Love Actually’ reunions, delivered by DoorDash: Inside Anthropologie’s holiday sales pitch

Launching October 19, the campaign spotlights products ranging from travel outfits and partywear to guest-bedroom updates, pajamas, and last-minute hostess gifts. Anthropologie is pairing that broader holiday wardrobe with an expanded food assortment, more home collaborations and a new DoorDash partnership, aiming to capture spending across the season’s smaller occasions.

“We know that we have a customer who loves to not only self-purchase but also look for gift-giving ideas,” said Anu Narayanan, global president of women’s, home and retail at Anthropologie. This year, she said, the focus extends to the preparations and personal moments surrounding those celebrations.

There is spending to compete for. The National Retail Federation forecasts that U.S. retail sales in November and December will rise 4.2% year over year to $1.013 trillion, excluding automobile dealers, gasoline stations and restaurants. Adobe expects online spending over the same period to rise 6.7% to $275.1 billion. But growth comes with price competition: Adobe forecasts apparel discounts will peak at 23% off list prices.

Alongside its airport-set mini film, Anthropologie has organized the campaign imagery around four holiday scenarios, each showcasing a different part of its assortment. Alongside the airport imagery, “Come On In” centers on Christmas at home; “Meet Me There” covers partywear; “Stay A While” features intimates and pajamas; and “Wish You Were Here” addresses resort dressing for warm-weather holiday trips. The range gives customers reasons to shop beyond a dress for one big night out.

The campaign will run across Anthropologie’s owned and paid channels, including Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and Facebook, as well as its own Substack. The brand has not specified which creative assets will appear on each platform.

“The holidays are all about finding our way back to the people we love,” Chief Creative Officer Jisoo Kang said in a statement. “Whether it’s a long flight home, a late-night drive or a quick ride across town, there’s something special about the anticipation of seeing someone again.”

In clothing, that translates into a less formal approach to festive dressing. Narayanan pointed to silky camisoles worn with cargo pants and sequined ballet flats, alongside the expected party dresses. Pull-on pants like the Maeve Marni (Donni- and Reformation-style taffeta trousers) with elastic or drawstring waistbands offer another option, while Fair Isle sweaters, soft joggers and a blue sherpa coat carry the travel story.

The holiday home assortment follows a similar logic: new sheets for overnight guests, mugs for morning coffee and faux-fur throws for the sofa. Anthropologie is expanding its food offerings with coffee syrups and cake mixes that can accompany gifts of mugs or bakeware. A “take and bake” approach encourages customers to bake something in a dish they can bring to a gathering.

That gives the retailer a way to sell several complementary items around one purchase. A PayPal survey of 2,005 U.S. adults, conducted by Morning Consult and released through PR Newswire in September, found that 58% felt greater financial concern heading into the holidays, yet 64% expected to spend the same or more than last year. Thirty-four percent said they would spend less on each individual gift to accommodate holiday spending.

Asked about value, Narayanan pointed to Anthropologie’s complimentary home and wardrobe styling services, which provide recommendations at different price points, and virtual appointments where customers can get help choosing gifts within a budget. The retailer will promote that support through holiday styling parties and store events in November and December. It has also reworked its online gift guide to make its recommended gifts easier to find.

“Sometimes styling seems intimidating,” she said. “You think that you either have to have a really big budget to work with a stylist, or you have to spend all this time. We want to prove that is not the case.”

DoorDash is intended to address more immediate needs. Narayanan described a forgotten hostess gift before a neighbor’s cookie exchange or shoes left behind while visiting family. The DoorDash partnership is available nationally in the U.S., with products automatically drawn from each store’s available inventory across apparel, home, gifting, beauty and accessories. According to information supplied by the brand’s DoorDash representative, delivery is free for DashPass members on Anthropologie orders of $20 or more, with a $1.99 delivery fee below that threshold. For nonmembers, the delivery fee is typically $3.99, though it varies by location and other factors.

Exclusivity is another part of the pitch to consumers. Anthropologie is bringing back its New York City Ballet partnership and collaborating on products with Suleika Jaouad and Jon Batiste, Susan Alexandra, and Molly Hatch, as well as nonalcoholic drinks brand Ghia. The Jaouad and Batiste collection, launched October 15, draws on the couple’s entertaining habits, down to their preferences for coffee and cocktail glasses. The Ghia collection, meanwhile, complements the retailer’s barware.

The campaign will also extend to a five-part “Between Us Girls” social series with influencer Coco Schiffer (208,500 Instagram followers), launching October 23. In a statement, Global Chief Marketing Officer Barbra Sainsurin described creator-led storytelling as “a more personal, relatable way to connect with our community.”

The commercial test will be whether those stories and services persuade customers to add more to their baskets. The holiday push comes ahead of a quarter that accounted for nearly 30% of Anthropologie’s annual sales last year. It also builds on encouraging results from its summer marketing. On URBN’s August earnings call, executives said Anthropologie’s customer base grew more than 4% in the second quarter, driven primarily by a July influencer campaign that helped the team identify promising fall and holiday products. Comparable sales rose 3%, with dresses, bottoms and shoes among the stronger categories, while home was flat. Although the brand used higher markdowns to clear slower-selling inventory, regular-price comparable sales turned positive in July as new merchandise arrived. Anthropologie Group CEO Tricia Smith said introducing seasonal products earlier had helped improve full-price sales.

For now, its holiday proposition leaves room for celebrations of different sizes, including none at all. “For some people, honestly, it may just be a moment of solitude by yourself at home,” Narayanan said. “That’s cool, too.”