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Camille
Most people know the Louvre was robbed, burglarized, one of the biggest art heists in the history of humanity.
Bonnie
Hundred million dollars.
Camille
What I thought was fascinating is that Crane Co. Is a German crane company that had the strength of character to say, hey, look, we didn't do the robbery, but our crane worked really well. So we're going to do an ad campaign that says, this crane works really well.
Bonnie
Like, I want to follow if Martha Stewart was posting on her stories.
Camille
So she should be saying some controversial stuff because she can get away with it. Like, she's a bit of a G in terms of.
Bonnie
And she's also in her documentary is like, I'm successful woman because I can be disagreeable. Kim is leveraging in skims what she's always done properly, which is break the Internet and have 10 minutes. And now she's basically profiting off of that with skim sales. So it's an entire campaign strategy designed around only getting 10 minutes so that people talk about skims. In case you've missed it, Burberry is killing it. They've completely gone back to their roots.
Camille
The British roots have some great stuff about it. Like, there's a charmingness to how they do it, there's a politeness, there's an elegance that's aspirational.
Bonnie
Hayley Bieber's road misses sales targets after the Elf Beauty acquisition as shares slip 7%.
Camille
If you can build a brand as a founder, you can get some MBAs in a giant public corporation to overpay for it because of your brand in addition to your product. Well, as people may or may not know, there's $100 million lawsuit going on that arise arose from a 2020 partnership between MrBeast and this restaurant company, I think it's called VLC or something, where he put his name on this restaurant company and it catastrophically failed, like, really bad.
Bonnie
Justin Bieber did a really interesting move and he basically launched a streaming channel.
Camille
Is that like watching the Eagle's Nest with the little baby eagles in it? 24 7.
Bonnie
This is how he's gonna monetize his music. In an age of where music streaming is making no money. And the Toronto Blue Jays are in the World Series right now. It's a big deal in Toronto. What a brand, what a brand, what a brand, what a mighty good brand say it again now. What a brand, what a brand, what a brand, what a mighty good brand. Welcome back to another episode of Art of the Brand. The.
Camille
You're looking fabulous today, by the way.
Bonnie
So are you. And Knit Cashmere. I'm here for it.
Camille
Number one branding podcast in the world, happy to say. Listen to across the world. The feedback is amazing. People are telling us, keep scrapping, keep fighting, keep telling it like it is.
Bonnie
I don't know what you guys have signed up for because we scrap pretty hard. But we'll be giving an extended cut on these coming episodes so you can get the real color, the flavor of.
Camille
We should do a blooper of all of our scraps that we edited in.
Bonnie
I would just love to know, like, whose side people take.
Camille
You just need to know. Nine times out of ten you apologize, but let's get on with it.
Bonnie
I also am very tactical, my friend. I know how to get the job done. So we've got a bunch of things to cover today all over the place. Our topics as well. So I'm excited to talk all things brand from sports to fashion to beauty to movement, coaches content.
Camille
Mr. Beast blowing up some stuff.
Bonnie
Oh, yeah, Live streaming. We got a lot to get into it. So let's kick it off with the Louvre. It was broken into and you brought a super cool ad to my attention. And let's kick it off with that one.
Camille
You know, one of the themes in some of my talks is bet big and be right. And it relates to your social media, your advertising and marketing campaigns is that you're in a market and you're doing your best to be heard and to be seen. But every once in a while, an opportunity comes around that allows you to magnify your product. But it takes courage. And there's really not a lot of courage with a lot. With most CEOs and boards and C suites, everybody's just trying to survive, not get in trouble. Well, as most people know, the Louvre was robbed, burglarized, one of the biggest art heists in the history of humanity, $100 million.
Bonnie
So they took in like a total of four minutes.
Camille
Broad daylight.
Bonnie
Yeah. 9:30 in the morning.
Camille
Beautifully executed. I'd be surprised if there wasn't some ex special operators in there. The way it was done. But the photo everybody saw was the crane that was just driven up to the Louvre and put to the window and it helped them escape with their booty and nobody got caught. So what I thought was fascinating is that Crane Co. Is a German crane company that had the strength of character to say, hey, look, we didn't do the robbery, but our crane worked really well. So we're going to do an ad campaign that says this crane works really well. They essentially took advantage of that Kind of once in every 10 year, once in every five year opportunity, once in.
Bonnie
A lifetime opportunity, 15 minutes of fame.
Camille
But they doubled down on it. And that's how you make a name for yourself. You have to be prepared to act quickly when there's something that's controversial and maybe a little risky because it has disproportionate reward then to the risk. And I just really admired whoever that CEO or the board is. Love to chat with them. I think that was a fantastic, interesting, bold move. And I think there's a lot our clients and listeners could learn from that. What are your thoughts?
