<Well, it’s nearly Christmas again. Or is it?

Yes, if you live in North America, Oz, Kiwi-land or the UK and bits of Western Europe it is, but outside of that it all goes to Greenland in a handcart. Strictly speaking, of course, Christmas does not exist for the majority of the world’s population, but that doesn’t stop bedecked fir trees from being lit up in Dubai or Hong Kong. The Russians still stick to the archaic calendar and celebrate Christmas after New Year’s Eve, and everyone else.  And so it goes.

It is a complete minefield for many a corporate marketer:

• How many corporate databases capture religion as a standard field in their CRM?
• >Or stop to consider that it may not be Christmas where the customer is?
• How does the average Westerner feel about getting an email blast for Eid or Diwali?

Conversely, how many Europeans are irritated by the insidious “Season’s Greetings” or, worse,  “Happy Holidays“? As far as I’m concerned my “holidays” are when I spend at least two weeks in sunny climes well removed from work, colleagues and blogging. Certainly not to be confused with that grim, dark, grey part of the year we Brits still call “Christmas”.

Anyway, here at Wordbank we thought it would be a bit of fun to create an interactive, multimedia Christmas Trivia Quiz to amuse any of you who might be interested in how Christmas is celebrated across the globe.

Finally, just to prove that being a luxury brand doesn’t mean that you don’t make mistakes like the rest of us, can you spot the error in this ‘Christmas email’ to an American colleague? Click to view and Spot the error.

P.S.  For the Scots (NB: Scotch is what you drink) it is New Year’s Eve or Hogmanay that is the big night including, of course, singing ‘Auld Lang Syne’.