Restaurants are selling $5K gift cards
Plus: Good design made a B2B brand go viral
Hi to a bunch of you that are new! Excited to have you here.
As always, the lens of this letter is a best-of-the-best on culture, trends, marketing, etc. What I’m dropping to friends on Slack or finding useful in meetings with brands.
This week in…
CULTURE
WE’RE ALL LOVING LOVE TRIANGLES
The ‘WTF Did I Marry’ series is a long format, TikTok romance novel—albeit a not romantic story. And the internet is obsessed. And we shouldn’t be surprised this is taking off given that romance novels are keeping the publishing industry alive. What brands are going to jump on to this trend? How one of the faltering dating apps not leaning into this romance trend is beyond me.
Bumble is shifting focus to enhance its friend-finding Bumble BFF. In China, people are monetizing by hanging out with lonely moms on errands or just listening to people. There’s a lot of cultural stigma around ‘not being able to make friends’. Brands like Kido are a great example of how you can use your place in the community to provide a service that people seem to be craving.
SPEND MONEY TO MAKE LIKES -> Feed Me
“Tarte Cosmetics sent influencers a Canon G7x ($640) and Purple Jordans ($150) ahead of their brand trip to Bora Bora, and We Wore What sent influencers a Terra Keffe espresso machine ($900) to promote their new pajama sets.” This signals how saturated influencer marketing is. Wondering if influencer marketing is headed the way of Google Ads where it’s so costly brands will shift their dollars elsewhere.
NO PICTURES IS PISSING PEOPLE OFF
The Row’s “decision to ban phones and encourage the attendees to take notes – from provided notebooks” pissed a lot of folx off it seems. Others thought it was “refreshing”. 2 thoughts: 1) There are journalists and there are influencers, and their content ‘needs’ are vastly different. So the Row’s showing what they value—not judging that just observing. It is certainly positioning. 2) The coverage they got off this compared to the show: huge.
FINDING A GOOD WORK VIBE IS CAUSING A WAITLIST -> Feed Me
Laobra Cafe recently opened in Brooklyn and it’s selling out every weekend. It seems they are a cafe you can book to work in. “This past Saturday’s Day Passes sold out in just 15 MINUTES!” For each date, they offer day passes for there are “40 Day Passes available which begin at $15 (tax+tip included)”. Not sure how the financials make sense but the demand tells us something.
POSITIONING
IS IT A TAB OR IS IT JUST AN EXPENSIVE GIFT CARD?
Emily tearing ‘house accounts’ a new one made my week. Hysterical. The whole rant was about how brands, like our beloved Gjelina (still love them), are introducing ‘house accounts’. Eg. $5K gets you a $5K ‘tab’ and a private phone number, $10K gets you a $10K ‘tab’, the private number, private event invites, and a discount for hotel stays. Except these are not ‘tabs’ because you pre-paid. They are uber-expensive gift cards with some small plus-ups. Guaranteed it won’t stop people from buying them. Truly a lesson for how positioning matters to people.
Wendy’s was forced to clarify what they meant when they said their new digital menu boards would enable “dynamic pricing,” Don’t think any consumers wondered if burgers would be more expensive at peak hours but we can all see inflation pricing tactics when we see them. Are we headed to ‘Market Price’ fast food?
BOWLS OF SUGAR FOR DINNER DIDN’T GO DOWN WELL
Kellogg’s CEO Gary Pilnick came under fire for a recent CNBC interview in which he suggested cereal for dinner as a viable money-saving solution for families experiencing economic hardship. What’s funny is that they made a WHOLE campaign around the concept in 2022. 1) Kellogg’s (and others) need to get their product strategy in order 2) Really look at what value they ACTUALLY add.
F&B
Snaxshot loved the concept but reviews like ‘Greasier than a Lays’ aren’t great. Brands are just under a lot of pressure from press outlets to “have something newsworthy” and this fits that bill. But pointing out how your chips are 39% fat is pretty odd.
