You didn't know banks could teach you about branding
Plus: The PR teams at Facebook and Westman Atelier are wizards
Morning all,
Bit of a long one, might want to get a coffee.
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.
Let’s dive in!
CULTURE
Glassdoor, THE place for anonymously reviewing employers has made a hair-brained decision to require people sure of their real name. If your brand equity is tied to anonymity you should probably hold onto that at all costs. Should we guess is this from a consultant-recco’d change?
OUTING IS NOT ALL BAD -> AfterSchool
The internet is not mad at all types of outings. Publicly outing cheating fiancees is totally encouraged and enjoyed by all (except maybe by one party). Publicly calling brands copying designers is also huge fodder for internet craziness (like this example of Soho House knocking off classic designers). But brands outing copycats and cheats doesn’t go well.
GIRLS WANT TO BALL -> The Hustle
BookTok is driving demand for immersive fantasy events. Texas-based Eudantria Events sold all 420 tickets to its first fantasy-themed ball in 2022, priced at $175 each. UK company Hushfable sold 1k+ tickets to its first event, inspired by Sarah J. Maas’ A Court of Thorns and Roses series, for $230-$320 each. This is a fun place for brands to play.
FARMING AND SIMPLICITY ARE APPEALING -> AfterSchool
There’s a growing interest in farming and simpler pleasures among young people who are “trading in keyboards for tractors at higher rates,” and Pennsylvania’s legislators are passing initiatives to support beginning farmers to take advantage. Good content opps here.
CLEANING AND MANNERS ARE POPULAR -> AfterSchool
Modern etiquette William Hanson, (1.7M followers on TikTok), is teaching people manners. And Nessa, a CleanTok star regularly has more than +20M views on her posts. This isn’t news but these are great places for brands to partner. Similar to the topic above, mundane sh*t is really where it’s at right now.
MrBeast is launching a reality show with Amazon (Prime needs a win, made this is it) in which 1k people will compete for $5m. Emily says hospitality peeps are into making trivia hot again. And there’s now an “invite-only virtual trivia by the girls, for the girls.“ Another fun place for brands to play.
F&B
RESTAURANTS CAN MAKE MONEY -> Feed Me
Major Food Group is now a $500M+/year business. We’ve written about Carbone and founder Jeff Zalaznick before. He wants to build the LVMH of hospitality. Emily pointed out that it’s hard to scale restaurants and not experience ‘Vegasificiation’. Investing in an iconic brand is clearly worth it.
AND RESTAURANTS CAN RAISE MONEY -> The Information
Restaurant startup, Wonder, has raised $700 million. At first glance it looks like a ghost kitchen that isn’t ashamed. But the CEO has an entrepreneurial track record, (co-founded Diapers.com and Jet.com) And he is a skilled marketer—clearly. Seems like a big piece is collaborating with other food brands so worth watching.
This Marie Condo x Barilla collaboration is super confusing. It took this post breaking down helped—but not much. Essentially, the campaign tries to tap into the fact that when people ship second-hand goods they get packed into cheapest packaging possible to save money. Marie Condo teaches you how to make that experience better with a Barilla box. Yep, it’s a lot to unpack.
EXPO IS THE WORLD CUP FOR SNACKS
Snaxshot had a fun, informal recap of Expo West’s show this week. This was the best line:
“The amount of VC money being lit on fire at EXPO was palpable—you can directly correlate a big raise with a bougie booth, see Goodles, POPPI and Better Brand.”
Omsom has a reel breaking down the cost of having these booths for small brands. With ad costs being ridiculous, getting wholesale accounts is the goal for most brands so while these booths cost money it’s likely a good investment if they pick up good accounts. But not everyone was doing it. There was also energy like this which is also fun.
IS IT POSSIBLE FOR MEAT EATER TO LIKE IMPOSSIBLE?
Impossible rebranded this week, announcing they were “Hopping on the red bandwagon ❤️‼️💥💃🚨🔴🌶️❤️🔥🎈” Juicy Marbles commented “ Welcome.” (Their red branding is much more fun). Most of the commentsshared this sentiment: ”Love the packaging, hate that it will now be hard to identify in stores. 😩” Impossible is not trying to please the customer it has. Only 5-8% of Americans are vegetarian. The red is about appealing to meat eaters. Not sure it’s a big enough shift to right the ship. Hopefully, the strategy has more than the color to go on.
