'Baby scan' Jesus gets Christmas 2010 started

News Release: 13 December 2010

Commuters across the country will be reminded of the real Christmas message when a high impact national advertising campaign rolls out in the next few weeks.

Posters provided by ChurchAds.net featuring an image of a 'Baby Scan' Jesus with a halo, and the words, ‘He’s on His Way – Christmas starts with Christ’, will appear on bus stops and billboards in towns and cities from 6 to 27 December.

Organisers behind the campaign are confident it will be effective, since recent research from a pilot campaign proved its success in raising awareness.
Chair of the Christian charity ChurchAds.net, Francis Goodwin said: “The adverts have a powerful image with eight words that manage to communicate the unique combination of Humanity and Divinity that Jesus represents. This is a celebration of His birth and our objectives are simply to help people focus on the Christian message and story of the Nativity. This follows on from our 19 year track record of producing Christian Advertising.”

Church groups and individuals have been buying poster sites through the internet and donating to the national campaign which aims to see 2,000 billboards displaying the advert. Francis explained: “At the moment we have funds for about half of the campaign, but donations and booking are still coming in and we are still hoping to hit our ambitious target. In addition to the paid for media we have also distributed 40,000 A3 window posters via The Universe newspaper and have radio adverts running on commercial stations nationally. This will be a very visible and audible campaign.”

This year two new 30 second radio adverts follow in the theme of four previous adverts from past years and tell the Christmas story in modern setting. One takes the form of an Airport Announcement and the other an answerphone message from Joseph. The adverts can be downloaded free from Churchads.net online and will be broadcast on national networks and some 20 plus local commercial radio stations in the run up to Christmas, with the backing of local church groups.

Church Army's Mark Russell [pictured here] has backed the poster campaign, saying: "Our society is trying to airbrush Christ out of Christmas, but this imaginative poster reminds people that Christmas is all about Jesus. I encourage every church in the land to join me in supporting this exciting campaign, and buy a poster-site in their community to get people thinking about Jesus this Christmas."