Bonnie
It's crazy because we've been in so many situations where you would love the business to capitalize on a moment, but because it comes with some form of negativity, it's absolutely like hands thrown up, extreme X. Like there's just all of this risk adverseness of no, we can't touch this, Legals won't allow it. This is the worst thing because this person could, could throw this in this way. And I'm so happy that we saw a brand that was taking the moment and riding with it because it allows not only for people like us to have a conversation like this brand has become so much more relevant, but no one is blaming them for the situation and any of that controversy that's tied it is it. It goes back to that saying, like, you know, all press is good press.
Camille
One of the videos that I show all, anytime I'm doing a class or a talk, I show that video by Jocko Wilnick called Good.
Bonnie
Yeah.
Camille
And if you haven't seen it, please click the link or watch it here. It should give you shivers regardless of where you are.
Bonnie
It's one of the best videos.
Camille
But when I'm talking to people about leadership, leadership is not just getting an appointment and then doing everything safe and everybody loving you and liking you. That people aren't taught that leadership is actually really hard. It involves risk, it involves stress, it involves mistakes, it involves a journey where you get knocked down, you have to get back up. I was giving this talk this week to some people about that saying, look, you got, you have to embrace the suck to be a leader who's going to take your organization somewhere in this particular context. If you've watched the video, and I hope you've watched it before I get here, the owner of that crane company probably sees in the news their brand on a picture at a robbery at the Louvre. And I bet you there's a ton of people around them going, oh my God, this is horrible. Oh, my God. We're going to get negative press, but in this case, somebody in leadership said, good. Our brand was used in the biggest art heist ever in the history of the world. Good. We can use this opportunity to show that our product works. And it's a really good mindset shift. So many words in one mindset shift that I really encourage people to embrace.
Bonnie
Watch that video.
Camille
Good. And think of it in your own socials.
Bonnie
Every week, we're talking about brands leveraging a moment, creating a moment, leaning into a moment. That is how you stand out in an attention economy. And so many business owners are handed a gift of like, of luck, and they're not prepared to own that moment to take their brand to the next level. That one of your mentors, who I also was able to work with, taught me such an invaluable lesson of, you only have so many, maybe two or three asymmetric upsides in your life and in your career. And so many of these moments of randomness can be that difference that your brand steps onto in order to get yourself into a different area and a different level. Like, we would never be talking about the Crane company if not for the Crane company owning that moment. And who knows where that Crane company will go on. It's kind of that butterfly effect as well, right? Like, because they do this, where does that go? And even if people don't like how they did that within that business sphere, people are still talking about them. And there's gonna be enough businesses that choose to hire that person because it entered into the dialogue. And that is the kind of strategy that you need to be thinking about in the branding context is whatever opportunity you're handed, how do you use that opportunity to get ahead? And so many business owners just want to, like, bury their head in the sand, and they just want it to go away. And it's such a. Such a stupid way of looking at opportunities that can change your business.
Camille
I was giving a talk to a bunch of female leaders this week, and one of the focuses was you have to get out of your own way, right? Especially if you want to, if you're worried about making a mistake or doing the wrong thing. But when that. When these asymmetric opportunities pop up, you know, hesitation, nervousness, insecurity, you can just have giant opportunities. You could lose giant opportunities. And the parallel analogy, I'm saying, even when it comes to partners, I imagine everybody can imagine a time where they kind of bumped into somebody, and it's so random. You meet somebody amazing you get an amazing vibe, an amazing smile, a great conversation. And then your insecurities are like, oh, maybe those, maybe this. They don't do it and the person leaves it. And you might have lost your soulmate. The same thing happens in your socials, in your business. If you come up with a great idea or there's an opportunity that you can make some content about or talk about and you just kind of talk yourself out of it, you get in your own way and then the opportunity passes by and then you just go back to vanilla nonsense. And I want to encourage people, especially these founders and small business owners, to take that risk and say something interesting, do something dangerous and a way to.
Bonnie
Add on to that. You have such a small window to do something with it. And for so many brands, what kills them is how many people they have to talk to, how many, like, levels of decision making process it has to go through. I was actually, I did an intake with a really big events company and they couldn't, like, by the time they got approval to use the background image of Taylor Swift getting engaged for them to put another event that they organized on top of a border of an image, it was already five days out from her getting engaged. Like, they lost the moment. Like, how many levels of decision making process, if you don't have that in your brand, you don't realize how much of an advantage you have. So when something happens, take it. Like take it by the horns and like run with it quickly. Because if the Crane company had waited until this week or next week or next month to do something, it's not relevant anymore to the world. So you gotta move fast and break things.