DRUGS
ZYN’S GOT NOTHING ON A PIPE -> AfterSchool
Having recently spent a lot of time at the old Nat Sherman store for a cannabis client, I’ve been thinking a lot about the culture of cigars and pipes. It’s not surprising that people think they are cool. They are slower, more about savoring the moment, and come with cool accessories. But maybe have just had enough of talking to people who have a mouthful of Zyn. Could see a (non-conforming) brand entering this space soon.
ALPHAS
GEN ALPHA IS DRIVING 49 PERCENT SALES
26% of households have a tween (or possibly fewer), yet this cohort is driving 49 percent of mass skin care’s growth. Cleansers, serums, and masks. We’ve talked about this before. Think there’s a lot of possibility for cleaner (yet) affordable brands that parents would be happier buying.
Driven by social media, the brick-and-mortar experience is a boon for brands. Last month, we wrote about Sol de Janeiro’s Meatpacking pop-up. They, smartly, timed it to co-inside with the mid-February break when New York students have no school. And because of it “saw people of multiple generations together—moms and daughters.”
RETAIL
We talked about brands using kid or kid-created content/assets last week. This SSense campaign is another great example. So share-worthy. It’s not new but it works.
SAM EDELMAN IS GOING FOR DUPE CONSUMER-> AfterSchool
Kylie Jenner is the new face of Sam Edelman. It’s a bit of an odd oneness she’s always pictured in luxury brands like Loewe, Lanvin, Jacquemus, etc. But honestly, that’s who Sam Edelman wants to be, the lux dupe of. But Kylie doesn’t do dupes, she doesn’t need to. You can see how they got to this choice but it’s not a great fit.
LUXURY IS HAVING A TOUGH WEEK -> The Hustle
Luxury stocks took a tumble yesterday. Gucci’s sales are down 20% YoY. The market Kering saw a ~12% drop. And Hermes is being sued for requiring shoppers to buy other products before they can get a Birkin bag. Maybe Kylie’s collab choice makes more sense now.
Someone at Gap woke up and thought what we’d all been thinking: why don’t see just go back to the good old days? Not sure there’s that much overlap between Palace’s and Gaps’ audience but the ode to the brands’ heritage and ‘90s style makes sense. In the comments, the Gap customer seems more excited than Palace’s skater crowd.
TIFFANY’S LOOKS BETTER IN CHINA
Tiffany & Co. is courting wealthy Chinese buyers with another exclusive high jewelry launch in Shanghai. Not news. But what’s worth looking at is the interiors for the launch. A very different Tiffany’s than we’re used to.
TIME FOR A MID-TIER WOMEN’S WATCH BRAND
Fine jewelry brand Kinn is getting into the watch space with a curated edit of vintage Cartier, Gucci, and Seiko timepieces. The watches are very complementary of Kinn’s 14k gold house line. We’ve said it before: Curation is back.
TECH
AI GOT BOOED AT SXSW-> The Information
SxSW shared a sizzle reel ahead of a screening that on keynotes and panelists in town to discuss AI. No shock, it got booed—loudly. Those boos grew the loudest when OpenAI’s head of ChatGPT declared “I actually think that AI fundamentally makes us more human.” AI is amazing and it’s inescapable but people are still very on the fence.
BANKS ARE USING AI BUT IT WILL KILL THEM
“Banks will be incrementally assisted by generative AI and then they will be destroyed by the fact that everyone else will have it. Their entire business model depends on inertia and opacity and latency — and all those things will go away.”
This quote from a talk at the NewComer’s Bank Summit is fascinating. Value propositions are about to get a whole lot more important—not just in banking.
REDDIT’S ON A ROLE -> The Information
Last week we talked about Reddit’s rollout of Pro, a brand-ad offering. This week’s successful IPO maybe the glimmer happiness we’ve all been waiting for. They ended its first day on the public markets up 48%. It wasn’t without a little Twitter co-founder drama though.
