions of the spot rolled out on Dec. 9 and will be airing on television, in movie theatres and across social media.

Media planning was executed by Media Experts.