Camille
That's why you're always telling people you have to be involved in your own social media. And I can't tell how many times we've been upset that clients or even ourselves have had great ideas, but we kind of delegated them. And then things get overtaken by events and you miss the window and you don't know what you missed because you didn't get it out on the day.
Bonnie
Well, that's why you can't. When it comes to, like, who you're hiring. So many founders are like, I'm so busy and you're not wrong that you're wearing so many hats and there's so many things to do. But when it comes to maintaining relevance within your company and understanding that you have to be on top of what's relevant and being involved in that is the difference between making it or not making it. And so many Founders. Like when you're working with an agency that's helping you. Like there's, that's why I talk so much about the content funnel. You have to understand the top of the funnel. The most relevant is breaking news. No one should be more on top of breaking news in your industry that you can tie something that you do than you. Because when you're hiring and paying somebody else, their job isn't to like unless they're an internal employee. That is job is to do that. Otherwise that's your job. When you're working with an agency, they're helping you build the remainder of the funnel, which is still super important because clowns don't sell. If you're only ever breaking news or just being funny. Top of funnel by chasing trends, there's a role for that, but you need that rest of that funnel Evergreen content that converts, that speaks to the psychology of your potential customer. That's very valuable to your business. But it's a two part relationship. There's a husband and there's a wife or there's two wives or two husbands, whatever. Like there's two people in that relationship in that you need to have that blend. And that's the Olympic difference.
Camille
Just paralleling what you say. You can't speak out of both sides of your mouth. You can't want to be a thought leader in your industry, somebody with credibility and authority to speak on the industry, what's best for your customer and all that. If you're not prepared to say something about your industry in a timely manner. And what I want people to remember is that perfect can be the enemy of good or the enemy of great. If you're just waiting, if everything has to be perfect, you're not going to get it done. In a world where attention is such a scarce commodity and things move fast. I think we were taught when we were young that mistakes had greater consequences than they actually do today. And I think I shared that analogy that when people are worried about mistakes. If you've ever canoed, when you canoe, there's like a little swirl. But if you take another stroke, that swirl is dissipating behind you and three strokes later it's gone. The same thing is true when you're looking at social media. Even if you make a mistake on a post, it'll get forgotten. It's not gonna be a game changer. So you can afford to take more risks on social media. It's not gonna destroy you unless you say something that's completely offside.
Bonnie
That's the whole Thing that's interesting too is when you're prepared to lean into risk, it allows you to understand what is your community's appetite for. For what you're prepared to say. Unless you're doing stuff that's like, is extreme, extreme, extremely offside, you're pretty safe. Like, you went on a full headline of Meghan Markle sucks in like in the uk and it was from our podcast clip and no one came for us. Like, and most people loved it.
Camille
Absolutely people loved it.
Bonnie
But most people would be like, up at night if you're like, meghan Markle sucks. Like, you can't believe those words came out of your mouth when the camera was turned on. And like, I'm not saying it's, you know, it's, there's a spectrum to it, but the point is exactly what you're saying. Do it quickly. But what I want to talk about too is there was these beauty founders I'm talking to, I was talking to big beauty founders. And there's a such a complicated narrative when it comes to like posting and posting online. Because I find a lot of these founders have now understood that it's a box to check. Like they have to have a founder led brand. Like, it's no longer like an if. Like it's a, we know we have to do it. But for so many of these founder led pages, you can tell that they've just hired somebody to do it and it's not them. And like they're just doing all of these swipe through posts with like random texts on them and it sees like videos that are being constructed by someone who's like freshly out of school. And they're, they're trying hard, they're doing a good job, but it's not the founder. And that's where I almost want the pendulum to swing back. Like, I'd rather you post less, but it'd be, it would actually like be from you and you're involved in it. Then you feeling like you needed to get out seven days a week and it loses your tone, your approach and it's not you. Because how far can that grow when it's not really you? Like when I look at Martha Stewart's Instagram account, like, I know it's not her and it's not really engaging to.
Camille
Watch because it's not interesting anymore. Because once you know it's not her, who cares?
Bonnie
She's not, it's on her involved. Like it's like a PR message on the comments and it's like it's that's not what I want to follow. Like I want to follow if Martha Stewart was posting on her stories so.
Camille
She should be saying some controversial stuff because she can get away with it. Like she's a bit of a G in terms of.
