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WATCH: Iceland Foods flexes partnership with Disney in Frozen-themed Christmas ad

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Iceland has paired their specialism in frozen foods with one of highest-grossing animated films ever, Disney’s Frozen, for this year’s Christmas advert.

The advert, which simultaneously promotes Iceland’s frozen products and the release of Frozen 2, airs for the first time today, November 1st, on ITV.

The 40-second spot is the product of a partnership created between Iceland and Disney last Autumn, prior to the release of Iceland’s banned 2018’s Christmas advert, and the plan all along was for the advert to promote both the upcoming film and Iceland’s Christmas range.

Neil Hayes, Marketing Director at Iceland, told Prolific North: “We’re very proud of the partnership with Disney that we’ve got. Within a few minutes of talking to the Disney team, it was clear that it was going to be one of those opportunities that doesn’t come around very often.”

Viewers of the advert will notice that the scene switches between a family Christmas and then the characters of Frozen playing charades and talking about their favourite thing about Christmas, before switching back to a Christmas dinner comprised of Iceland’s festive frozen food range.

Iceland’s team visited Disney’s production team in Los Angeles last year, when the film was still far from finished, and met the film producer Peter Del Vecho. One scene that seemed appropriate to use was the charades scene, an activity that LA-based producers didn’t know was a UK Christmas tradition. 

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The Magic of Frozen advert airs for the first time today on ITV


The partnership meant that Iceland had its own specific animations inspired by scenes in the upcoming film. Since meeting initially last year, they’ve worked hand-in-hand on the screenwriting whilst making use of Disney’s animation work.

“The overarching theme that we were going for was a feeling of warmth, that you typically get with Disney films – particularly Frozen 2. We wanted that to be woven through the spot,” Neil said. 

The partnership between Iceland Foods, headquartered in Deeside, and Disney extends beyond the Christmas advert. Their exclusive-in-store products include Frozen-themed food and a metre tall Olaf snowman toy which is pictured at the dinner table briefly in the advert. 


Watch Iceland’s 2019 Christmas advert


This year’s advert differs greatly from the Christmas advert that Iceland endorsed last year – Greenpeace’s ‘Rang-Tan’ video which shows an orangutan losing its home due to palm oil deforestation.

Despite being banned from being aired on TV for political reasons, Iceland saw the endorsement of the video as a wholly-worthwhile endeavour, as it marked the milestone of the supermarket halting the sale of their own-brand products that contained palm oil.

Neil added: “Rang Tan was a brilliant moment for us as it was an opportunity to celebrate 12 months of work removing palm oil from our products. When we came across that opportunity, it made sense for us to take it. I wouldn’t rule out doing something similar again but it would only ever be to mark a milestone, something that we’ve achieved.”


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