Thanksgiving is only a couple of weeks away, ahead of Black Friday and Cyber Monday and now the Christmas ads are coming at us thick and fast.

We know that their primary goal is to sell but in recent years they have increasingly become a little part of the Christmas lead-up in themselves thanks to their feel-good factor.

There was the lovely Lidl family one based around a mourning granddad, the little Aldi carrot dude last year (he's back - see below), the celeb-spotted M&S fashion ones and of course, the wee gems that are the John Lewis ads.

When is the John Lewis ad 2017 being released? 

Details are thin on the ground and last year at this time they gave us a sneaky peak of Buster the Boxer on Twitter. Fans believe that’s what happening with this teaser…

And one very canny shopper noticed this yesterday:

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However there hasn’t been any official confirmation yet that this is coming from the good peeps at the UK store.

I hope Christmas Countdown is right.

Looking at previous years though, 'Buster the Boxer' first aired on Sky on Thursday 10 November.

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Before that the 2015 ad, the Man on the Moon landed on Friday 6 November and Monty the Penguin (LOVED this one, below) was unveiled on Friday 7 November, 2014. Not that we’re counting.

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Gets. Me. Every. Time.

Excitement is building on Twitter already:

I'm with Heather...

And Alexandra...

Intrigued by Cristina's suggestion.

Check out the Irish connection to last year's ad here.

M&S' new Paddington ad:

The Aldi Kevin the Carrot 2017 ad - voiced by Jim Broadbent:

Lets learn from the kiddies on this one, watch the ads through their eyes: - Park the cynicism, enjoy them for what they are, a couple of minutes of feel-good-factor. And that's free.