Bonnie
She's a total G. And she's also in her documentaries like I'm successful woman because I can be disagreeable. Like I don't have to be this like prim and proper like woman that everyone has to like. And so I kind of like this like unlikability about her and makes me like her more because she was she like eight people alive. Like there's a reason why she went to the top. And I think that I want to celebrate that more too. And there's different types of women that can succeed and I want to see those types of women as well.
Camille
I love that lesson because I remember when years ago I was in Natal headquarters of very impressive US General said to me, because we were trying to manage all of these different nations. And he goes, he's like, young man, you're nobody until somebody hates you. Like if you haven't done something that pisses somebody off, you're not doing anything. And I think most people can learn from it. Especially there's, there's some segments of society that are really worried about not being liked or doing something that's insulting to some people and really just lean into it. That's the way to be a gift.
Bonnie
I think that especially for women and a lot of these women that really made themselves these careers, I actually like it more when I get to see, get to see them and what they're like and that they are dislikable because I, I've also struggled on my own in my own way of wanting things to be very well executed but also wanting to be liked. And the two aren't often, they don't often go together. Especially when you don't come from an insane amount of money where you can just, you know, throw money at people and then they like you more because you have all like when you look at like these stories that have come out on like Ellen DeGeneres and seeing like this Martha Stewart documentary, I like actually seeing that more because that now gives me at least a standard to not necessarily strive for it, but an understanding of what it means to be at that level. So that I can decide now within these parameters where do I want to be harder on my team, where do I want to be stricter on my standards? Where what happens when you're in Media for 45 or 50 years. Like, do you lose that edge? Like those are things that are at least relevant to know than these, like pr, these PR images of people that, that aren't accurate.
Camille
It's kind of interesting. You can't want to be successful, but then insulate yourself from all of the dangers of the path to being successful, which is like being disagreeable, making mistakes. Like, there's a lot of people who want to sit back and never be disagreeable and then resent that they're not successful. Most of the successful people had to piss off a lot of people, not be bad people, but they actually had to do things that, that disrupted the way things were done.
Bonnie
Even when I think about like from, from an Ellen DeGeneres standpoint, you know, like, I need to know more about all of these stories that came out. But when I even look at our day to day and how busy the day to day is, when you sit down and you like, you want to talk to someone, they can easily take up 25 minutes of your time. Like and just being polite. And it's like when you get to a point where you're on really strict timelines, you have to prep like you're being pulled in a bunch of different directions. It's hard to be the nicest person in the world. Like, especially to like when, for, for other people who are meeting you, like them. Like I had this convers the other day in the kitchen with one of the team members and they were like going on about one of their kids, like high school aspirations and what is going on with their current job at 16. And I'm like, this is so lovely, but like I've got a meeting in 20 minutes and I'm self the prep for this. So like I actually can like, I get it.
Camille
You have to train yourself to do that, right? Because it's so hard to interrupt people and it's not personal, but we're so socially engineered to not interrupt and say, hey, sorry, that's nice, but I really have something. And then it ends up time sucking your your day up. Like when it comes to me, I'm kind of infamous for hanging up quickly.
Bonnie
Way too fast. You hang up way too fast. Like I haven't even said goodbye. I'm like, this is mean.
Camille
I have to tell people, like, I'm not being mean, but like when, when, when the communications is over, I don't want to go, okay, well then I'll talk to you. Last week, well, it was good talking to you. We'll see you later. Like I can't stand it. I'm just like, okay, bye. That's just. That's what a busy person does. But I wanted to just mention, when people are looking at Martha Stewart, they're seeing her at the end of her career where she's realized that her success comes from a willingness to be disagreeable. When we're talking to founders who are looking at putting themselves out there often and we're doing a discovery process, often, we see them kind of, you know, almost performing in a politically safe way. But then when we start to dig into their history and we hear what they're passionate about and when they got into it, there's an aha moment where we're like, you have to channel that kind of darker side that you're pissed off that your industry is letting customers down. You're pissed off that this is happening. That's what really gets us interested. We both peak up when we hear them talk like that. But we're not really listening to the. To the paragraph that's safe.
Bonnie
Well, safe doesn't perform. But I think most people that we work with don't have to have that level of darkness of like, an Ellen DeGeneres or Martha Stewart has to have, like, they're successful within their realm. But we're talking about women who made their way into an industry that was, like, way more competitive than the NHL, you know, or the NFL. Like, there's. There's 10 women that had TV shows. There was 10 women that had famous cookbooks, you know, like, the. The level of competition at that stage is very different than the founders that we're talking about. But what you're underscoring is that the shit that's most interesting to us when we're consulting with them is not the. The veneer of niceness when you're not saying anything, because that's just not interesting to anybody.
Camille
Well said.
