12 Black Friday Marketing Campaigns That Stole the Show

With Black Friday approaching, businesses across the UK and beyond are getting ready for one of the biggest dates in the marketing calendar. It’s a chance to attract new customers, drive sales and get your brand in front of people who are actively looking for a deal.

But with so many businesses competing for attention, simply offering a discount isn’t always enough. The brands that really stand out are the ones that think beyond the price tag and come up with creative ways to get people talking.

From unexpected brand collaborations and clever cultural references to campaigns that challenge the whole idea of Black Friday, we’ve rounded up 12 marketing campaigns that caught our attention. Some of it will be useful for the next promotion you run. Some of it is worth seeing for its own sake, because the biggest brands in the world treat this weekend very differently from each other.

Let’s take a look.

1. Gymshark: Big Deal Energy (2020)

When it comes to building hype around a sale, Gymshark knows how to get people moving.

Its Big Deal Energy campaign brought the brand’s familiar fitness-focused personality to Black Friday, turning a promotional event into something that felt much bigger than a standard discount announcement.

The campaign leaned into energy, entertainment and the excitement surrounding the shopping event. Rather than simply telling customers that prices had dropped, Gymshark made the occasion feel like an event worth getting involved in.

It’s a good example of how a brand can maintain its identity while still making a commercial message the centre of attention.

Build the anticipation before the day

The sale lasts a weekend. The anticipation can run for three weeks, and it is the cheaper half to produce. Gymshark pulled in KSI, Behzinga and Calfreezy, creators its audience already followed, which did the work of making the sale feel like something happening rather than something announced.

Most businesses cannot book that kind of talent, and do not need to. The same effect comes from telling your existing customers first: an email a fortnight out saying what is coming and when, early access for anyone on the list, a reminder the night before. People who already buy from you are the ones most likely to buy again, and they cost nothing to reach.

The thing to avoid is announcing the sale on the morning it starts. By then every inbox in the country is full.

Discounts might get people through the door, but a strong brand personality gives them a reason to pay attention in the first place.

2. Amazon: Wonderland Will (2021)

Amazon does not really run a Black Friday campaign. It runs Christmas advertising, early, and lets Black Friday sit inside it.

Wonderland Will is a fifteen second festive spot that went out in November 2021. No sale price, no countdown, no mention of the date. Just the feeling of finding something good for somebody, which is the mood Amazon wants people in when the deals land a fortnight later.

That is a deliberate choice, and an expensive one to copy. While competitors spend November shouting about percentages, Amazon spends it establishing the occasion, on the basis that the discount will do its own work once the day arrives.

For most businesses the lesson is the order of operations rather than the production budget. Say what the thing is for before you say what it costs.

Sell the occasion behind the purchase

A good share of what gets bought on Black Friday is Christmas shopping in disguise. The person buying is not treating themselves, they are ticking a name off a list, and that changes what they need from you.

Practically, that means organising the offer around the recipient rather than the product category. Gifts under thirty pounds. Something for the person who has everything. The in-laws. It also means answering the question that decides the purchase, which is whether it will arrive in time. A visible last-order date does more for conversion that week than another five per cent off.

Bundles work for the same reason. They solve the recipient problem rather than the price problem.

Think beyond the sale itself. Connecting Black Friday to a wider seasonal moment can give your campaign more emotional appeal.

3. Walmart: Mean Girls Reunion (2023)

On Wednesdays, we wear pink. On Black Friday, apparently, we shop at Walmart.

Walmart brought together familiar faces from the much-loved film Mean Girls for a Black Friday campaign that leaned heavily into nostalgia and pop culture.

The reunion gave audiences an immediate reason to watch. Rather than relying on a traditional retail advert, Walmart used recognisable characters and references to create something entertaining and highly shareable.

Nostalgia is a powerful marketing tool, particularly when it connects with an audience that already has an emotional attachment to the subject matter.

And by tying the concept back to Black Friday shopping, Walmart made sure the entertainment still had a commercial purpose.

Borrowing culture costs money. Borrowing a format does not

Nobody reading this is licensing a film cast. Worth saying plainly, because the gap between admiring this campaign and attempting it is a rights budget most businesses do not have, and the attempt usually ends with a takedown notice or a bill.

What is free is the structure underneath. Walmart took something its customers already recognised and put it somewhere unexpected. A local business can do that with a format rather than a property: the style of a public information film, a lost cat poster, a match programme, a council letter. The recognition does the work and nobody owns it.

Music is where this goes wrong most often. A track used without a licence on a commercial post is the single easiest way to turn a good campaign into a legal problem.

