Growth
A Ramadan campaign planning timeline for Kuwait brands
A month by month plan working backwards from the first iftar of Ramadan 2027: strategy, production, media booking, gifting, Eid and how to measure it.
Ramadan 2027 is expected to begin around the middle of February and to end with Eid al Fitr around the middle of March, subject to the moon. If you want a campaign in market on the first day, the useful question is not when to start. It is what has to be true in each month between now and then.
Working backwards is the only planning method that survives a Kuwait Ramadan. Media inventory is booked before you are ready, and cast, crew, kitchens, locations and printers all fill up because everyone else is producing at the same time. A campaign decided in January pays a premium for whatever is left.
Here is the timeline we run with clients, month by month, with what actually has to be finished at each point.
The shape of the plan on one page
| When | What must be finished |
|---|---|
| October | Last year reviewed, objective agreed, budget approved, the offer decided |
| November | Idea and message signed off, channel plan drafted, production brief written |
| December | Cast, locations and crew booked, packaging and print started, media held |
| January | Shoot and edit complete, all assets versioned, media confirmed and paid |
| Early February | Everything scheduled, the inbox and delivery ready, the team briefed |
| Ramadan | Run, read the numbers weekly, hold budget back for the last ten nights |
| Eid and after | Eid message, thank you, then the debrief while it is still fresh |
October and November are the decision months
Start by reading last Ramadan honestly. Pull the sales by week, the media spend by channel, the creative that carried the season and the operational failures, which are usually delivery times and stock. Most brands skip this and repeat the same mistake at a higher cost.
Then agree one objective. Volume, new customers, or gifting revenue. A campaign trying to do all three splits the budget into portions too small to work, and the creative ends up saying nothing in particular.
The single most important October decision is the offer. Not the film, not the key visual, the offer. A family bundle, an iftar set, a gifting box, a delivery promise, free assembly, a payment split. If the offer is weak, better content only makes more people aware of something they do not want.
November turns that into a message and a channel plan. Write the idea in one sentence a warehouse manager would understand, decide which channels carry the season for your category, then write the production brief with the full asset list, because the asset list determines the cost of the shoot.
December and January are production
Book people early. By December the good crews, kitchens, homes and studio spaces are being held for Ramadan work. If your campaign needs a family, an older cast member or a specific look, casting takes longer than people expect and should start in December, not after the boards are approved.
Anything physical needs more time. Gifting boxes, sleeves, printed inserts and in store material all have a lead time, and a reprint in late January is where budgets quietly go. Approve the packaging artwork before the shoot, then shoot the real thing rather than a mock up.
Shoot in early to mid January so the edit has room. Plan the full asset list in one production: the main film, cutdowns at fifteen and six seconds, vertical versions, stills for print and menus, a gifting sequence, and neutral clips for the last ten nights and Eid. Building all of it in one go is the difference between one production budget and three.
By the end of January every asset should be finished, versioned in Arabic and English, and named so that whoever schedules them can find the right one at midnight. We plan and produce this as one block, which is described on our content, photo and video page.
Book media before the good inventory goes
Ramadan is the most competitive advertising month of the year in Kuwait. Anything bought at auction gets more expensive, and anything negotiated gets scarce. Both problems have the same answer, which is to commit earlier than feels comfortable.
Hold positions in December and confirm in January. That covers broadcast and sponsorship, out of home along the routes that fill after iftar, and creator partnerships, which are usually booked out by early January. Digital budgets can be set later, but the account structure, audiences and tracking should be built and tested in January, not in the first week of the month.
Keep roughly a fifth of the budget unallocated. You will want it for the last ten nights, and for whichever creative turns out to be working, which is never the one everybody predicted.
Content that fits the shape of a Ramadan day
The day inverts. Mornings are slow, the afternoon is planning and shopping, the hour before iftar is the sharpest window of the day, and the evening runs late through suhoor. Your content and your media should follow that curve rather than a normal schedule.