Bonnie
So the next segment I want to talk about is skims again, which I wasn't expecting to be talking about on this week's episode, but our friend this week, Brooke Yocum, did a post on Kim's kind of viral skim strategy. And the whole premise is that Kim is leveraging in skims what she's always done properly, which is break the Internet and have 10 minutes. And now she's basically profiting off of that with skim sales and how all of these product launches are done to only achieve what we've talked about on the show. So the average like per post is a thousand likes. When they do one of these drops. They're over 30,000 likes. They're really only launching with maybe 100 SKUs, and they're selling out. It's allowing them to say that they're sold out. So it's an entire campaign strategy designed around only getting 10 minutes so that people talk about skims. And when you analyze it through that lens, it's harder for me to be as critical of skims, although I don't like what it represents for the skims brand, because ultimately, if these campaigns are what we talk about in branding and marketing news and it's all over the Internet, and that's what everyone is talking about, the question is, like, are they winning?
Camille
I might call you out a little bit, because I think you're actually doing something a little counter to what we talked about in the last segment. I am in that skims is saying, I don't care what you think, miss.
Bonnie
Whatever.
Camille
Right. We need to get attention in a very competitive market, and we're gonna get it. We're not gonna play by your rules that make you feel comfortable. Now, I agree with you that skims is, you know, it's not really focusing on what was amazing about its products, but in today's world, it looks like somebody is looking. Looking at the market and saying, that's not gonna work if we're gonna keep growing and doing it. So we're gonna dare to do something that might piss some people off, and that's fine. It seems like a cool extension. Well, not an extension, but advertising has always been doing that in some way, trying to do something to be extreme. Extreme or noticed or not pass by. I was thinking of the. The church signs. When you drive by churches and they have, like, a funny sign. Like, there was one I saw the other day, like, avoid sinburn by being. By wearing sun protection.
Bonnie
Oh, that's hilarious.
Camille
Right?
Bonnie
Like the church signs. Yeah, yeah.
Camille
Like, the church sign makes you, hey, there's a church there, and if ever you're inclined, it'll bring you there. That's kind of what they're doing. It's not the key message of the church, but they need to get people to stop and pay attention. And, you know, for skims, that's the angle they're going. Their strategy is unique, but I don't agree with the underwear with the hair on it. But otherwise, I think they're getting people's attention.
Bonnie
What they're doing is so good through the lens of how much they're investing in production, how much they're making us talk about skims on A frequent basis. In that way, the brand is unmatched, untouched. And it is a strategy to learn from, because effectively, all of the campaigns we talk about week over week are campaigns that broke through the noise, and we're talking about it and we're analyzing them. So in that way, they won.
Camille
And that's why that's different than Burberry, what we're gonna talk about. Like, both can work, right? It's interesting.
Bonnie
The only thing for me, though, that I still. I think fundamentally what Skims is doing is correct. The point that gets me on it is it doesn't make me want to buy Skims.
Camille
Yeah, it's short term.
Bonnie
And that's, I think, a really relevant nuance to the strategy is that what I loved about Skims is that they filled a gap in the market that nobody else was filling. Like, they really created the best products, and all of the initial ads and creative to go to market made me go to the website and spend a lot of money because they filled a gap in the market that nobody else was. Now I feel like I don't ever have a reason to go because in my mind, it's just coming across as kitschy. But I'm struggling with that from a reconciliation standpoint, because the strategy is strong, but it doesn't fit the brand's universe.
Camille
I think markets change, though, as you grow. When you come out, you can speak more purely to your market, but then if you want to keep growing, you have to expand. And you can lose your core people sometimes, maybe to the. Maybe to the devaluation of your brand over time, but they're now just. They're just trying to appeal to a broader market through these tactics. And so they lose you, and that could be part of the cycle.
Bonnie
I just would love to have some people that listen, like, chime in and send me a message because. And not even when they launched. For a long time, they're who I would go to for sleepwear for, like, basics. I even got used some stuff from there.
Camille
That outfit I still value. Like, it seems like it was good.
Bonnie
But I still don't go to their site anymore. Like, I don't spend money there anymore. Because to me, like, the brand comes across as like. Like a cheap mall brand.
Camille
Like, it was. They've lost it, you know, their luxury position.
Bonnie
And then the question is, like, is relevance worth that?
Camille
It depends on what you want or what your shareholders want or what your mission statement is. Right. It's different. Compare that to Burberry.
Bonnie
Well, that's. I guess that's a great cue for us to launch into Burberry. So in case you've missed it, Burberry is killing it. They've completely gone back to their roots. They're leaning into their British heritage. I went. Even went through the comments, and the comments are so positive here, too. I took one. Is Damien Broderick acting or not? Gentlemen, take note. He stands as she sits. He stands when she stands. The next one was like, these adverts are top tier, essentially, and colloquially British. And everyone is really celebrating these ads because not only are these so entertaining and so well done, but they so.
