Adland's top festive ad picks (part six)

Here's what Dentsu Creative Webchutney's Surjo Dutt and Centrick's Vistasp Hodiwala picked as their most-liked pieces of work.

Amidst the barrage of festive communication coming our way, Manifest asked the advertising, marketing and media community to share their most-liked piece of work from all time.

This article was originally published in our November issue (which can be bought here). We’re featuring the advertising industry's favourite works, sharing two selections at a time in alphabetical order.

Here are the top picks from Dentsu Creative Webchutney's Surjo Dutt and Centrick's Vistasp Hodiwala.

Surjo Dutt, chief creative officer, Dentsu Creative Webchutney

I don’t have a favourite festival ad of all time. But there was a recent one that made me smile and also think. The Cherrapunji ki Diwali (Cherrapunji’s Diwali) piece has stayed in my head for two years now. It was warm and soft and energetic and awww-inducing and sensitive and effective all at the same time.

Diversity and integration are truths that we should never stop telling. Again and again in a million different ways because nothing is cooler than diversity, and national integration will never ever go out of style. At least I hope so.

Vistasp Hodiwala, co-founder and chief creative officer, Underdog, and co-founder, Centrick

It’s a commercial by the John Lewis store made more than a dozen years ago. John Lewis has of course aced the festive season genre (if one may call it that) for years, and it’s a real task to pick a personal favourite from a whole bunch of legendary pieces. But I will go with the 2011 season’s The Long Wait. Everything about that commercial is pitch perfect and the ‘wait’ even for the viewer when it comes to the pay-off is totally worth it. What elevates this everyday story to classic status is the way it brings alive the warmth, love, and the universal sense of expectation that the holidays come with.