French supermarket's Christmas advert is worldwide hit (without AI) [video]

McDonalds were recently criticised for an AI-generated Christmas advert:

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/dec/11/mcdonalds-r...

It seems like an excellent advert because it got everybody talking about McDonalds. Even this thread talks more about McDonalds than the “French supermarket’s” ad. The “French supermarket” isn’t even named in the title. The people who came up with the McDonalds ad were wildly successful in what they set out to do; they even have all the people who hate AI talking about their new ad, even when attempting to showcase somebody else’s ad.

It isn’t named in the title because it doesn’t have the same brand recognition as mcdonalds.

> Even this thread talks more about McDonalds than the “French supermarket’s” ad. The “French supermarket” isn’t even named in the title.

The name of the supermarket is mentioned in the title when the audience is likely to know it, e.g. on French websites. I don’t blame any American who does not know Intermarché, as they are very unlikely to come across one. I am not going to link them because that’s a bit pointless and the URLs are terrible, but a quick googling of "publicité Intermarché" should give plenty of examples.

We have come a long way down from ads like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VM2eLhvsSM

I think it's debatable whether the principle that "any press is good press" is actually true. Especially for a brand that is already a household name. People will talk about you, yes. But is it a good thing that they're gonna be talking, and reinforcing the association in the minds of your customers, that you're putting out lazy, soulless slop? Of course, that's de facto what McDonald's is, but it's not like they don't benefit from at the very least an illusion that this isn't the case.