Argos Christmas advert 2026: “Tales of Argos Past” reviewed

Richard Ayoade is on the sofa in a mustard corduroy suit, phone to his ear, stuck for a present for his mother. Someone on the line suggests Argos. “Argos? For Mother? They’re a toy shop,” he says, and the room goes dark. Two glowing figures float out of the gloom: Connie the doll, who introduces herself as “the ghost of Christmas presents”, and Trevor, who is “the dinosaur of Argos past”.

That is “Tales of Argos Past”, the Argos Christmas advert 2026, which went live on 1 November. It is a one minute spoof of A Christmas Carol made by T&P and directed by Declan Lowney, and it is the third Christmas in a row starring the brand’s toy mascots, and the second in which they stage an intervention on a grown-up who thinks Argos only sells toys.

Our take: the funniest Christmas advert of the season so far, and a smart way to turn the catalogue nostalgia that holds Argos back into the thing that sells it forward. It is also a very familiar shape, and the strategy is now said out loud so often that the joke is starting to carry the brief rather than the other way round.

Credits

• Client: Argos; Heni Hazbay, marketing director; Laura Boothby, head of campaigns
• Agency: T&P, London; chief executive Jack Swayne
• Executive creative directors: Chris Clarke, Matthew Moreland; creative directors: Ben Fallows, Matt Deacon; creatives: Becky Brice, Tom White
• Director: Declan Lowney
• Production company: Merman; executive producers Siobhan Murphy, Spencer Dodd; producer Simon Monhemius; director of photography Benedict Spence; production designer Kem White
• Post production and VFX: Electric Theatre Collective; colourist Andi Chu
• Editor: Charlie Moreton, WORK Editorial
• Music: Holy Wax; composer Charlie Smith; music supervisor Jeremy Newton. Sound: Noble State, London; sound designer Munzie Thind
• Casting: Talent Republic. Stills: Curious Productions; photographer Dan Humphreys
• Cast: Richard Ayoade
• Launched: 1 November 2026, on TV, streaming, cinema, social and outdoor

The brief: the catalogue problem

Argos has a problem most retailers would love to have. Generations of British children grew up circling presents in its catalogue, so almost everyone knows the brand. The trouble is what they remember it for, which is toys, when the shop now sells headphones, games consoles, beauty tech and homeware.

T&P’s answer since 2023 has been the “There’s More to Argos” platform, carried by Connie and Trevor, who headlined Christmas 2024 as a rock and roll double act. Last Christmas the pair ambushed Simon Bird in his car after he dismissed Argos as a toy shop on the phone. That film came ninth in our ranking of the 2025 Christmas adverts, and in September 2026 Lowney turned the mascots into mafia bosses for an autumn spot on the same theme.

The commercial pressure is real. In Sainsbury’s half-year results, Argos sales fell 1.8%. Sainsbury’s has also agreed to sell Argos to Swift Partners for at least £120m, a deal announced on 31 July and due to complete in February 2027, as ITV News reported. This is the last Argos Christmas under Sainsbury’s ownership, and it has a lot to prove.

The idea: haunted by the toy section

The cleverest move is to make the nostalgia the villain and the hero at once. Trevor is weighed down with old catalogues like Marley’s ghost, and the pair take Richard “back to where it all began”: camcorder footage, stamped 1982 and 1990, of a small boy in a tiny version of the same corduroy jacket, circling toys on the living room carpet. Asked what happened to such a sweet kid, Richard has a two word answer: “Life and despair.”

Then the ghosts deliver the brief, almost word for word: “You never got past the toy section, pal. Now there’s so much more.” The room fills with floating products, from headphones and a games console to a hair styler and a light therapy mask. Richard picks the mask for his mother, with the line “Nothing says Christmas like advanced skincare technology”, and she loves it.

The ending is pure Dickens. A transformed Richard throws open his window onto a snowy street, where an Argos van is making a delivery, and shouts: “You there, person. There is more to Argos.” A man in the street below delivers the button: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile before.”

It works because the insight is true. Matt Deacon, creative director at T&P, told LBB: “When you’re chatting to someone and you mention Argos, it takes about 30 seconds before someone is mentioning circling stuff in the catalogue.” Plenty of brands claim a place in childhood memories, but Argos can actually prove it.

