House of Fraser & Harrods: a Tale of Two Retailers

Arguably the world's most famous department store, Harrods was at one time part of the House of Fraser group.  Now the two trade separately and compete for the same customers.

House of Fraser operates over 60 stores across the UK and Ireland, and has recently opened a store in Abu Dhabi.  They launched their TV advertisement on 14 November.  A second version was launched on 19 November, with the same theme. This was reported to be their first brand advertising on TV for over a decade, and part of a £4 million investment in branding. At the time of writing it had received a meager 17,000 viewings compared to the 17 million achieved by direct rival John Lewis. The second installment from HoF is currently scoring just over 4,000 hits.  One journalist wondered HoF had produced "the most boring Christmas advert of 2014".  However, digital measurement analyics reported that there had been a 610% jump in interest in House of Fraser as a result of the advertisement.



Curiously, House of Fraser does not appear even to have mentioned this major new piece of branding to its 300,000 Facebook fans.  It is highly proactive in providing quizzes, competitions and special offers, but no links through to YouTube apart from on the page's sidebar.  They have even put on a promotion that seems to borrow from Marks & Spencer's #TheTwoFairies idea of making gifts to random good causes.  The Facebook intiatives are largely replicated on Twitter, although the moderators there have attempted (repeatedly) to publicise the ads on YouTube.  There is no dedicated hashtag in use.

Harrods, by contrast, have produced a TV and cinema advertisement that is getting viewed and talked about.  Its animated film is striking and was described by the Daily Telegraph as "charming in a very understated way".  Harrods has far more followers on Twitter (432,000 of them) than any other UK retailer.  It has not followed John Lewis (Monty the Penguin) and Homebase (Harriet) in making its central character into a social media sensation, although it does frequently name tag its Peter Pumpernickel character.  Harrods's preferred hashtag is the predictable #HarrodsChristmas.



Harrods has announced a selfie-based competition in store featuring the mouse character.  No PP merchandise, though - a wasted opportunity perhaps, given that Monty the Penguin replicas sold out in John Lewis on day one, despite their £95 price tag.  Harrods are using Facebook and Instagram to publicise its Christmas campaign.  Once again, Harrods is immensely popular on these sites, with over 600,000 likes on Facebook.  They are constant communicators here, with most of the postings engaging effectively with Harrods fans, who 'like' the posts in their hundreds and comment frequently.  But despite their social media skills and the eye-catching quality of the advertisement, 37,000 viewings on YouTube is a disappointing return.  Particularly when contrasted with John Lewis's 17 million hits.