The hour before iftar is for anything decided in the moment: delivery, offers, reminders, availability. Keep those short and useful. The late evening is where people browse and shop, so it suits the film, the gifting story and considered content. Suhoor is a smaller, quieter window that rewards a calm tone and suits cafes, groceries and anything convenient.
Gifting deserves its own track. Decide the price points early, make the box look good in a hand rather than on a plinth, and be explicit about the last date you can deliver in time. Confirm with your operations team what they can actually fulfil during the busiest weeks, then promise slightly less than that.
On tone, be useful rather than sentimental. Generic imagery of lanterns and moons is the visual equivalent of a form letter, and there is a great deal of it every year. A brand that shows its own product solving a real Ramadan problem, the rush before iftar or feeding a full house, is the one remembered.
The last ten nights and Eid
The last ten nights change behaviour. Shopping intensifies, nights run later, and a lot of brands have spent their budget by then. This is where the reserve earns its place, and where you should be increasing spend on whatever is converting rather than launching something new.
Eid has to be ready before the last week, because nobody has the capacity to make it then. At a minimum: a greeting that does not look like everyone else's, your opening hours, and a clear line on delivery and returns. If you sell gifts, plan the days after Eid too, because exchanges and returning customers arrive at once.
Then stop and write the debrief in the week after Eid, while people still remember what happened. Nobody wants to do it. It is the single highest value hour of the whole season, because it becomes next October's starting point.
The mistakes that repeat every year
- Starting in January. The campaign gets made, but you pay more for media, shoot with second choice crew and cast, and lose the room to fix anything.
- Generic visuals. If your key visual would work with a competitor's logo on it, it is not doing any work for you.
- Ignoring the last ten nights. Spending evenly across the month means going quiet exactly when intent peaks.
- Marketing ahead of operations. Driving demand your kitchen, warehouse or delivery cannot meet costs you more in reviews and messages than the campaign earns.
- One asset in one language. Arabic and English versions written separately, plus vertical and horizontal cuts, should be in the production brief from the start.
- No measurement plan. Deciding what success looks like after the campaign runs guarantees an argument in April.
Measuring a season that does not behave like a month
Do not compare Ramadan to the month before it. Compare it to the same season last year, week by week, because the rhythm inside the month matters more than the total. Week one is curiosity, the middle weeks are steady, the last ten nights are the peak, and Eid is its own event.
Track four things weekly: cost per order or per qualified conversation, the share of orders from new customers, average order value against your bundle plan, and delivery or fulfilment time. That last one is a marketing metric during Ramadan, because it decides whether the demand you bought turns into repeat business.
Set the baselines in November so you are not defining success in March. Our approach to that measurement sits with the rest of our performance marketing work, and we would rather agree the numbers before the money is spent.
Frequently asked questions
When should we start planning Ramadan 2027
October for strategy, budget and the offer. December for booking crew, cast and anything printed. January for the shoot, the edit and confirming media. If it is already January, cut the ambition rather than the preparation time.
How much of the annual budget should Ramadan take
It depends entirely on your category. For food, gifting, grocery and home, Ramadan and Eid are often the largest trading period of the year and the budget should reflect that. Work back from what the season is worth to your revenue, not from a share of the media plan.
Can we shoot in February instead
You can shoot small, reactive content in February and you should. The main production should not be there. Crews, cast and locations are stretched, working hours shift, and any delay eats into the campaign itself with no room to recover.
What if our product has no obvious Ramadan angle
Then do not force one. Be useful instead: adjusted hours, faster delivery, a bundle that suits a full house, a payment option. A quiet, practical message in a month full of sentiment often stands out more than a themed film.
We plan Ramadan the same way each year, backwards from the first iftar, with the offer agreed before anyone talks about the film. If you want help setting that timeline for 2027, our growth marketing team usually starts with last year's numbers and a single page of decisions, not a creative deck.
