Special Episode: Inside an Acquisition—The MikMak x SPINS Story + Lessons from BRAVE COMMERCE Leaders

Summary

BRAVE COMMERCE – Special Episode: Inside an Acquisition—The MikMak x SPINS Story + Lessons from BRAVE COMMERCE Leaders
Date: February 3, 2026
Hosts: Rachel Tipograph (MikMak Founder & CEO), Sarah Hofstetter (Profitero President)

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Episode Overview

This special episode dives deep into the recent acquisition of MikMak by SPINS, providing a transparent, behind-the-scenes look at what it’s like to be on the founder/CEO side of an M&A (merger and acquisition) transaction. Rachel Tipograph walks listeners through the practical, strategic, and emotional facets of the acquisition, integrating lessons learned from her own prior experiences as both acquirer and acquiree. The episode rounds out with a collage of perspectives from other leaders who have navigated brand acquisitions, offering valuable advice and real-world takeaways for founders, executives, and anyone navigating eCommerce’s rapidly changing landscape.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Context and Rationale Behind the MikMak x SPINS Acquisition

• Strategic Alignment: MikMak’s focus on large enterprise brands complements SPINS’ strength in the SMB and mid-market sectors.
• Expansion of Market Access: Combined, they have unprecedented visibility across the global consumer economy, from small brands to giants like Walmart and Whole Foods.
• Why Sell Now? Rachel discusses her 11.5-year journey building MikMak and the multi-faceted reasoning behind seeking a liquidity event:
  • Investor timelines and expectations
  • Shifting market and technological dynamics
  • The imperative to support employee growth
  • Meeting changing customer needs

Quote:

“I believe that in moments of great change, often you can be stronger together than being an independent player.”
—Rachel Tipograph [03:25]

• The ‘Breakfast Meeting’ that Changed Everything: Rachel expected to discuss a data partnership and instead received an acquisition offer directly from SPINS CEO Jay Margulies:

“I went in there thinking that we were going to talk about a data partnership. Very quickly I realized, oh, this is going to be a very different day than I thought it was going to be.”
—Rachel Tipograph [03:25]

2. Foundational Criteria for Choosing an Acquirer

• Three Key Stakeholders:
  • Customers (product/service enhancement)
  • Investors (strong financial outcome)
  • Employees (continued growth and opportunity)
• SPINS as a Fit: Their exclusive access to grocery retail data and focus on different market segments made them complementary partners for MikMak.

Quote:

“It really checked all three boxes: good for the customers, good for my investors, and good for my employees.”
—Rachel Tipograph [08:25]

3. Lessons from Past Acquisitions: What Makes M&A So Difficult?

• The Real Challenge is Integration: The post-deal integration phase is far harder than negotiating or structuring the actual deal.
• Change Management and Culture:
  • Past MikMak acquisitions (Swaven and part of Channel Advisor) highlighted how culture, not language or geography, determines integration success or failure.
  • Early missteps often stem from underestimating emotional/cultural impacts—especially in small, family-like teams.

Quote:

“The biggest thing that is so hard to do in M&A diligence...is the people diligence part.”
—Rachel Tipograph [11:59]

“It's like when you walk into your parents’ house after not being there for a long time and you smell the house smell...those are the kinds of intangibles in M&A.”
—Sarah Hofstetter [13:13]

4. The Emotional Journey of Founders Through Acquisition

• Identity Shift: Rachel acknowledges feeling a sense of “handing over the baby,” but also points out she remains CEO of MikMak, now as a business unit within SPINS—and is now responsible for additional brands.
• Integration Dynamics: The “babushka doll” analogy is used to illustrate layers of company integration, and the essential but uncomfortable transition phase post-acquisition. Maintaining open communication and empathy is key.

Quote:

“The first 90 to 180 days of an M&A integration is extremely telling...storming, forming, norming, and you just kind of go through those motions and there’s no way around it.”
—Rachel Tipograph [14:09]

5. Communicating an Acquisition: Internal & External Strategies

• Strategic Customer Communication: Rachel reached out directly to influential customers (current and past) to express gratitude before the news went public.
• Positive Reception: The acquisition was well received by both MikMak and SPINS customers, perceived as a win-win for the market.

