Cartier ad Outshines Luxury Brands with Iconic Panther

Dec. 02, 2025

Cartier’s new social creative, "A Magical Night in 13 Paix", has earned an exceptional 5.2 Star Rating with creative effectiveness platform System1, significantly higher than the 2.1 average score for luxury brands.

System1’s Star Rating predicts an advert’s long-term brand-building potential and is calculated by measuring emotional response to each ad, with a score of 5.0 or above considered “exceptional”.

The creative, which shows a pack of mischievous panther cubs causing havoc in Cartier’s flagship Paris store until they are brought into line by the brand’s iconic panther, injects familiar brand assets with a new spirit of humour and fun.

Jon Evans, Chief Customer Officer at System1, said: 

"As we saw in The Extraordinary Cost of Dull report, luxury brands too often get ‘optimised’ into sameness, stretching to fit every channel and losing the character that made them distinctive. In a narrow, highly targeted game, that leaves a category where elegance, provenance and exclusivity crowd out play, humour and feeling, so brands struggle to connect and to stand out. Cartier proves there is another way. By refusing to sand down its identity, it has optimised the brand properly. It leads with story and warmth, lets the product sit back, and puts its assets front and centre: the red, the panther, the logo. The panther is real category cut-through, and proof that in luxury, charm and emotion can work as hard as status."

 

Along with a 5.2 Star Rating, the Cartier creative received an exceptional Spike Rating (indicating high short-term sales potential). The creative also recorded an exceptional 87% fast fluency score, meaning that within just 2 seconds, nearly everyone recognised the brand. Instant brand recognition is especially critical for social media, where attention is fleeting and creatives risk being lost in the scroll.

Evans added:

"First unveiled in 1914, the Cartier Panther is still leaving his pawprint on the brand. The success of this latest creative shows just how effective distinctive brand assets can be when they’re reimagined in a new context."