Uber’s new holiday ad tackles messy family moments and emotional travel as it doubles down on suburban riders—where value, convenience, and huge growth potential meet.
Uber is intensifying its marketing strategy targeting suburban communities with a new holiday advertisement, “Close.” The campaign shifts away from typical seasonal sentimentality, instead aiming for a grounded, emotional tone that acknowledges the complexities of year-end family gatherings.
“Close” frames the holidays around potential friction, addressing both the family spats that can occur and the possibilities for reconnection and forgiveness against the same backdrop. The ad’s emotional current is underscored by a stripped-back, chilly rendition of Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide” by singer-songwriter James Blake.
Connecting the Emotional and Physical Journey
The concept, developed by the agency Mother, was to link a literal journey—flying home for the holidays—with an emotional one, according to Chief Creative Officer Felix Richter. This recognizes that many travelers rely on ride-hailing services for the critical final leg of their trips.
The campaign’s launch comes amid a precarious holiday travel forecast for 2025, following an extended U.S. government shutdown and reports from Deloitte that suggest more consumers are pulling back on travel plans due to budgetary pressures. Given these factors, Uber is banking on the ad’s emphasis on value and convenience to forge stronger connections in the fourth quarter.
“Close” utilizes a storytelling approach similar to “In Good Time,” another campaign launched in October and also created with Mother. That ad, which chronicled a couple’s relationship highs and lows soundtracked by Billie Eilish’s “when the party’s over,” similarly used an Uber ride as the context for a relational turning point.
Also Read: Winning the Holiday Shopping Season in the US with Google, YouTube, and AI
A Focus on Suburban Growth
The marketing push is strategically aligned with Uber’s recent financial performance. The company reported strong Q3 earnings, with trips up 22% year-over-year to 3.5 billion. Executives highlighted that features like “wait and save” were gaining significant traction in “sparse” geographies, referring to suburban areas where consumers are more comfortable waiting a few extra minutes for a ride than in denser urban markets.
Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah, Uber CFO, noted the immense remaining opportunity in these areas during an analyst call discussing the Q3 results. “The penetration opportunity in these sparser markets continues to be quite high,” he said. “Our rough take is that we are maybe 20% into what the opportunity is on the sparse market, so [there is] still lots of upside there.”