Popular culture can give a campaign an instant hook. Just make sure the connection to your product or offer is clear.

4. Google: Buying All Black (2022)

Black Friday is all about buying things. Google used the occasion to put the spotlight on something a little different.

Buying All Black was a campaign celebrating Black-owned businesses, using the shopping event to encourage people to support independent brands and entrepreneurs.

It gave Black Friday a purpose beyond the usual race for the biggest discount. By connecting the campaign to representation and economic opportunity, Google created a message with a wider social impact.

It’s also a reminder that major shopping moments can provide an opportunity for brands to support causes and communities that matter to their audiences.

Pick something you were already part of

Audiences are good at spotting a cause picked up for a fortnight and dropped in December. The test is simple: could you have run this campaign last year, and will you still be involved next year. If the answer to either is no, the campaign will read as decoration.

For a smaller business the credible version is close to home. The club you already sponsor. The food bank you already collect for. The trade body you already pay into. You are not claiming to fix anything, you are pointing at something you were already doing and giving customers a way to join in.

Be exact about the money. A pound per order, a fixed donation, the full price of one product. Vague wording about supporting a cause invites the question of how much, and not having an answer is worse than not running it.

A campaign can have a commercial objective and a meaningful message. The strongest examples find a real connection between the two.

5. Patagonia: Buy Less, Demand More (2020)

Most brands spend Black Friday asking people to buy more. Patagonia has spent years asking them to buy less and mean it.

Buy Less, Demand More puts the argument on the record: think harder before buying anything, and expect more from the companies you buy from. It sits alongside a long-running position on repair, resale and clothing built to outlast a season.

It works because the operation behind it backs it up. Patagonia repairs what it sells, runs a resale channel for used kit, and publishes detail about where its materials come from. The campaign states something already true rather than a stance adopted for one weekend in November.

That is also what makes it hard to copy. A brand with no repair service and no resale channel saying the same words is inviting someone to check.

The smaller version of the same argument

You probably do not have a repair network or a resale platform, and building one to support a campaign is the wrong way round. The question is what you already do that makes the thing last longer.

A longer warranty you are willing to honour. A free service at twelve months. Guidance on maintenance that saves someone replacing a product early, even when selling the replacement would have suited you. A trades business can offer to repair before it quotes to replace. Each of those is the same argument at a scale you can deliver.

The appeal is commercial rather than moral. Buying decisions in a tight year lean towards the supplier who looks like they will still be answering the phone in three years, and this is how you look like that one.

An anti-consumption message only works when your operations can stand behind it. Say it after you have built it, not before.

6. IKEA: Buy Back Friday (2020)

Black Friday is usually associated with buying more. IKEA decided to turn that idea around.

With Buy Back Friday, the furniture retailer encouraged customers to return eligible pre-loved IKEA furniture in exchange for store credit. The campaign put sustainability and the circular economy at the centre of a shopping event traditionally associated with excess consumption.

It was a particularly effective way to connect IKEA’s wider sustainability messaging with a moment when consumers were already thinking about spending money.

Rather than simply competing with other retailers on price, IKEA created a campaign that was distinctive and true to what the business already stood for.

Trade-ins only work when the old thing is worth something to you

The mechanic is clever because it is not charity. IKEA takes back furniture it can resell, and pays in store credit rather than cash, so the money never leaves. The customer gets a discount that feels earned rather than given, and the business gets stock and a returning shopper in one move.

Copy it only where the returned item has value to you. A bike shop can resell a traded frame. A phone repair business can harvest parts. A photographer or a software business has nothing to take back, and a trade-in there is just a discount with extra admin.

Where there is nothing physical to return, the equivalent is crediting what the customer already has. Knock the cost of last year’s audit off this year’s project. Count what they already paid for towards the next thing. The feeling is the same: they are not starting from nothing.

Sometimes the best way to stand out is to challenge the expectations of the occasion. You don’t always have to follow the crowd.

7. REI: #OptOutside (2015)

What if your Black Friday campaign involved telling customers not to shop with you?

That’s exactly the approach outdoor retailer REI took with #OptOutside.

In 2015, REI closed its stores on Black Friday and paid its employees to take the day off, encouraging people to spend time outdoors instead of joining the shopping frenzy.

It was a bold move, particularly given the commercial importance of Black Friday for retailers. But it also created a campaign that was completely aligned with REI’s outdoor-focused identity.

The message was simple, and easy for people to get behind. It also helped turn a single-day campaign into a wider movement around spending time outside.

Opting out is a position, not a saving

The reason this one is remembered a decade later is the cost. REI gave up its takings on the busiest retail day of the year and paid staff to be elsewhere. The sacrifice was the message, and everyone understood that without being told.

