FESTIVE MAGIC WITH MCDONALDS

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FESTIVE MAGIC WITH MCDONALDS |

CLIENT:

McDonald’s UK, in collaboration OMD UK & Leo Burnett UK

ROLE:

Creative Direction, Concept and Design, UX/UI Oversight, 3D Design, Client Relations.

Augmented Reality experience for the 2022 Christmas season, launched as part of McDonald’s UK’s #ReindeerReady campaign to bring holiday cheer into real-world spaces through mobile interaction.

CONTEXT:

To support McDonald’s annual #ReindeerReady campaign, we designed an accessible, festive AR experience that encouraged families and everyday passers-by to engage with branded holiday content in their own environments. The concept was built around joy, simplicity, and participation.

My role as Creative Lead included developing the interaction concept, leading the 3D asset direction, and defining the user experience in collaboration with Darabase and the wider agency team. I also advised on technical constraints and user flow logic to ensure performance and ease of use across devices and locations

PlATFORM:

Mobile WebAR with geolocation-enabled experiences, accessible through the McDonald’s app and via digital media promotions

GOALS

1. Enhance Customer Engagement

Deliver a festive AR experience that invites playful interaction and supports the holiday campaign across digital and physical touchpoints.

2. Promote the #ReindeerReady Campaign

Translate the tone and messaging of the larger brand initiative into an immersive moment that complements the narrative of the broader media strategy.

3. Encourage Social Sharing

Give users a natural and simple way to create and share visual moments with friends and family during the holiday season.

Creative Approach

The experience allowed users to place animated festive decorations into their real-world environment using their mobile device. Content included virtual snowmen, Christmas trees, gift boxes, and reindeer that could be positioned and scaled within the scene. The interface was designed for simplicity and required no app download, relying on intuitive gestures and fast load times. Asset interactions and placement guidance were refined to ensure delight and clarity without visual overload. From the first tap, the goal was to create a light-hearted interaction that felt personal and shareable while remaining true to McDonald’s inclusive brand voice.

Project Toolkit:

Choosing the Right Direction

Designing for Familiarity & Surprise

Early creative exploration focused on determining the right balance between familiarity and surprise. We developed moodboards and micro-concepts exploring different tonal directions, from whimsical storybook aesthetics to playful, minimal ornamentation. Ultimately, we aligned on a concept that prioritized recognisable Christmas motifs, family-friendly visuals, and responsive animations that would hold up in outdoor and indoor environments alike. The focus remained on engagement over complexity, letting users enjoy the interaction without needing extensive onboarding or instruction.

Laying Out the Interaction Plan

CRAFTING Flow and Feel

The AR journey was designed to unfold in a single interaction loop. Upon launching the experience, users could select from a set of festive items and tap to place them in their environment using the phone’s camera. Each placed item featured simple animations to enhance immersion. Once satisfied, users were encouraged to capture a photo of their decorated scene. We ensured that the experience required minimal UI input while still feeling interactive and expressive. My responsibilities here included mapping out each stage of the journey, designing the visual and functional feedback systems, and supervising the creation of 3D assets.

Rolling It Out In the Real World🎉

What Worked, and Why It Mattered

The McDonald’s AR Christmas campaign delivered a high-performing, accessible WebAR experience that supported the broader goals of the #ReindeerReady initiative.

With dwell times exceeding 60 seconds and consistent user engagement across mobile devices and environments, the activation demonstrated the effectiveness of lightweight immersive content at scale.

Seamlessly integrated into digital and out-of-home media placements, it contributed to brand visibility during a key seasonal period and established a strong foundation for future AR-led campaign strategies within McDonald’s UK marketing efforts.

Outcomes

👥

Over 2,850 daily users.

Over 700 hours of engagement over 2 weeks.

⏱️

Average dwell time of over 1 minute - above the average for a short-form web experience of its kind.

📰

Featured across numerous outlets, and highlighted as amongst the top Christmas AR experience of the year.

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