The pub owner behind the heartwarming Christmas advert giving John Lewis a run for its money has said being mentioned in the same breath as the retail giant is ‘completely overwhelming’ and ‘just phenomenal’.
Una Burns admitted she never expected her humble home-made video to go viral, putting Charlie’s Bar in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh on the map.
Set to the moving music of the song People Help The People covered by Birdy, it shows an elderly man visit a grave before ending up lonely in the pub – only for a little dog to warm to him, encouraging its owners to join him for a drink.
Una said: ‘It’s completely blown me away and the whole family away.
‘It actually came about because a friend of mine texted me, we do videos on our social media and they’re usually quite light-hearted.
Pub owner Una Burns (pictured) who is behind the heartwarming Christmas advert giving John Lewis a run for its money has said being mentioned in the same breath as the retail giant is ‘completely overwhelming’ and ‘just phenomenal’
Una admitted she never expected her humble home-made video to go viral, putting Charlie’s Bar (pictured) in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh on the map
‘And one of my friends had texted me and said, “Una, would you not consider doing a Christmas advert?”
‘And the day he texted me that, it was the only thing I could think about, I couldn’t focus on anything else.
‘The idea came really from what we’ve seen over the years in the bar and it didn’t seem very ground-breaking at the time, it’s a very simple message, and if anyone walks into Charlie’s it’s probably what you will see.
‘But it was very important for me that this message was more serious. We wanted people to feel something when they watched this video and to get across the idea that unfortunately Christmas isn’t as positive and joyful for some as it is for other and we probably see that more than others at this time of year.’
Una said that she wasn’t expecting such an incredible response online – and not least from the company that has been seen as the gold standard for Christmas adverts for years, investing millions in the process.
She continued: ‘The actual comment from John Lewis said, “We’re not crying, you are.” But there were so many headlines yesterday saying that we’ve blown John Lewis out of the water.
‘And for us to even be in the same headline as John Lewis is just completely overwhelming.
‘It was always something I waited for, the John Lewis advert every year, so to be even compared to that it’s just phenomenal.’
Una also revealed that the main star of the show is a local actor – but that everyone else involved are regulars of Charlie’s Bar.
The video, from Charlie’s Bar in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, tells the tale of a lonely older gentleman who finds company in two kind strangers after their adorable dog brings them together
The heartwarming Christmas ad left viewers in tears as they say it gives John Lewis – known for tearjerking festive campaigns – a ‘run for its money’
The sweet video- which is filmed and edited by Aoife Teague – ends on a quote from at W. B. Yeats poem: ‘There are no strangers here, only friends you haven’t yet met’
She added: ‘His name’s Martin McManus, he is from Fermanagh. A lot of people have asked, “Does he drink in the bar, is he a local?”
‘But he’s not actually, he’s not a regular of our bar and the was a conscious decision that I made, I didn’t want that to distract from the message.
‘A lot of the other people are well known in Fermanagh and would be recognisable but I wanted that main actor not to be because I didn’t want it to distract.
‘The couple actually own the dog and they do come into the bar, the dog’s called Missy and it was just a star in the show.
‘She is a really friendly dog and when I first came up with the idea I just knew they were the right couple and that would be the dog for the job.
‘My phone has been off the hook but I think we’re over seven million views on Twitter and we don’t even have a Twitter account, people are just sending me screenshots.’
Una said: ‘It’s not been a typical Monday today at the bar! It went up at 7pm on Friday evening and I said to my friends I’d reply if there were any comments, but then it just took off on Saturday.
‘It just went completely mad. I think it was when the big accounts started to share it, the likes of joe.ie and LadBible, and then the papers and I think it just completely blew up then. I haven’t even been able to actually read any of the articles, but I definitely will.
‘From Saturday people were coming in who had seen the advert and were coming in because they’ve seen it. And they were saying to me, “Have you seen how many likes you’ve got on TikTok?”
‘And I was behind the bar and didn’t have my phone on me and they were showing me and they’d never been in before, so it’s very hard normally to measure the success of a social media video but obviously this one’s on a completely other level.’
Una joked that she’s now made a rod for her own back, and that just like with John Lewis, punters will be expecting a new advert each year.
She laughed: ‘I know! I don’t what we’re going to do next year, we’ll definitely have to do one. The thing was, for me it was seen as such a simple idea, there wasn’t a huge storyline, it just seemed simple to me. I suppose that’s maybe what has taken the hearts of so many.’
The clip has raked up hundreds of comments, with people admitting to shedding tears and praising the heartwarming message
The main actor Marty McManus will be back in the pub today, and Una said he has been equally taken aback by the reaction to the video.
She said: ‘Absolutely. Whenever I had suggested it to him, he was totally on for the idea, but obviously it’s very difficult whenever someone suggest something to know what it’s going to look like at the end product.
‘And I didn’t realise he didn’t actually have social media, so when it went up, he wasn’t seeing the response. It was only that one of his family had said to me, so I sent him the video and I’ve been chatting to him on the phone.
‘He was actually in the bar yesterday, he’s coming in today, but I think he’s just completely blown away, he can’t believe it, he said he’s never had as many phone calls and messages in his life.
‘My Mum knew all about this from the outset and she said to me yesterday, “Oh, make sure and give him a hug.” I’m like, “Mum, he’s not actually grieving!” But he obviously played it very well and people were leaving comments underneath that they wanted to buy him a pint and how can they get in touch with this man. But people are obviously really buying into his story.’
Una said that the video production was the handiwork of local woman Aoife Teague, and hopes it will lead to bigger things for her too.
She added that it shows just how good a video can be made on a budget, when retail giants like John Lewis spend millions on their ad campaigns.
Una said: ‘This is our first Christmas video and hopefully not the last by the sounds of it. I think part of the reason it’s captured people’s imaginations is that the timing of it just seemed to right, and it wasn’t an intentional thing.
‘We put it up on Friday but at that time there was a lot about the Dublin riots and obviously everything else that is going on in the world that I think people just kind of wanted to see something positive and our video just seemed to fill that gap.
‘Aoife’s brilliant and I knew I needed somebody that knew what they were doing behind a camera because that’s certainly not my skillset and she was great in that regard.
‘But she took it all on an iPhone and I think a lot of people were surprised when they heard that. And some of the people in the video were literally just asked on the day when we were standing there.
‘The two girls were walking across the road and one of them works for us. The man with the newspaper was in the bar and said, “Oh, I want to be in the video!” so he ended up in it! So some of it was literally done on the day and it just worked out well.
‘Aoife was a dream to work with and it was a team effort that got us to where we are today, I think it is something she wants to do full-time and I’ve no doubt that’s going to turn into a full-time job very soon.’