Quote:

“The best thing is everyone sees this opportunity. It's clear as day, this is just good for the market.”
—Rachel Tipograph [16:48]

6. What’s Next for MikMak? (and Tips for Others Facing M&A)

• Integration Priorities:
  1. Incorporate proprietary SPINS data into MikMak’s platform
  2. Expand availability to SMB and mid-market brands
  3. Launch MicMak 4.0 and a new product (MicMak Aura) aimed at integrating media, commerce, and advanced analytics for omnichannel retail

Quote:

“We are about to announce our new platform, MicMak 4.0...there’s nothing out in market that can help you understand how to invest your dollars across all channels in real time married to actual in-market execution.”
—Rachel Tipograph [17:21]

• Advice to Founders/Leaders:
  • Be ready for a long journey: “You gotta want to do it for at least 10 years.”
  • Obsess over winning, not just the idea—be willing to adapt as markets shift.
  • Build relationships with competitors and ecosystem partners—they may be future acquirers.
  • Surround yourself with aligned investors and board members; little room for dissent in high-stakes moments.

Quote:

“This is just all about human to human relationships.”
—Rachel Tipograph [20:39]

7. Wisdom from Other Acquisition Leaders

[21:54–25:47: Montage of other acquisition leaders; Timestamps at start]

• Quest:
  • Maintain the unique qualities that made the acquired brand strong; avoid going “big company” and instead “double down on being scrappy.”
  • “The mission stayed intact. We got more obsessive about our consumer.”
• Hostess Brands:
  • Acquisitions can turbocharge a brand by leveraging new scale and skills.
• Tate’s Bake Shop & Tom’s of Maine Expert:
  • The acquired brand’s DNA and culture are its real value—preserve obsessive focus on innovation and quality through integration.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “You gotta want to do it for at least 10 years. It took me 11 and a half.”
  —Rachel Tipograph [19:17], on founder mindset

• “There's a tendency to want to go corporate...What we try to do is double down on being scrappy.”
  —Quest Executive [22:32], on maintaining challenger brand DNA post-acquisition

• “Culture is where the true incrementality of the value lies.”
  —Acquisition Brand Expert [24:46]

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Important Timestamps

• [02:13] Announcement/context of the acquisition and what listeners can expect from the episode
• [03:25] Rachel shares the real story behind the acquisition—her journey and the SPINS meeting
• [08:25] Criteria for choosing the right acquirer and what made SPINS the right fit
• [10:06] Lessons learned from past acquisitions—why integration is so difficult
• [13:24] The emotional and cultural toll of M&A
• [14:09] Founder’s emotional journey, managing integration
• [16:02] Communicating the acquisition to customers and stakeholders
• [17:21] Immediate post-acquisition priorities and MikMak 4.0 announcement
• [19:17] Rachel’s advice to founders and leaders
• [21:54]–[25:47] Perspectives from other acquisition leaders (Quest, Hostess Brands, Tate’s/Tom’s)

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Tone and Style

• Conversational, candid, and occasionally humorous (“shit ton”—Rachel; “it’s like a babushka doll”—Rachel); emphasizes authenticity and shared experience
• Focused on practical wisdom, emotional honesty, and actionable takeaways

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Summary

This episode is a must-listen (or read) for founders, CEOs, and anyone considering, or navigating, an acquisition—offering not just the “how” but the often unspoken “what it feels like” behind major deals in commerce. It shines in its raw honesty about the challenges of integration, the primacy of people and culture, and the ongoing importance of maintaining a brand’s core values and scrappy DNA post-acquisition. The final segment broadens the impact, sharing voices from other leaders who have survived and thrived through similar transitions, reinforcing the message that success in M&A is as much about empathy and cultural stewardship as it is about strategy and execution.

Transcript

[Rachel Tippograph]

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[Rachel Tippograph]

I believe that in moments of great change, often you can be stronger together than being an independent player. And I think you're seeing that across the ecosystem. I went in there thinking that we were going to talk about a data partnership. Very quickly I realized, oh, this is going to be a very different day than I thought it was going to be.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Well, ultimately, you did end up with a partnership, right?

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yes, absolutely. Just different than what I imagined it was going to look like.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Welcome to today's episode of Free of Commerce. I'm Sarah Hofstadter.

