Make Your List, Check It Twice - RIGHT NOW!
It’s already time to get ready for the holidays. Here’s what you should be doing right now!
Sun, Sand, and Seasonal Strategy
Even Santa checks his list in July. Start your holiday marketing prep before the real rush begins.
It’s pretty common to get a late start on holiday shopping. But I’m here to tell you it’s time to start getting ready - RIGHT NOW. No, you don’t have to wrap gifts yet; I’m talking about planning marketing and advertising. Time will fly by between now and the holiday-marketing-end-of-year sprint.
Let’s see if this sounds like anyone you know: we are starting to dip our toes into summer, and with it, the hope of some well-deserved sunshine, maybe some vacation days, and calmer weeks with no one in the office. But don’t let your summer dreams burst at the seams. The mirage of summer will melt into the panic of the holidays if you don’t get a handle on it right now.
At the time of print, it’s less than 30 weeks until Halloween, and closely on its heels, the onslaught of other holidays and shopping days that will fill the rest of the year. Holiday marketing is typically one of the biggest budget outlays, with a potentially attractive ROI on the other end. When we don’t start planning the end of the year until spooky season, budgets can already be stretched, and production time nonexistent. Talk about terrifying.
So let’s take a page out of Old St. Nick's playbook and write our list now so we can check it twice with plenty of time to ready the elves.
Holiday List
May
May 5: Cinco de Mayo
May 11: Mother's Day
May 17: Armed Forces Day
May 26: Memorial Day
June
June 8: Pentecost (Christian)
June 14: Flag Day
June 15: Father's Day
June 19: Juneteenth
June 21: First Day of Summer
July
July 4: Independence Day
July 22: Back to School Season Begins
August
August 19: World Humanitarian Day
August 30: Back to School Season Ends
September
September 1: Labor Day
September 22: First Day of Fall
September 29: Rosh Hashanah (Jewish)
October
October 3: Feast of St. Francis of Assisi (Christian)
October 9: Yom Kippur (Jewish)
October 14: Indigenous Peoples’ Day / Columbus Day
October 20: Diwali
October 31: Halloween
November
November 1: All Saints’ Day (Christian)
November 2: All Souls’ Day (Christian)
November 11: Veterans Day
November 15: 12 Days of Deals Begin
November 26: 12 Days of Deals End
November 27: Thanksgiving
November 28: Black Friday
November 29: Small Business Saturday
December
December 1: Cyber Monday
December 2: Giving Tuesday
December 8: Feast of the Immaculate Conception (Christian)
December 17: Saturnalia Begins
December 21: First Day of Winter
December 22: Start of Hanukkah
December 23: Saturnalia Ends
December 24: Christmas Eve
December 25: Christmas Day
December 26: Boxing Day / Start of Kwanzaa
December 31: New Year’s Eve
January 1: New Year’s Day
List 1: The Calendar
Do you have a marketing plan for the rest of the year? If the answer is an unfortunate “no” or a “well, sort of,” you need to take notice. Let’s get some dates on paper.
We started you a list of holidays and events - but you need to go in add add every important business date (product launches, galas, etc.) you can think of between now and the end of the year and any important local dates like festivals and tree lightings.
List 2: The Budget
Make note of all of the events and marketing you know you have budget allocated for and will for sure be producing.
Jot down your total marketing budget for reference. Attach a rough number or percentage to the events you already have planned and leave blanks for anything you haven’t accounted for yet.
Next, it’s time to budget in for anything you don’t have money allocated to.
Rules of Thumb
Businesses that take holiday marketing seriously are spending early and often.
Small businesses (under $1M/year revenue) typically budget between $5,000 and $25,000 for holiday campaigns
Mid-sized businesses ($1M–$10M/year) often allocate $25,000 to $250,000 or more
Large enterprises may spend $500,000 to over $5 million on end-of-year marketing
If you’re trying to compete in Q4 without a clear spend plan, you’re not just behind, you’re invisible.
The Art Meets the Science
You will have to make hard choices to stretch your dollar, especially if you're a smaller business. Just know that it’s okay to focus on a few top holidays if your budget is limited.
This can be a big math problem, especially if you aren’t sure which events are most important to your business or what kind of spending will actually drive results.
Don’t worry — we can help you work through this and advise you on what kind of budgets will work for your goals. Solid creative strategy is our only hope.
Keep it Real
Don’t expect Coca-Cola sized campaigns on a bake-sale budget. But that doesn’t mean you can’t make what you do count.
This task is a big one. But Santa doesn’t chicken out from his list — and his list is much longer than yours.
Meet Your Elves
At Flanagan Silcott, we help brands sleigh the season and slay the strategy. Whether you're working with a big budget or a scrappy list, we turn chaos into campaigns and deadlines into deliverables.
Sleigh the season. We’re riding with you!