Camille
Connect to those British roots, what it acknowledges. And it's almost become a sin to say that anything from an empire could be good, but the British roots are one of the British roots have some great stuff about it. Like, there's a charmingness to how they do it, there's a politeness, there's an elegance that's aspirational and that's why you're going to spend money. It's not because you're doing a skims route, right, which is like, hey, this is edgy. It's. I aspire to live in this type of world of politeness, of smiles, of charmingness. Like, when I watch those ads, I actually found them disarming in that I kind of leaned in because I wanted to see what was going on. Like I. And the narrator's voice was on unapologetically British. And they taught me about the history. It was. Somebody at skims is incredibly creative and doing a great job.
Bonnie
You remember.
Camille
Sorry, Burberry. That's what I meant.
Bonnie
But I. You bring up a really good point. So a lot to unpack with this strategy. The first of what you're talking about is that they've actually launched with clear content pillars, so not all of the content that they're doing is the same. They've relaunched their brand strategy through understanding content pillars. So the pillars that you really connected with were their heritage pillars. Talking about how their product was made, talking about how the check came to be. I loved those videos, but. But then they also have these other videos that feel like they're almost a part of a TV series or a movie series where there's these different British things happening with these really famous cricket, that.
Camille
Cricket one.
Bonnie
Actors, actresses, models. That is almost an entertaining pillar that bring back to the kind of. They're all connecting with British roots, but they created different pillars within that new brand concept, which is. So I break down in the social media masterclass. And the reason why Content pillars are so relevant is that you need to be communicating different stories with different goals, but they all have to connect to your brand. And what Burberry has figured out is that they understand that good socials come from having a clear brand. And they've gone back to what is their brand, what is their. Like, how do they want to make people feel, what are their values? And all of that has gone back to their heritage. British roots.
Camille
Being proud of your roots, not apologizing for the roots. The number one thing I get from Burberry is it's like they fired anybody who was woke in their marketing campaign and said, screw you, we're gonna go back to our roots and they're gonna like talk about what made this company amazing and not apologize for it. And what I love about their, their campaign is there's zero preachiness.
Bonnie
Zero.
Camille
Like it doesn't preach anything to you.
Bonnie
But it's also super diverse.
Camille
Yeah, but that's fine. Like in a great way is, is cool, but not when you're preaching it, not when you're forcing it. But like it's what I found is the opposite of being preachy. But then that model, they have that British lady, that older British lady with an absolutely beautiful smile, she just seems to love life. Like they didn't. They have beautiful people, but not traditional, you know, like not cheesy model beautiful. Like just people who seem beautiful on the inside and outside. Which makes you aspire to be that type of Burberry person.
Bonnie
Olivia Colman.
Camille
Yeah, it's such an interesting line to not be snobby because that's kind of the negative part of some of the British stuff. There's nothing snobby about this Burberry campaign. It's very aspirational in terms of being a happy person.
Bonnie
She is a two time Emmy award winning and a three time Golden Globe awarded actress. She, it was in the Roses Broadchurch, the Crown, the Lost daughter. She's been in a bunch of really iconic British shows. So she has a lot of that like British pedigree. And what's cool is in the one on the fish and chips, they hired like Lucky, Lucky Blue Smith, who's like a famous American actor. And it's like a cool moment of like him coming in and asking for the fish and chips and she's the one serving the fish and chips and she kind of like more kind of guides him on like the British way of doing it. So it's this cool way of like, of the brand accept extending into different cultures and the Thing that, to me, that was so astute compared to the skims, compared to Victoria's Secret, compared to all these, is that they've gone back to what their brand is, and that's what makes these so well done. But it's also, when I'm watching it the entire time, I want to buy Burberry. I want to go and buy the boots that this one woman is wearing. In one of the videos, I'm intrigued to bring out my plaid scarf that I have in storage or buy a new one based on that message. Like, what makes these creatives so well done is they make me want to buy the brand, which is why does.
Camille
It make you want to buy the brand?
Bonnie
Is the reason why they want. They make me want to buy the brand is because they've. They found an entertaining and engaging way to. To communicate the Burberry point of difference in a way that still revolves around the brand universe.