[Rachel Tippograph]

And I'm Rachel Tippograph. And this is a show that talks about what's relevant in commerce for the world's biggest brands.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

And you know, normally we bring on brands and so many of them have been through mergers and acquisitions and divestitures and all that other stuff. But gosh, charity begins at home. And today we are really excited to unpack what the M and A world looks like on our side of the table. In fact, if you've been living under a rock, Mic Mac has recently been acquired by Spins. And so this represents a big day or big month or whatever, big year for my co host sister from another Mr. Rachel Tippograph. And today we're going to unpack a little bit about what goes into these kinds of things. Many of you have been involved maybe from the sidelines, and many of you maybe have been involved very directly. But selling a company, integrating that stuff is complicated and not usually part of your day to day job as a CEO. So, Rachel, why don't we start? Just take us through the process. You built this company. You were employee number one. At what point did you say, hmm, now is the time for a liquidity event? And let me think about where I would want that to happen.

[Rachel Tippograph]

First of all, thank you, Sarah. Just following your footsteps in the journey of being acquired. Yeah, we're super excited to be a part of spins. I imagine many of our listeners are aware of spins, but if you're not, they essentially have proprietary access to the majority of grocery retail data in the US and as a result, if you're a brand and you're listed in places like Whole Foods or Sprouts or even big box like Walmart or Kroger, you have to leverage their software and data for you to understand your market share within those environments. So we're really excited to be a part of spins. And the really cool thing is that Mic Mac has been very focused on the enterprise market, meaning we work with really big brands. And spins, Bread and Butter is actually the opposite end of the market, which is SMB and mid market. And many of those brands end up getting acquired by our customers. So we now are in a position to see everything that's truly happening in the global consumer economy, from big to small. But to get to your question, Sarah, of the journey, honestly, I'm still processing it. We closed on January 5th of 2026. So really just three weeks ago from when we're recording this right now. And I've been building Mic Mac for 11 and a half years of my life, so in many ways the majority of my adult career. And it was a whirlwind. I met Jay Margulies, who's the CEO of spins, for breakfast on October 6th. It's honestly been a whirlwind. And when you are a founder or even an operator and you think about the next stage of your company, you know, you have to think about a lot of things. You have to think about one, how long have investors been on your cap table? That's one thing to consider. The second is market dynamics. So whether that's what's happening in the global economy, so the cost of capital, what's happening in technology? What's happening. Are there major shifts happening that could cause you to rethink the strategy of your business? What's happening in your customer environment, and then of course, what is important for your employees. And so for me, 11 and a half years in, it still feels like day zero. I think everyone who's been following MCMAC is constantly reinventing itself to make sure that it's ahead of the market. And that's not going to change because we sit at the intersection of media and commerce and you have to move at that speed. But I've had investors who were with us for 11 and a half years and we are sitting at a major period of consumer behavior and technology shift and none of us have a crystal ball. I believe that in moments of great change, often you can be stronger together than being an independent player. And I think you're seeing that across the ecosystem. Obviously, Publicis acquired Profiteera a few years ago and that was at a moment of when commerce media was changing. And so honestly, all the stars aligned. When I met Jay for breakfast, I went in there thinking that we were going to talk about a data partnership. And he looked me in the eyes during breakfast and told me that he wanted to acquire Mic Mac. And very quickly I realized, oh, this is going to be a very different day than I thought it was going to be.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Well, ultimately you did end up with a partnership, right?

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. Just different than what I imagined it was going to look like.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

When he brought this concept to you, I mean, obviously it wasn't the first time you thought about what's the long term goal for where McMack would go.

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[Sarah Hofstadter]

You thought about what would make for an ideal partner? What were the qualities, hard, soft that were really important to you to make sure that NCMAC would be able to continue to serve the market and its employees?

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yeah, so our number one company value is to be brand obsessed. So the first thing for me is, is the partnership going to better our output in terms of product and serve our customers? So really answering the question, is this good for the customer? With spins it absolutely is. Because one of the most valuable things that we do is aggregate retail data and then obviously marry that to media data and SPINS has a competitive moat around their retail data. So that was clear as day that this was going to be good for the customer. And then the second is good for my investors. So you know, I did raise money. You have to think about what's the financial outcome going to be for your investors. And then the third is my employees, are they going to be able to continue to grow their careers at NIC Mac or at a greater company or does the parent company have a different vision for what they want to do? And the beautiful thing about SPINS is that SPINS business is currently concentrated in the US and very much on SMB and mid market. So MI Mac is complementary and we're global and SPINS wants that focus to maintain. And so it really checked all three boxes in terms of being good for the customers, good for my investors and good for my employees.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

So now that you're on the acquired side, over the past few years you've made some acquisitions yourself.

