Was Your Favorite Holiday Tradition Once a Marketing Campaign?

From candy canes to Christmas cards, the year-end holiday season is steeped in traditions that often feel timeless.

Yet, many of these cherished customs can trace their origins to savvy marketing campaigns dating back to the 19th and 20th centuries. These campaigns not only captured consumer attention but also redefined how we celebrate the season, embedding corporate creativity into the fabric of holiday joy.

The holiday season today remains a defining revenue period for many businesses, particularly smaller ones, but these retailers face strong competition for holiday shoppers’ attention and sales.

In 1939, mail-order-retailer-turned-department-store Montgomery Ward was looking for a way to capture that attention when a copywriter on its staff, Robert May, wrote the story of Rudolph, the plucky and now-famous red-nosed reindeer, as part of a promotional campaign. The department store distributed booklets featuring Rudolph’s tale to children during the holiday season, and its popularity soared, leading to the now-iconic 1949 song by Johnny Marks, May’s brother-in-law.

A look back at some of the most iconic holiday examples, from the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to candy canes, all the way to Santa Claus himself and beyond, reveals how commerce and culture have intertwined to shape modern festivities and traditions.

What unites these examples is their ability to resonate beyond the marketplace. These campaigns didn’t just sell products; they captured the essence of the holidays, aligning brands with the season’s emotions, rituals and values. In doing so, they successfully turned marketing strategies into enduring traditions.

Read more: A Merry Little Season: SMB Payment Strategies for Driving Holiday Sales This Year

How Holiday Marketing Campaigns Transformed Into Beloved Traditions

Perhaps no figure embodies the Christmas holiday more universally than Santa Claus. While Saint Nicholas has existed in various forms for centuries, the jolly, red-suited Santa we know today owes much of his image to Coca-Cola. In the 1930s, Coca-Cola commissioned artist Haddon Sundblom to create illustrations of Santa for its holiday advertisements. These depictions — rosy-cheeked, rotund and undeniably cheerful — became an instant hit.

The Coca-Cola Santa wasn’t just a marketing triumph; it was a cultural phenomenon. Coca-Cola repeated the same message every December, and by standardizing Santa’s image across millions of print ads, Coca-Cola solidified this portrayal as the definitive Santa in popular imagination, with other versions of Father Christmas falling from popularity. The campaign didn’t just sell soda; it redefined the Christmas aesthetic, shaping traditions for generations to come.

While exchanging Christmas cards can feel as old as the season itself, it wasn’t until the early 20th century that this tradition gained widespread popularity. Hallmark, founded in 1910, played a pivotal role in transforming the humble card into a seasonal necessity.

Hallmark’s innovation was recognizing that cards could do more than convey holiday greetings; they could express emotions, celebrate milestones and become keepsakes. By the 1920s, Hallmark had introduced stylish, mass-produced Christmas cards that resonated with a growing middle class eager to partake in the festive spirit. Today, the greeting card industry owes much of its holiday revenue to the foundation Hallmark laid a century ago.

When Marketing Becomes Tradition

The candy cane, with its red-and-white stripes, feels intrinsically tied to Christmas. While its origins date back centuries, its widespread popularity in the U.S. surged in the 20th century thanks to clever marketing by confectionery companies. By packaging and advertising candy canes as quintessential holiday treats, brands like Bobs Candies ensured their place in Christmas traditions.

Similarly, Hershey’s Kisses became synonymous with the holiday season through strategic packaging and advertising. Introduced in 1907, Kisses gained festive flair in the 1960s with the advent of red and green foil wrappers. Seasonal advertising campaigns further cemented their role as holiday staples, from candy dishes to stocking stuffers.

A more recent example of marketing shaping tradition is Starbucks’ red holiday cup. Introduced in 1997, the red cup initially served as a festive redesign of the chain’s standard white cup. However, it quickly became a cultural touchpoint, signaling the start of the holiday season for coffee lovers.

Over the years, Starbucks has built extensive holiday campaigns around the red cup, including themed beverages, limited-edition merchandise and social media promotions.

As we celebrate the holidays this year, it’s worth pausing to appreciate how these customs came to be. Behind the twinkling lights and festive cheer lies a testament to the power of creativity — not just to sell but to shape how we experience the most wonderful time of the year.