The craft

Casting is the whole game here, and Ayoade is a perfect fit. He plays it bone dry, a man who would never be seen dead in Argos, and his delivery makes lines that would read as flat on paper genuinely funny. “Are you two a couple?” he asks the ghosts, and when they challenge him he snaps back “Aren’t you a toy?”, which is the brand’s own problem turned into a gag.

Lowney, the director behind Father Ted and episodes of Ted Lasso, keeps the pace brisk and the tone warm. Electric Theatre Collective’s ghosts are spectral without being scary, and the details reward a second look. According to LBB, three “mini Richards” appear across the flashbacks, and each prop catalogue matches the year that child represents.

The weakness is length. One minute is a lot of plot: a phone call, two ghosts, a flashback, a product montage, a gift scene and a Scrooge ending. The flashback, which is the best idea in the film, gets about ten seconds, and Holy Wax’s score mostly has to sprint to keep up. A longer cut would let the past breathe.

Beyond the film: Christmas Past, Christmas Present

The outdoor work may be the best thing in the campaign. Each site splits into two posters. On the left, under “Christmas Past”, there is a period photograph of a child on Christmas morning with a gift from the catalogue years, under the old Argos logo. On the right, under “Christmas Present”, there is the modern equivalent you can buy today.

The pairings are well chosen. A Game Boy Colour becomes a Nintendo Switch 2, a Mr Frosty becomes a Ninja slush machine, and a Barbie styling head becomes a Dyson hair styler. Each pair lets the grown-up who once circled the toy see what the same impulse buys now, which is the whole strategy in a single glance, with no ghosts required.

Ben Fallows, creative director at T&P, put the insight best on LinkedIn: “We all have a photo like this in a photo album somewhere and it always connects back to a circle in the Argos catalogue.” He credited Becky Brice’s art direction for the period feel, and said the team had to work hard to track down a 1980s Mr Frosty. The pictures were shot by Dan Humphreys for Curious.

Laura Boothby, Argos head of campaigns, told LBB the brand had long been wary of leaning on the catalogue, but that the current appetite for the 1980s and 1990s made this the moment to embrace it. The posters prove her right.

The results

It is too early for evidence on this campaign. The official upload had passed 3.7 million YouTube views within three days of launch, but a view count says nothing about sales.

The platform has a decent record. Last year’s Simon Bird film, listed by System1 as “Thought we were just for toys?”, scored 5.1 stars in its festive ad tracker, a solid result. It also won Christmas Advert of the Year at the Retail Gazette Excellence Awards 2026. Whether “There’s More to Argos” is shifting perceptions and sales is another matter, and Argos has not published data on that.

The legacy: Argos finds its Kevin

Argos has had good Christmases before: The Christmas Fool made our list of the best Christmas adverts of all time. What it lacked was continuity. Connie and Trevor now give it a recurring cast that can be dropped into any story, which is exactly what Kevin the Carrot gave Aldi.

Boothby told LBB she thinks of the work as a TV series in which the mascots are interventionists, with a new episode each time. That is the right way to think about it, and it is why a third outing still feels fresh. The risk is that the episodes start to rhyme too closely, with a celebrity who thinks Argos sells toys, a mascot ambush and a lesson learned.

It also sits apart from the tearjerkers around it. “We would never really do a tearjerker campaign,” Boothby said. In a week when John Lewis has gone for warmth and a cover version, a straight comedy with a deadpan lead is a welcome change of key.

What to steal

• Turn your reputation into the plot. If everyone already thinks something about you, make a character say it out loud and then prove them wrong.
• Use the nostalgia you own. Only Argos can show a child circling its catalogue, so it is a memory no competitor can borrow.
• Cast for delivery, not fame. Ayoade’s deadpan makes ordinary lines funny, which is worth more than a bigger name.
• Treat a platform as a series. Keep the characters and the conflict fixed, and change the genre each episode.
• Let outdoor make the argument in one glance. Past and present side by side does what a minute of film takes many scenes to do.

The verdict

Tales of Argos Past scores well for craft, thanks to Ayoade, Lowney and a careful period eye, and for legs, because Connie and Trevor are becoming a proper long-running property and the outdoor idea could run for years. The idea is clever but familiar, and bravery is middling, since a celebrity ambushed by mascots is now the established formula. Effectiveness is held at five until Argos publishes evidence. The marking is explained in how we score.

See every UK Christmas advert of 2026 so far, with the films, updated as each one launches.