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yeah.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Is there anything you think you would have done differently with your acquisitions? The process of it, not the actual acquisitions, but like what do you think you could have done differently or better? Or what do you wish you knew then? You know, now it's so funny.

[Rachel Tippograph]

Like M and A is so frickin hard. You know, there's so much glamour around it. But at the end of the day, I think it's one of the hardest things that you can do as a business operator. And really creating the deal isn't the hard part, it's the integration after we learned a lot with our first acquisition. So our first acquisition was Swaven, a company that was headquartered in Paris. And we applied those learnings to then our Channel Advisor acquisition where again we learned a shit Tonight. And I'm really grateful for those experiences because it's now setting us up for, I think, greater success going into spins. But the biggest, biggest part that I think we fumbled at with the first acquisition because we honestly just didn't know better was the change management aspect. Even though Suaven was a competitor of ours, meaning, you know, our products were doing very similar things culturally, our businesses were actually very different. There's the geographical element for sure. There was also the size of the company. Like when we picked them up, they were 22 people. For anyone who's ever worked at a 22 person company, you're a family then, right? Like you really have that nature. And they were only selling into the European market. And so bringing them into a US company that had a lot of process and rigor, that was a huge adjustment for those employees. And, and I don't think in the early days we did a great job of level setting for them what that initial experience was going to be like at mcmac. We tried to do a much better job of that as Channel Advisor. Now that acquisition also had its own uniqueness. We did a carve out, so we didn't acquire the entire Channel Advisor business. It was just a particular product line that we competed on called Shoppable Media. And I think one of the things that we didn't realize in the diligence period was that those employees, once again, it always comes down to people, they had gone through a lot of change. They had entered Channel Advisor through their own acquisitions. Channel Advisor then went from a public to a private company. Then they got acquired by essentially a venture backed company, Micmac. And so they were going through their own personal experiences of do I want to stay on this journey or not? And so the biggest thing that is so hard to do in M and a diligence because a lot of it is always a secret, is the people diligence part.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Yeah, you're talking about the people. I was thinking as you're talking about the next question which for me turned out about culture. And culture is so much about people and how people work with each other. And even if the companies are serving a similar need and they are operating with similar customers, even if they're the same size, everybody's battle rhythm is very different. And the sway of an acquisition is interesting. You look at the sway of an acquisition, 22 people, family style, if you will, and international roots, there's always culture gaps when it comes to that. It's never about the language, it's always about the culture. People Think it's language and it's not. But there's this emotional toll because it's a small company and there are so many rituals that exist within companies that you don't even realize that they are. It's like when you walk into your parents house after not being there for a long time and you smell, you smell the house smell that nobody else knows.

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yeah.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Those are the kinds of things that, you know, those would be intangibles in M and A. Yeah. That you have to have a sensitivity to, like as technologists. It's always going to be there. It's always going to be there. You know, I've been the acquired. I've been an acquirer. My acquirer has been acquired. There's a whole bunch of, you know, nesting dolls. And it brings different personalities and it brings different emotion. I mean, I know it's very early days, you know, like you said, it's just a few weeks, but what are you thinking about in terms of yourself? This was your baby and now you have handed this baby for a check, but you've handed this baby to somebody else. Like, how are you emotionally feeling?

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yeah, well, you know what's so unique is I'm still the CEO of Mic Mac. I report into the CEO of spins, and I'm now running a business unit within spins. So essentially, SPINS owned a competitive asset to us, and I'm now running both mcmac and this company that was called Destiny, which will now be called Mic Mac. So it's almost like a babushka doll in the sense that SPINS is a big doll. Then there's mcmac, then there's Destiny, and I'm controlling mcmac and Destiny. To be transparent, like we're going through that dance right now. What remains the way of Micmac's operating cadence and culture and what needs to change to become a part of a larger parent company. You know, I think the first 90 to 180 days of an M and A integration is extremely telling. There's this infographic that some of you have probably seen storming, forming, norming, and you just kind of go through those motions and there's no way around it. And you'll get to the other side, you'll come out stronger. The experience might be what certain employees want and what others don't. And, you know, you work through all of that. The beautiful thing, and again, this is why I'm grateful, is like, we've done it twice already at Mic Mac, so we know this is just par for the course. It's not Fun, but it's totally worth it. And as long as you keep open communication with the folks throughout the experience, that's really all you can ask for.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

So heavy duty empathy, especially coming from having done it before, which is just such a critical skill and one that comes very naturally to you.

