We're publishing the book of the 2013 John Lewis Christmas Advert: The Bear Who Had Never Seen Christmas - Nosy Crow Skip to content
Posted by Kate, November 15, 2013

We’re publishing the book of the 2013 John Lewis Christmas Advert: The Bear Who Had Never Seen Christmas

When the John Lewis Christmas advert aired on Saturday 9 November, I, like pretty much everyone else, felt very lumpy-throaty… but the other thing I felt was relieved.

I felt relieved because, this year, we were so much further ahead than we’d been the previous year. In 2012, we’d seen the 2012 John Lewis Christmas advert, The Journey, on YouTube on Friday 9 November. We’d been pushed there by the Twitter buzz that was already building. Then I’d felt, on the morning of Saturday 10 November, that we could make a book of it… a book that we then wrote and designed that weekend. We pitched the book, The Snowman’s Journey, and got our order from John Lewis the following week. We delivered books to John Lewis in early December. You can read the story here. By contrast, this year I knew that we’d just seen and approved some pretty splendid-looking folded and gathered sheets for The Bear Who Had Never Seen Christmas, our book based on the John Lewis’s 2013 Christmas advert, from the print run that was, at that moment, on press in Italy.

And I felt relieved because, this year, working with John Lewis’s amazingly creative advertising agency, adam&eveDDB we’d had access to some pretty spectacular, specially commissioned book-friendly artwork, rather than having to use stills from the ad itself as we had to do in 2012. Having seen the folded and gathered sheets, I knew how superb the art looked combined with a text written by Louise and me on pages designed by Steph, We’d had a proper choice of paper stock too, rather than having to go for the paper that was available at such short notice. Altogether, this was a book that I knew would look great. Here’s a look inside:

The Bear Who Had Never Seen Christmas is a hardback, priced at £7.99, and it will be sold exclusively by John Lewis from 18 November 2013, with John Lewis donating £1.20 from each sale to Save The Children. You can buy it online here.

This year – I’d like to think inspired by our successful translation of last year’s ad into a book! – the book’s not the only thing based on the characters and the story that lovers of the advert can buy from John Lewis.

This year’s advert has been viewed 6.3 million times – and counting – on YouTube. Our insight into the making of the advert left us astonished at the investment of time and energy into getting every detail right. You can see behind the scenes here

Craig Inglis, John Lewis’s Head of Marketing, told us, “It’s great to be working with Nosy Crow again on a new Christmas book after their hugely creative and quick work last year. Once again, the John Lewis Christmas advert seems to have captured the imagination of a wide audience so it’s great that
children can now enjoy the story in such a magical and beautiful book.”

bearwhohadneverseenxmas_cvrWe also heard that there had been a story-time reading in the John Lewis children’s product buying department at their head office yesterday… and I’ll be being an author again this year at storytelling events in Peter Jones on 23 and 24 November.

John Lewis has, once again, been a complete joy to work with: responsive, supportive, respectful of our areas of expertise… and delighted with the lovely book we’ve made for them

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