McDonald’s launched a manga campaign this week. Comic culture is interesting and comes with some deeply ardent fans so, it was interesting to see this not getting that much love on their socials, underperforming compared to their typical content. They also launched a collab with Nails.INC that didn’t seem to go over either based on the comments. Not a great week.
HARDROCK IS BRING IN THE BIG BOYS
This week Major Food Group (Carbone, Grill, Parm, etc) announced a partnership with the Hard Rock franchise — which has 300 locations — to be their culinary consultants. Their roles will involve overhauling the menus at pre-existing Hard Rock locations as well as upcoming ones. Hardrock was so great once, would be cool to see them make a comeback. Truly good food would help but would love to see the brand reimagined too.
DRUGS
GOOD NEIGHBORS ARE FOR BUSINESS
The restrictions on cannabis advertising are notoriously draconian, even in places where cannabis is legal. But, one cannabis brand in Canada—called Stok'd Cannabis Retail Store skirted the restrictions by advertising their neighbors and then quietly being in the picture. A little gimmicky but honestly smart.
RETAIL
Coach has gone all out in Tokyo with a giant pop-up called Coach Play (might be permanent, can’t tell). It’s “a multi-sensorial space” with a coffee/donut shop and a bespoke craft bar. Bar. What stands out though is: if you removed all the Coach logos throughout, would you have any idea it was Coach?
GAP ran a fun dance campaign with Tyla this week and people are into it. If you aren’t online all the seconds of the day the bringing together of this campaign might go over your head a bit (it’s based on a viral video that they reworked WITH the original creators and Tyla). Mainly though the video is fun, did a good job of social listening and crediting, AND feels like the GAP everyone knew and loved. Maybe the Gap is back?
VEGA WILL REPAIR ANY BRAND’S SHOES
Mentioned last week that ‘repair’ was the sustainability trend in 2024 and then saw Vega open yet another store. “With a 100-square-meter space, this space welcomes 2 cobblers to work on repairing sneakers and shoes every day of the week, but also a tailor to give a new lease on life to your clothes, no matter the brand.”
IKEA SHOULD STICK TO VIRAL PRODUCTS
Ikea launched its first global ad campaign at the ripe old age of 80. “Do Try This at Home,” supposedly “equips [the brand] with a more consistent voice across the 31 markets… [and] communicates Ikea’s recent price cuts to cash-strapped customers. This ad is not it. Meanwhile, Ikea’s been doing what it does best with a new collection with Raw Color and it looks downright adorable. Why isn’t the ad this cute?
Love this casting of Sha’Carri Richardson. That’s all there is to say. Most brands aren’t this brave but it always pays off when you are.
Jordan’s unveiling its new flagship concept in the States finally and they have chosen Philly as the location—interesting, like it. "Philadelphia’s Jordan The World of Flight will deliver a timeless, thoughtful designed store that can contribute to the neighborhood and character of the streetscape.” The brand opened its first World of Flight store in Milan, followed by Tokyo, and most recently in Seoul.
ARE MERCHANDISERS ARE KILLING BRANDS?
This quote says it all really. We have worked with so many brands that shoot looks based on the buy that’s just not the way people get inspired. Seems like runways are having a similar issue.
MISS LEWINSKY IS GETTING THE LOVE SHE DESERVES
People are loving this new Reformation campaign with Monica Lewinsky. Unsurprisingly half the audience seems to not know who she is but the other half is eager enough to tell them so it’s all good. Strong comment section! The way they present it on TikTok is pretty lackluster though—odd.
STETSON NEEDS TO CAPITALIZE -> AfterSchool
“Following her Super Bowl ad, Google searches for “cowboy hat” were up 212.5%…And now Stetson, Beyoncé’s brand of choice, is having a hard time keeping their signature Western hats in stock.” It’s interesting when you see brands like this riding a wave. What do they do next to ensure they stay popular once the trend wears off?
There’s very little you have to do to make me want to go back to Japan constantly. Uniqlo made a store in Yokohama that is a full-on playground on the exterior and it’s pretty genius. The interiors look a little meh though.