[Rachel Tippograph]

I try, but it's an adjustment for all of us, but it's going to be worthwhile.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

How are you? The communication, the clients probably also is one of those things where I'm sure SPINS is super excited to tell their clients. You're super excited to tell your clients. There's a lot that kind of goes into that consideration side and it crystallizes a lot of things, makes it really real, you know.

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yeah, that was really special. So we did press a few days after we closed. It was whatever. We closed on a Monday and it was seven business days later that we did press. Right before the two days before press, I personally contacted our most strategic customers as well as some people that took big bets on Mic Mac in the early days as customers, whether they remain customers or not, to express my personal gratitude and appreciation for what they did for us. And so that was really, really special to be able to connect with customers on an individual level like that. And then press hit and communication went out to both all of McMac and Spin's customers. And the best thing is everyone sees this opportunity. It's clear as day, this is just good for the market. And so it's just been a really positive experience hearing from all of the customers.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

Sounds great. Good market opportunity. We're all excited, so happy for you. And as I said to Jay, he really hit jackpot with you. What's next for Micmac? I mean you gotta, you gotta do the integration, all that other stuff, but like business gotta get done. You still gotta, you know, customer still needs to be served. Yeah, product needs evolution, like all this other stuff. How do you make sure it's not noise, but what happens to mcmac? What should people be looking for?

[Rachel Tippograph]

Yeah, so I mean there's three big priorities. So first is we want to get this proprietary SPINS data into Micmac because it's a fricking home run that is already in the works. The second is we are now going to be available to the SMB and mid market. So I mean brands less than 25 million revenue, brands that are doing 25 million to 200. And then of course we've always had our enterprise segment. So that's the destiny business that we've taken over and bringing them over to Mic Mac and Offering them way more capabilities than they've ever had. And then the third is what you were getting at, Sarah continued product innovation. So we are about to announce our new platform, Mic Mac 4.0, which is a big step forward because we're obviously living in a moment of change and we're not all just caring about the digital shelf or the social shelf or the physical shelf, but obviously we now have the agentic shelf. And being able to understand that end to end customer journey is becoming more complicated than ever before with traditional forms of investment like media mix modeling. And there's nothing out in market that can help you understand how to invest your dollars across all of those channels in real time married to actual in market execution. So that is our brand new product, Mic Mac Aura that we'll be launching next month that I think is going to really disrupt a new segment of the space. So that's what we're focused on and we're excited to just be able to now bring this to more brands.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

There are people that listen to us that are founders, leaders. There are also people that are considering moving to smaller companies from bigger companies. But for the founders and leaders and like people who own their own business, what advice do you have on what it takes to both be an independent and the process of selling the company?

[Rachel Tippograph]

Well, first, if you're still in your building journey, someone said this to me when I was just starting the company, you gotta want to do it for at least 10 years. It took me 11 and a half. Most of this journey takes a lot of blood, sweat and tears and time. The second is you really got to believe in what you're doing. You gotta be obsessed with winning, not the actual idea, because markets are gonna change and you gotta be able to reinvent yourself. And the third is make sure you surround yourself with investors, board members, teams, partners that really believe in what you're doing. There's no room for dissenting voices when you're trying to create a market opportunity. And then from M and A, I mean, Sarah, you probably have way more wisdom than me, but I think when it comes to M and A, there's strategic M and A and there's financial sponsor M and A. So let's just say private equity coming to buy you. But if you're focused on strategic, keep in mind that your competitors could become your next great buyer. And so it's actually important to build human relationships with your competitors. And the second is building really strong relationships with the sister ecosystem, the strategic partner ecosystem that you might be playing in because Those are also potential likely buyers. And so at the end of the day, this is just all about human to human relationships.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

That's extremely well said. The support given post acquisition from so many of our ecosystem partners actually really helps. It helped in a way that I didn't expect it to. I mean, not that we had any issues like Marco was pretty positive about our acquisition, but the reaction from that, that, that ecosystem that, you know, we're so proud to be a part of certainly helped post acquisition. And then just pre acquisitions just helps you understand. I mean, you and I have had so many conversations over the past six years that we've known each other on market dynamics, on who's selling to whom and why, and you know, our own little private, not recorded assessments, evaluations and things like that. So it's helpful to hear the advice. Well, Rachel, thanks so much for sharing some of your thoughts on this. Obviously, we're going to be watching a lot about NCMAC 4.0. There seems to be a lot going on. Next episode after this, we'll be back to our regularly scheduled programs. As a segue, we thought it would be a fun little tip to give you some clips from prior episodes of our clients who have been through acquisitions, which we hope you'll enjoy.

