Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

To my many online friends, followers and curator family, happy holidays and may your New Year be filled with promise!

A look back at Christmases past. How many of the top 50 Christmas toys of the last 100 years have you owned? I count 25 that I owned as a child.

The run up to Christmas has got us thinking about that other well-known courier specialist… yes, we are talking about Father Christmas of course!

Inspired by an excellent article by ABC, we decided to take things one step further and find out just how many tasty treats he’ll get through in the night, as well as the effect that this may have on his waistline by Christmas morning.

Santa isn’t the only one who has to put in a tough night’s work though, so we also calculated how much strain all those new Furbies are going to place on his trusty reindeer....

The people have spoken: with the red haze of those last, desperate days of Christmas shopping descending, we’ve polled the populace on how stressed they feel about… Christmas songs. And apparently, the last thing anyone wants to hear whilst out shopping is Paul McCartney’s Wonderful Christmas Time (so don’t click that link unless you’re one of the 12.5% of people who find it ‘Mildly Relaxing’).

Other songs that are considered ‘stressful’ by shoppers include Justin Bieber’s “Mistletoe” (which peaked at 21 in the UK Singles chart just two months ago) and of course, Cliff Richard’s “Mistletoe & Wine”. Just missing out on a position of the podium of Christmas infamy were the candy-cane sickly “There’s No One Quite Like Grandma”, the terminally over-played “All I Want For Christmas Is You” and Shakin’ Stevens’ “Merry Christmas Everyone”. So avoid them if you possibly can!

It’s not all bad news for Christmas tune-makers though. 60% of people surveyed said that Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” had a positive effect on their mood, making them feel more relaxed (and perhaps, less likely to shove in a thirty minute queue at a packed department store). Dean Martin’s “Winter Wonderland” was also looked on favourably, as was Bing’s “Little Drummer Boy” duet with David Bowie.

Serious Christmas card trivia. ;-)

Merry Christmas everyone! I guess you all gather around with your families to celebrate Christmas, right? In Indonesia, there aren’t a lot of traditions to celebrate Christmas, but in other countries each have their own traditions. To expand your knowledge, we have created an infographic about ‘Christmas in Every Country’. There are a lot of traditions that we did not know about the history of Christmas or how each country celebrates it. So here is our infographic. Enjoy!

How many Christmas cards are sent each year? Get Christmas facts about everything from trees and traditions with this Christmas by the Numbers infographic.

Music video by Kurt Elling performing The Michigan Farm (Grieg: Opus 41/1) (Yule Log Video). (C) 2016 Sony Music Entertainment http://vevo.ly/jjutOw

A look into the greatest selling Christmas movies of all time and what made these films so special to those who watched them.

Your true love will need to raise his or her budget for your Christmas gifts this year.

PNC released its annual Christmas Price Index on Friday, and it showed that prices for items from the Christmas carol "The Twelve Days of Christmas" rose by 0.7% from last year. That's slightly up from the 0.6% pace in 2015.

The cost of everything on the list, from the partridge to the drummers, totaled $34,363.49, an increase of a few hundred dollars from last year. The "core" index, excluding volatile swan prices, rose 1.1% to $21,238.49.

But as the carol goes, all of the gifts except the drummers are counted multiple times, bringing the cost up to $156,507.88....

There’s no doubt about it, Americans LOVE pie. And when it comes to holidays, we really dig in. A recent survey from Pillsbury reveals that 94% of Americans plan to eat pie over the holidays and two-thirds of Americans prefer holiday foods over gifts!

So which pies are the favorite? A survey from Schwan’s (the makers of Mrs. Smith’s pies) asked American’s what their three favorite pies were and declared Apple pie the winner with an overwhelming 72% of the vote (47% for plain apple and 25% for apple-crumb pie). Second place fell to pumpkin pie, which received 37% of the vote....

Christmas Day is a difficult time of year for dieters. As well as Christmas dinner, you will no doubt be attending plenty of parties and family events, all of which will have – you’ve guessed it... unhealthy food. That’s why Diet Chef assessed the calories contained in many of your favourite treats and came up with a few guilt-free alternatives.

For example, did you know that fruit-based stuffing is much healthier than sausage meat? Or that gravy has far fewer calories than cranberry sauce? They also looked into lots of party snack favourites such as quiche and sausage rolls, so check out the in...fographic to discover some less-calorific alternatives.

Christmas as we know it today is a Victorian invention of the 1860s. Probably the most celebrated holiday in the world, our modern Christmas is a product of hundreds of years of both secular and religious traditions from around the globe. Discover the origins of Christmas traditions from around the world, like the Yule log, caroling and how Christmas is celebrated “Down Under.”...

The posh Mayfair hotel Claridge’s has unveiled its 2016 Christmas Tree, an annual tradition. Designed by Apple Chief Design Officer Sir Jony Ive and Industrial Designer Marc Newson, two of the world’s most respected and influential designers, this year’s was more than just a decorated tree, it was – in industry parlance – an ‘immersive’ experience.

Claridge’s Christmas Trees from 2009-2016 

For the past seven years Claridge’s has invited a favourite guest to reinterpret the tree in their own distinctive style.

Without fail, I almost always forget to put up an out-of-office email message when I'm headed out for vacation. It's one of those things I remember just as I'm shutting down, or sometimes even after I've already left. (Heh, sorry guys.)

Since I usually throw them up in a hurry, I don't take a lot of time to get creative. However, I remembered to put up my OOO message early this time around -- so I decided to do some Googling for funny, clever, and snarky messages people have used in the past.

Here are some of the gems I found....