Camille
You know what I think it is? When I was. Because you asked me to watch it, and I wasn't looking forward to, but I really enjoyed watching them. It's. It's that interesting part of brand that's hard to nail down, that they're making you feel away. Like, the. They have one of those videos when there's a cricket game on and there's that really famous black male model who was like a rock star years ago, gorgeous man sitting on the. On the bench with a Burberry jacket. And then that lady we just spoke about sits down and she's watching cricket. And you're like, what's going on? But it. It leaves gaps for you to try to feel.
Bonnie
Well, then they go, I love your jacket. She's like, I love your jacket. The reason why they're great is because they don't. They're not selling.
Camille
No, they're. And there's gaps for the audience to think, what's going on here? Does this guy know a cricket?
Bonnie
But they're showcasing the product in a gorgeous way. In the other video, she's a tour, like a group guide, and they're talking about, like, the Earl of Sandwich, you know? And she, like, asks this Muslim woman to, like, take off your jacket and put it down. I'm sure the Muslim woman is someone. I just. I don't recognize her. And she's like, no, absolutely not. What. What you wait for her to say is, this is Burberry. Like, I'm not putting it down. And she doesn't say, say that. And then she goes, okay, let's move on. Next, we're gonna go see the Earl of sandwich. And the kid's like, is that the guy that. She's like, yes, it is like basically that created the sandwich. But again they don't say it.
Camille
You have to fill in the gaps.
Bonnie
Yes. And, and when you're watching this, they're not selling to you, but because they're all wearing Burberry, I'm like, shouldn't love those boots like she loves.
Camille
And the people seem cool. Totally like, you know what I mean? They're not cookie cutter one thing or the other.
Bonnie
Well, that actually really connects with this, this kind of, this other concept. I want to talk about today where it's like the best ads don't feel like ads. And Gap is doing such a great job of, of launching with this. With Zach Poston being their new Creative Director since 2024 last year, he's absolutely transformed Gap being cool again. The only thing that really disappoints me with the Gap being cool again is that the in store experience does not match how relevant they come online. Like Gap is a true like 180 success story of that you can become culturally relevant with the right creative direction. And you can tell that Zach Poston has no control over like the E Comm experience because the website still feels like outdated and boring. But if we were just to talk about the creative that he's doing, they're not selling in any of the ads. So one of the breakout ads this year was with Cat's Eye, which is a really cool girls group that you know, has K pop but they have brought in some like other mixed race dancers so that it's like it, it kind of feels more Americanized. And they did this really cool dance of all of them in denim and it went viral with all of the universities. But what's so smart is they're dancing.
Camille
Did they get the sororities to do it? Because you know the sorority dances. That's a beautiful yes.
Bonnie
And they crushed it. Well, they didn't get the sororities to do it. The sororities wanted to do it because the dance was so well done. So they got this girls group to do this dance to Milkshake, you know that hit. Then my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard. They're like, it's better than your. You have to get the drum roll in the beginning, otherwise you just couldn't get the song. But they're basically doing all these crazy moves in denim. So one, it's like this stuff looks so cool, but when all the sororities take it on and they want to redo the dance. Where are they going to buy their denim? Probably Gap.
Camille
It goes back to how it makes you feel because if you like the dance, you learn the dance. The brand is making you feel amazing because you know what I mean? Like it's associating the. How you make the customer feel with your product.
Bonnie
Totally. And here's another one too. Montclair did this awesome ad about friendship and it's Robert De Niro and Al Pacino talking about what friendship means in life. And it's just shot so beautifully and it did so well because it's two super iconic men that did say so many movies together that built this beautiful friendship. And they're both in Moncler jackets, but they're not talking about Montclair at any point in time. It's great lighting and it's.
Camille
I wonder if he's talking about what it's like to be a dad at 89.
Bonnie
No, he's not. He doesn't talk about that. He talks about what it means to be a friend. But what's cool is the way that they shoot it and what they're talking about throughout the entire. You want to stay till the end.
Camille
Oh. Because the. To eavesdrop on their conversation is amazing. So that's money well spent.
Bonnie
It is. And it's also, there's such a nostalgia to it that you feel a warm feeling towards Moncler because it gave you an intimate feeling with people that you love and respect and you know aren't going to be here forever. So it keep. When we talk about those iconic like Nike commercials that made you feel this is like, like that, but they're not directly selling.
Camille
You know what? It also, it just popped in my head. The Burberry in that commercial, you just, it shows a movement away from the 1 second clips to going bang, go here, go here. Like they weren't like throwing all of their past movie roles. It was just them talking, kind of rotating around them. So it's. If you make good enough content, people will lean in and listen. But the kind of lazy way to do it is to just do a scene cut every half second and just kind of overwhelm the brain totally.