TECH
IF A B2B FINANCE COMPANY CAN GO VIRAL SO CAN YOU
What’s more interesting than the fact that Runway went viral is what it went viral for. Branding. Yep. A B2B brand leaned into brand design and their website went crazy. Honestly, the design isn’t THAT shocking. Though it’s good it shows how low the bar generally for B2B. Loved these quotes best from the interview about the thinking behind the new site:
“During the development design process, the thing we kept on thinking about is, how do we do something that tells the story of what Runway is, but pushes what people think good design is, in the space of B2B forward, and is built for not just conversion ... actually not at all for conversion ... but for interest, like surprise and entertainment.”
“...what we're trying to get to do is, our buyer may want to think about this once or twice a year, and our goal needs to be that when they do that, they think Runway is in the mix, because we have a lot of confidence that if they just talk to us and look at us, they will end up buying us. So we just need them to be more aware of us, and that requires something different, too.”
“According to Pew, there are actually less young people on TikTok right now than there were on Instagram in 2014. Almost 40% of TikTok users are in their 30s and 40s. In 2014, that same age group (which we are trying not to refer to as middle-aged) accounted for only about 20% of Instagram users. Even crazier, according to Pew's survey, people aged 35-49 are more likely to actually upload videos than people aged 18-34. And, perhaps most damning of all, TikTok’s 30-49 demographic is actually growing faster than the 18-34 cohort.” Will just leave this here.
SPORT
REI announced a new gender-free line called Active Pursuits. The line launches in stores this spring, and will have its own space near the front, “a nod to the commitment the company is making to gender-free shopping.” This article also points to several other brands that have been leading the way here such as Smart Wool, Janji, and Bakline.
Charlotte Tilbury is now an official sponsor of the F1 academy, Formula 1’s female-only racing championship. The partnership makes Charlotte Tilbury the first female-founded and first beauty brand to officially sponsor the sub-league. The Charlotte Tilbury car will be driven by 18-year-old French driver Lola Lovinfosse. Like I’ve said before, think we are just at the beginning of this F1 brand love affair.
WELLNESS
LAUNDRY AISLE IS GETTING BOUJIE
Putting concerns about fragrance aside, it was interesting to see Snif launch a new laundry perfume. Ded Cool is already there but think we will see more brands in this space soon.
“On the morning of Monday, January 29, employees at the period-underwear brand Thinx were invited to a last-minute, company-wide Zoom meeting. CEO Meghan Davis logged on and quickly got to the point, reading from a script: The company was being “integrated” into its corporate owner Kimberly-Clark, the company behind Kotex and Kleenex, and significant layoffs were coming. By the end of the day, the Thinx team was decimated. On a team of 109 people, 95 were losing their jobs.” honestly this brand lost its edge ages ago (and had some serious PR issues) so no one is surprised here but when they were great, they were great. RIP.
BASIC LOOK BRANDS ARE IN STYLE
According to Magasin, body exfoliator and moisturizer Amlactin is very popular with the cool kids. As is, French pharmacy brand A313. And obviously, we never stop reading about someone resetting their skin by using Cerave. Interesting to see these brands all together, right?
SEAWEED’S HERE TO SAVE OUR OCEANS
Sway, the clean-tech start-up scaling seaweed-based, rapidly compostable replacements for plastic, raised $5 million in seed funding. Honestly, love all these sustainable options, usually the struggle is price and availability. But if they can make plastic windows in packaging sustainable, I’m in.
FUN TO FOLLOW
Like these Molly Matalon photos of Olivia Rodriguez fans
1.5M images in 12,000 subject headings available with your library card—the guest curations are stellar
JUST FOR LAUGHS
This sub-brand of CNN
Sounds of LA. Love me an infographic
Learning all the Gen-Z poses because of this
‘Methlab’ Willy Wonka pop-up
That’s all, folx! Made it under the word limit! Will take the win.