Walmart Permissions
This is an opening frame of Lily’s Walmart Christmas Commercial with Taylor Swift singing "Never Grow Up". Snow blanketed Greer on Christmas Day 2010.
Well, it would be as much a long shot as a snowball’s chance . . .
Let’s let Steve Owens, Communications Director at the City of Greer, describe the sequence of events that brought his attention to the depiction of Greer as a winter wonderland.
Said Owens: “I was surprised Sunday afternoon when my mobile phone began beeping with text messages and e-mails from city staff watching the Chiefs-Broncos game on WSPA. They were letting me know that Greer City Park had just been on national television.
“I thought it was a joke until I viewed the commercial on YouTube and repeatedly played the opening second of the ad. If viewers blinked they probably missed it, but those of us who see City Park on a daily basis were immediately hooked. It's difficult not to be excited and proud when the nation's largest retailer considers the City of Greer to have the epitome of a Christmas scene.”
Lily’s Walmart Christmas Commercial was launched last year during the holidays and is re-running this year. Swift sings “Never Grow Up”.
The first frames are of falling snow at a decorated Greer City Park. The snow footage was recorded on Christmas Day 2010. The holiday storm blanketed greater Greer.
Betsy Reithemeyer, a spokesperson for Walmart, told GreerToday.com she had been unable to track the producers of the commercial and was unsure how the Greer scene was worked into the opening.
Often times agencies will locate stock scenes posted on a website by amateurs and professionals and pay a small fee for one-time rights. It’s speculated the media company producing the commercial searched for Christmas Day snow and the video with Greer City Park was among the findings.