This piece features screengrabs of "Elf Behaving Badly".

It wouldn’t be Christmas in the sordid year of 2017 without a gross man ruining it, and so Poundland delivered the goods on its Facebook and Twitter feeds.

Using a plastic elf with a suspiciously innocent expression, the discount store’s questionable publicity campaign objectifies women, and has been putting out generally inappropriate content for a family shop pretty much every day this month.

Here are some of the worst:



Photos: Twitter screenshots

Dear @fernemccann,

Love you, love your Poundland lippy, and I certainly don’t need a mistletoe to kiss you.

From Elf. pic.twitter.com/fw4vOq83ly — Poundland (@Poundland) December 14, 2017



Some didn’t find the elf an entertaining bit of marketing, with Twitter users accusing Poundland of “poor taste”, being “dodgy/crude” and “clickbait arseholes”, “taking sexism to a whole new level”, “losing their minds” and “inciting violence” and depicting “sexual assault” – with one user claiming to have reported the most recent one (involving a teabag) to Twitter and the police:

Report the last one by @Poundland to @twitter & the police. That’s what I’ve done & I would expect any sensible company would withdraw it, apologise and donate a substantial sum to an Abused Woman’s Support Charity — Connie Nolan (@feistywomankent) December 21, 2017

has @Poundland been hacked..... their recent adverts on here have been in rather poor taste...... — mark howsham (@MarkHowsham) December 21, 2017



When asked about the offensiveness of the campaign, Poundland’s marketing director Mark Pym commented:

“The love on Facebook has been overwhelming, and that’s because it connects with our shoppers. We’re proud of a campaign that’s only cost £25.53 and is being touted as the winning marketing campaign this Christmas!”

This gleeful response further suggests that Poundland is deliberately courting controversy for a bit of publicity (yes, I know I’m providing that in this very piece), but this is no reason to ignore it. With a huge chunk of its products being for children, it may regret running such a campaign – particularly when the recent case of Paperchase being shamed by consumers led it to changing its practices.