This month, John Lewis' Christmas effort has achieved the highest uplift in YouGov's Ad Awareness score in the UK.

As ever, the lead up the Christmas period is dominated by high-profile ad campaigns from some of the biggest brands around.

Over the last decade or so, John Lewis’ campaign has traditionally attracted the most attention and press coverage. However, YouGov data had begun to indicate that perhaps the well-worn genre was starting to show its age, with last year’s effort not attracting the same levels of Ad Awareness and Word of Mouth Exposure scores that its predecessors had.

This year, John Lewis decided on a new strategy for its campaign. Featuring Elton John, the advert is a nostalgic look back at the superstar’s career, finishing with an infant Elton opening his first piano.

YouGov data shows that John Lewis’ Ad Awareness score has jumped from 15% to 45%, a rise of 30%.

Added to this, perhaps because of Elton’s star quality, or the emotional nature of the campaign, John Lewis’s Word of Mouth Exposure score has also grown considerably, reaching a peak of 25%, up from 11%.

Elsewhere, the supermarket brands have been engulfed in a battle of their own. On this occasion, Aldi’s campaign, featuring Kevin the Carrot once again, has the highest overall level of Ad Awareness among the supermarkets.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this year’s campaign season is Iceland’s effort. The advert was banned from television, but has achieved impressive levels of Ad Awareness regardless through its virality on social media. In fact, Iceland has had the biggest improvement in ad recall score among all the supermarkets.

Elsewhere, some heavyweight brands scaled back on their festive campaigns, which points to a future in which less budget is allocated to this time of year. Several brands have opted for a policy of consistency over the ‘Christmas epic’ which characterised the campaigns released in the middle of the decade.