The imitation that does not work is staying open, running the usual offers, and posting something about slowing down. That reads as having it both ways, and customers notice faster than marketers expect.

If you want to try it, work out what it costs first and commit to that number. Closing for the day. Giving the team a paid day off. Donating the day’s profit. Any of those are legible. The version that costs nothing says nothing, and a campaign about restraint is the worst possible place to be caught being careful with money.

A strong brand doesn’t always need to sell something. Sometimes standing for something can be far more memorable.

8. Samsung: Reverse Auction (2022)

Most Black Friday sales follow a familiar formula: products go on sale, prices come down and customers rush to grab a bargain.

Samsung took a different approach in Australia with its Reverse Auction.

Every item started at full recommended retail price and the price fell as the days went on, dropping until the stock was gone or it reached a single dollar, whichever came first. Buyers had to weigh paying more now against the risk of waiting and finding the item sold. It ran from 18 to 28 November 2022, and some products stayed hidden until the day they appeared.

It’s a useful example of how brands can take a familiar promotional mechanic and give it a fresh twist. Rather than simply publishing another list of discounted products, Samsung created a campaign concept designed to make people curious.

And curiosity is a valuable thing in a crowded advertising environment.

A mechanic has to be explainable in one line

Promotional games fail for one of two reasons. Either nobody can work out the rules, or everybody suspects the rules are rigged.

The first is a writing problem. If it takes a paragraph to explain, people leave before the end of it. A falling price that drops every hour until someone buys. A discount that opens up when a hundred people sign up. A locked offer revealed at nine in the morning. Each of those fits in a sentence and a reader knows instantly what to do.

The second is a trust problem, and it is settled by publishing the rules in advance and sticking to them even when it hurts. If the price was going to drop to half and someone buys at the top, honour the gap. The cost of that is small. The cost of being seen to move the goalposts runs well past November.

If everyone in your industry is using the same promotional approach, look for a way to make the experience itself more interesting.

9. Etihad Airways: Find Your Escape (2024)

Etihad Airways brought a little escapism to Black Friday with its Find Your Escape campaign.

Rather than focusing solely on the mechanics of a sale, the campaign tapped into something much more appealing: the idea of getting away.

It’s a natural fit for an airline. People don’t necessarily dream about booking a flight number or comparing fare classes. They imagine the destination, the experience and the feeling of being somewhere different.

By putting that feeling at the centre of the campaign, Etihad gave its Black Friday messaging a more aspirational angle.

Considered purchases need a different ask

Nobody books a long-haul holiday because an email arrived on a Friday morning. The decision has been forming for weeks and involves at least one other person, which makes the usual Black Friday mechanic useless.

So change the ask. A deposit that holds the price. A date reserved and the balance due in January. A voucher bought now and redeemed whenever. Each lets someone act on the offer before they have finished deciding, which is the only thing you need from them that weekend.

The same applies to anything expensive and slow. Kitchens, weddings, extensions, software, agency work. The money moves later and the commitment happens now, which is the part that matters, because an offer that expires on Monday is worth nothing to a buyer who needs until February.

Sell the experience, not just the product. Understanding what customers really want can make your marketing far more persuasive.

10. Lush: Orangutan Soap (2017)

On the Friday every other retailer spent cutting prices, Lush put one product on sale and gave the money away.

The brand made 14,600 orangutan-shaped soaps, scented with orange and patchouli and priced at £8.25, and released them on Black Friday 2017 with the money raised going to the Sumatran Orangutan Society. No discount was attached to anything. The soap was the campaign.

It landed because the product carried the argument. Palm oil production is a direct threat to orangutan habitat, and Lush had been making that case for years. A soap shaped like the animal at risk, made without the ingredient doing the damage, says the whole thing before anyone reads a word of copy.

It also answered the question every retailer faces that weekend. People are in a buying mood and looking for a reason to choose one brand over another. Lush gave them a reason that had nothing to do with price, and a run of 14,600 gave them a reason to come on the day rather than next week.

Make the limit real

14,600 is a strange number, and that is exactly why it is convincing. It reads like the output of a production run rather than a figure chosen by a marketing department, and a specific number is harder to disbelieve than a round one.

Scarcity only works while it is true. Sell out at 14,600 and quietly restock on the Monday and you have taught everyone to ignore the next limit you announce. If you are going to cap something, cap it at a number you can live with and stop when you reach it.

Making a product for a campaign is more achievable than it sounds at a smaller scale. A batch of fifty. A seasonal variant. Something bundled that only exists for a fortnight. The point is having a thing that only exists because of the campaign, which gives people a reason to come on the day rather than whenever.