TIKTOK IS THE NEW SEARCH ENGINE -> The Hustle
TikTok will now factor a “search value” metric into payouts through its Creator Rewards monetization program. Basically SEO for TikTok, creators will be paid in part based on how well their content answers user searches. This will drastically change how brands make content and write captions.
Just about everyone has a creator’s fund. Digital fashion is still a weird space for a lot of brands, this might help. Roblox claims 50% of Gen-Z say styling their avatar is more important than their style in real life, other’s say this space has plateaued. But this week digital fashion brand Mmerch secured $6.4 million in seed funding, so interest is still there.
FACEBOOK IS POPULAR AGAIN (FOR SOME THINGS)
Categorize this alongside the peplum being back—news, you didn’t want to hear. Pokes have gone up 13x since the start of 2024. Casey Lewis hilariously pointed out that “Between this and the Marketplace story, Facebook PR is doing overtime this week to convince us that Gen Z loves the social media platform.” Fun stat though: Facebook Marketplace has 1B+ monthly active users and ~40% of Facebook’s 3B+ users shop on Marketplace. So maybe it’s not all PR but clear the PR team will take any good news they can get.
SPORT
WOMEN’S SOCCER IS WORTH BETTING ON -> The Hustle
The NWSL’s San Diego Wave sold for $113m+, nearly 2x the highest-ever sale price for a US women’s soccer franchise. The NWSL is rising in popularity: In the last year, the league set records for attendance and scored a $240m broadcast deal. For sure a place for brands to play.
WELLNESS
MOVING FROM FUNCTIONAL TO BEAUTIFUL
Beauty beverages are having a moment. OEM is one example with a cool uniform sensorial experience that makes the canned drinks and beauty balms smell the same. Not sure if that’s desirable but love a brand that follows through on details.
PRESS ON NAILS, REBRANDED -> Feed Me
Nicki Minaj has launched a press-on nail brand, Pink Friday. Minaj’s longtime nail artist, Yvett Garcia, is the creative director. The nails are cool (look at these Hello Kitty ones). “To celebrate the launch, Minaj will stage a “press-on station” backstage during her upcoming tour, where fans with VIP passes will be able to try them on.”—smart.
WESTMAN ATELIER HAS A GOOD PR TEAM
Both AfterSchool and Feed Me posted about this ‘pop-up’ this week. But it’s a photo booth takeover. The only thing exciting about this is wondering who the PR team is that can get a photo booth coverage like this.
TRAVEL
BRITISH AIRWAYS GETS SENTIMENTAL
The concept of this BA campaign is good. Following the journey of a lifetime customer is a cute idea. But it’s so low personality and sentimental. Would have been amazing if they’d had more fun with it.
QATAR AIRWAYS HAS AI CABIN CREW
Qatar Airways launched an AI-enhanced version of its digital human cabin crew member, Sama. The new experience will give flight recommendations, booking status, seat options, etc. But when you go to this link the experience feels like you’re back in the 80s so don’t get excited yet.
FUN TO FOLLOW
This dive into Paul Revere Williams and the history of LA architecture
This adorable retired couple doing fit checks
Long reads but The Sociology of Business has some interesting thoughts on brand / brand strategy. This one of retail is good. This chart is fun:
JUST FOR LAUGHS
This headline about toddler versus teen scent
Fun(ny) but brilliant branding for an airline. Not new but new to me.
This thread on ‘things that don’t work’ this being the best one:
“Expecting people to follow written instructions. Sufficiently motivated people will climb any mountain and walk over any length of broken glass. But in most situations, if you send most people written instructions, they simply will not follow them and quite possibly will not even read them. This is true even when instructions are simple and stakes are high, like taking medication.
I’m not sure why this is true, but it explains the age-old question of, “Why did we have this meeting when it could have been an email?” And if you can follow moderately complicated instructions, that’s almost a minor super-power.”
BONUS
I have three FREE 1-month gift subscriptions to LinkInBio if anyone wants one. Give me a shout.
That’s all, folx.