[Acast Announcer]

The main takeaway here is don't get comfortable. And you have to double down on the things that make you who you were. And in this case, we really doubled down on what made us Quest. And that can be difficult to do because, you know, especially if you're coming from a world where the intent of the company is to be acquired, you're an acquisition target, you know, people are trying to find an exit, maybe make a little bit of money. The tendency becomes to sort of slow down, take a deep breath, relax. And we were lucky that we kept a lot of the core folks, even to this day, on the team at Quest. And we didn't do that at all. We doubled down, we doubled down on everything that made Quest different. There's a tendency to want to go corporate. There's a tendency to want to sort of, as we like to say, be big company. What we try to do is double down on being scrappy. The mission stayed intact. We got more obsessive about our consumer. And I think actually with Simply Good Acquire and Quest, it gave us access to more resources, more data, which actually helped us, you know, drive the consumer harder. And to the credit of Simply Good, when they acquired Quest, they didn't try to fix Quest. I mean, obviously we had some things we had to do right. We had to integrate, we had to take on new processes, new systems, but they let us be quest.

[Hostess Brands Executive]

I am really proud of everything that we created at Hostess Brands. If you think about the 10 year arc of Hostess, of going from being liquidated to your point, to selling for a great price and a great multiple, it was a huge ride. And you know, when I think about like everything that we created, Hostess, we really built a strong innovation engine. We had the ability to really redefine our go to market in terms of our distribution model, our manufacturing capabilities. We built sales and channels that a lot of companies weren't focused on and so we accomplished a lot. When I think about kind of pivoting to Smucker, you know, the thing that's great about Smucker is now we're basically taking this engine that was built at Hostess and then applying a lot of the skills and the scale of a larger organization to take everything we did and really just turbocharge it.

[Acquisition Brand Expert]

That founder connection is amazing because I'll tell you, I actually spent a couple of days ago talking to Kathleen and B in understanding that DNA is absolutely critical. So leading that acquisition brand takes a different muscle altogether. If you think about it, the very reason that a Colgate acquires a Thompson Main or a Mondelez acquires a Tate's is because these brands bring an incremental value to the parent company. That parent company can't make a Tom's of Maine. They can't make a Tate because that's not in their DNA. So sure, there is this product portfolio that hopefully is in the wheelhouse of the parent company, but it's also distinct enough to be incremental. And when we think about an acquisition, we often think about that product portfolio. But culture is where the true incrementality of the value lies. So successfully leading an acquisition brand requires that dogmatic focus on culture, on preservation, on rebuilding, if you will, that culture into newcomers. The question that I often ask myself, whether at Toms or at Tate's, is how do I continue to keep that DNA? That challenge your brand mentality to innovate, to experiment, to be obsessive about the quality, to continue to deliver that super hyper growth, right?

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[Rachel Tippograph]

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[Sarah Hofstadter]

Christian Bale was preparing for his role.

[Rachel Tippograph]

In American Psycho, dressing the part, hitting the gym for the first time in his life, even getting his teeth redone.

[Sarah Hofstadter]

There was just one problem.

[Rachel Tippograph]

He didn't actually have the part. Leonardo DiCaprio did. Listen to our podcast what Went Wrong every week as we unearth the chaos behind Hollywood's biggest movie flops and most shocking scenes successes available wherever you get your podcasts. ACAST helps creators launch, grow and monetize their podcasts everywhere.

[Acast Announcer]

Acast.com.

[Rachel Tippograph]

Hi, I'm Jackie Cooper, Global Chief Brand Officer at Edelman and the host of Touch of Truth, a new podcast launching on the Adweek Podcast Network. My dad gave me this incredibly smart piece of advice. Meet everyone once. As a result, I've met some of the most fascinating and inspiring people on the planet. Now on Touch of Truth, we're coming centre stage and sharing the mic to experience stories of truth, insights and visions for the future that will challenge your way of thinking. Touch of Truth is available wherever you listen to podcasts. New episodes come out every Tuesday. I do hope to see you there.