A product can be the campaign. Make something that carries your argument and you will not need to explain it or discount it.

11. Welder Watches: We Don’t Sell on Black Friday (2021)

Here’s a headline that might seem slightly counterproductive for a retailer during the biggest shopping weekend of the year: We Don’t Sell on Black Friday.

Welder Watches did not just say it. It shut the shop. In the brand’s own words, each year it closes its website on Black Friday and does not sell.

Instead of joining the race to offer bigger and bigger discounts, the campaign made a point of questioning the whole idea of the shopping event, and then backed the point with the one thing nobody can fake: a day of lost revenue.

It’s a simple example of using contrast to attract attention. When every other brand is telling customers to buy, a brand saying something different can stand out.

Of course, this approach needs to feel authentic. A provocative headline only works when the wider brand message backs it up.

A refusal is a promise

Closing for the day says something about the rest of the year too, and customers will check. If a code turns up in December, or the January sale starts on the 27th, the position stops being a position and becomes a line somebody wrote in November.

It suits businesses whose pricing is already consistent, which in practice means premium products, professional services and anyone whose customers would be annoyed to discover they paid full price last month. If you discount regularly, this is not the campaign for you, and pretending otherwise is a short route to being quoted back at yourself.

Where it does fit, the argument writes itself. Our price is our price, it was fair in June and it is fair today, and we would rather not insult the people who bought last week.

Don’t be afraid to take an opposing position. Being different can be more powerful than being louder.

12. P.C. Richard & Son: Buy More, More More (2021)

We’ll finish with a campaign that embraces the more traditional side of Black Friday marketing.

P.C. Richard & Son’s Buy More, More More campaign leaned into the excitement of shopping and the appeal of getting a deal.

The approach is deliberately direct. Black Friday is a high-intent shopping period, and customers are actively looking for offers. Sometimes a campaign doesn’t need an elaborate concept to communicate its message.

The important thing is making the offer clear, giving customers a reason to act and ensuring the creative has enough personality to be remembered.

The unfashionable version, done properly

Eleven campaigns in, it is worth saying that most businesses should do this one. A clever concept executed badly is worse than a plain offer executed well, and the plain offer is far more likely to get finished by the deadline.

Done properly means a few unglamorous things. One offer rather than six, because a page of competing deals makes people choose nothing. A deadline with a date and a time on it. Plain words about what is included and what is not. A page that loads on a phone on a train. Stock you can honour, because the fastest way to lose a customer for good is to sell them something you cannot deliver.

None of that will win an award. It will take more money that weekend than a concept nobody had time to finish.

Creativity doesn’t always mean reinventing the wheel. A clear offer, delivered with confidence, can still be an effective campaign.

What makes a good Black Friday marketing strategy?

Looking across these 12 campaigns, one thing becomes clear: there isn’t a single formula for getting Black Friday marketing right.

Some brands use humour and nostalgia. Others focus on social responsibility, brand identity or a completely different approach to promotions.

But there are a few common lessons worth taking away.

1. Don’t make everything about the discount

Price is important, but it’s rarely the only reason someone chooses one brand over another. Give people something interesting to remember about your campaign.

2. Make your brand part of the idea

Your campaign should feel like it could only come from your business. Your tone of voice, your visual identity, your values. One of them should make the campaign recognisably yours.

3. Give people a reason to share it

A clever concept, a familiar face or an unexpected message can help your campaign travel beyond its original audience. Think about what would make someone send it to a friend.

4. Understand your audience

The best campaigns aren’t necessarily the loudest or most expensive. They’re the ones that understand what their audience cares about and build a relevant message around it.

5. Start planning early

A successful Black Friday campaign doesn’t happen overnight. Give yourself enough time to develop the concept, prepare your creative, build your landing pages and plan your activity across the channels that matter.

Time to think beyond the discount

Black Friday is a noisy time of year. Every brand wants attention, every retailer has an offer and every marketing team is trying to make its campaign the one people remember.

But as these examples show, the brands that stand out aren’t always the ones offering the biggest discounts. They’re the ones with a clear idea, a strong understanding of their audience and the confidence to do something a little differently. That holds at any size, which is what makes these twelve worth looking at properly rather than skimming.

None of the twelve had a formula. They had a point of view about what their customers would find interesting on a weekend when everyone else was shouting about price, and the budget behind them changed the production values rather than the thinking. We ran the same exercise on the campaigns that owned Halloween if you want twelve more, and if you want a hand getting an idea off the ground before the 27th, that is the sort of thing we do at Cold.