With snow days and “100th day of school” parties upon us, back-to-school season couldn’t feel further away. But for media buyers and agencies, it’s now prime time for planning back-to-school ad strategies: how to reach parents, teachers and students who will be rushing to stock up on new calculators, backpacks, and clothes, while battling it out for a share of that annual shopping spree.
In 2024, retailers invested a whopping $517M in TV advertising – a 19% jump from 2023. Let's dive into what worked, and what retailers can implement as they plan for back-to-school 2025.
In the realm of the retail giants, 2024's back-to-school season played out like a fascinating three-way chess match between Amazon, Walmart, and Target. Amazon emerged as the star student, with ads scoring 272% greater consumer engagement than the average retail ad. Think of it as the retail equivalent of breaking the curve.
Walmart, meanwhile, took the "go big or go home" approach, and in this case, going big worked. Despite Amazon's higher per-impression effectiveness, Walmart's massive ad spend, which was more than double Amazon's, helped generate 23% more total consumer engagement. It's a classic case of "quantity has a quality all its own."
Target rounded out the top three, maintaining a strong presence with nearly 11,000 airings creating over 6.3 billion impressions. While its engagement rates didn't match its two biggest rivals, Target's steady approach kept it firmly in the conversation throughout the season.
Amazon made an investment in pop culture, with a Prime Day ad featuring Megan Thee Stallion buying a Kitchenaid stand mixer from the Amazon app and transforming into Megan Thee Chef. This ad was 10% more effective than the category average. Other Amazon creatives tended to emphasize the brand more than individual products, leaning into family life and dynamics.
Walmart’s creative tended to emphasize individual products and services while catering to a wide audience — from young kids riding a bike to school with a new JBL portable speaker to young adults getting ready for a formal dance, with Walmart handbags and homegoods featured heavily. Several ads featured its Black & Unlimited line of Black-founded products, while others nodded to Walmart+, its paid membership program, or its one-hour express delivery service.
The 2024 back-to-school season was about more than just the big three. Department stores showed they've still got plenty of life, with Kohl's and Macy's running high-frequency campaigns throughout the season.
These two brands leaned most heavily on general brand awareness plays. Sometimes these ads were oriented around big sales holidays like Labor Day, with a touch of sentimentality for parents sending their kids back to school, or families soaking up holiday time together.
Digital natives proved they can play the TV game too. Overstock and eBay achieved impressive engagement rates, showing that you don't need a brick-and-mortar legacy to win at back-to-school. Overstock was particularly effective, generating 222% greater per-person, per-second engagement than the category average, with a top ad featuring Camping World CEO and CNBC’s The Profit star Marcus Lemonis.
Here's a lesson some retailers learned in 2024 that others might want to write down: Spanish-language TV ads outperformed their English-language counterparts by a stunning 35% in effectiveness.
Walmart was particularly effective in engaging Spanish-language audiences — a Spanish-language version of its “Now Trending” ad that cleaned up with English-language audiences had 855% more engagement than the average retail ad. Ads with specific products or services, like this eBay Motors spot or a family home improvement ad spotlighting the Home Depot App, also saw high engagement. Overall, the Spanish language ads that consumers responded to were centered around the theme of family — family working on home projects together, shopping together, or parents and grandparents dropping their kids off at school.
But this isn't just about reaching a specific demographic – it's about tapping into a viewing audience that consistently demonstrates higher engagement with advertising content. For retailers who haven't yet made Spanish-language TV a significant part of their media mix, the data suggests they're leaving money on the table.
As retailers start mapping out their 2025 back-to-school strategies, the lessons from 2024 point to several key takeaways:
The retailers who ace their 2025 back-to-school season will be those who take these lessons to heart while staying nimble enough to adapt their approach based on real-time performance data.
In the world of retail advertising, there's always something new to learn. Ready to optimize your TV ad outcomes against your competitors? See what EDO can do for you.