Bonnie
But it also connects to what we talked about with Victoria's Secret last week. Right. Like these brands that are going back to what made their brand stand out in the first place and creating ways that don't sell, but don't directly sell, but tap into that original brand universe. The best socials are the ones that are the most closely tied to the real brand. And that was the issue of what we saw with all of this ESG and political correctness is that brands were losing sight of what made them different because they were all trying to be the same same to placate to a message that that didn't directly connect.
Camille
It's almost the opposite because if you want to break into a market, you have to disrupt something, you have to upset something someone, do something new. But if you're just acting like everything is, you know, safe, you're not going to disrupt. And so your brand can't have a personality if it doesn't dare to do something different or challenging.
Bonnie
Agreed? Agreed. All the way. So, interesting other article I read this week that these two icons from the fashion industry, Ailey park and Stephen Galloway, launched the Movement Creative, a boutique agency representing movement specialists. Okay, so really interesting I saw this other article this week that talks about this new service category that has just emerged. So Ailee park and Stephen Galloway, who are famous in the fashion and Runway and actor space, who would kind of coach these professionals that need to be on camera, be more natural on camera, have created an actual agency called MVM Creative that is a boutique agency representing movement specialists. And they teach models, actors, executives and founders how to move naturally on camera. And the whole premise is that a lot of people have been trained for static positioning, especially a lot of celebrities, right? That them expanding into executives and founders just shows you that even the people that have been doing this professionally for so long also don't find it natural to be on camera. Because being on camera is almost more like 3D, right? Like you're you kind of. Especially when everything is being shot on iPhone, there's so many different angles. You gotta really show up and have that personality and have that like effervescentness on camera. So they're basically coaching people to be able to be natural on camera. And it shows you how it's no longer an outlier to to be like a founder on video based content. It shows you that it's now a standard and there's actually professionals that you can hire to like level up. Because the difference is going to be those who are natural on camera and master it.
Camille
I had just written Level up the second you said it because it's not good enough just to do what's safe. You have to level up whether it's a social media masterclass, taking acting, voice, coaching, anything like public speaking. But the movement is interesting because of the different camera angles and it just shows you how important iPhone content is. I would love to take the course, see what it says about movement. It's very interesting.
Bonnie
No, they're an agency, so they're actually like on retainer, helping you get better at movement. And it's this, they're not even like the first to do this. They're just people that are pivoting out of doing like working with actors and like Runway models. And they're opening this up for founders, for executives.
Camille
What do their socials look like? That'd be interesting to me.
Bonnie
I gotta search it up, but I can't say I've done it yet. But what I think is fascinating though is it shows you that video doesn't come naturally to anybody. And people think that it's. They kind of get it, they hear me, but they're like, it's inconvenient to go through that uncomfortability in a public setting. And this shows you that, that feeling that you're experiencing. You better eat that frog sooner. Because it's becoming now the standard to be comfortable on camera. Like the next thing is coming right now, the standard of how good you are on camera. And I think that's was also really complicated with the people that reach out to us is there's a lot of people that keep put their phone in the same position, that memorize their scripts, that start their videos the same way. It's very robotic. It's not interesting and it's not working. And people want to keep finding their ways to like cut the corner where they feel like they're doing it, but it's not dynamic, it's not new, it's not interesting. And there's a reason why that that doesn't work.
Camille
And it's tough. One of our guys, I watch his contact, I won't say it this year, but like he's tied to sports, one of the nicest, coolest human beings in the world. And he went and he did the homework and he made content, he tied it to sports. Content was amazing. But he, he was so tied to having to read it that you could just see him talk and then go and talk. And I'm like, dude, just do it 25 times. Like if that thing hits, it's worth so much you can invest trying to do that two minute clip 25 times without having to kind of go down and read it because it just so takes you away from the message. Like seeing somebody talking and then going and then talking. Like it takes away all the authenticity. Just talk with passion about why your industry connects to this thing?
Bonnie
No, but it's not, it's inconvenient to have to go through the learning curve of learning something. Right. Like, our brains at this point have accepted the bare minimum if we have to do content. I had a client sent to me yesterday. She's getting into YouTube and she sends me this video of this woman's account. She's like, I'm kind of thinking something like this style. And it's like literally the most boring style that was like, kind of interesting 10 or 15 years ago. And I just clicked the page. I'm like, 300 subscribers. This woman has 300 subscribers. I'm like, no, you cannot give me, you cannot share me a medium where the person has 300 subscribers and her whole message is like, I'm, you know, I'm not doing YouTube to, like, really grow. It's for SEO purposes. This is like a long tail thing. This is for really, for research. And I'm like, well, that's what YouTube is, period. So using trying to emulate someone's strategy that's been doing it for years and is not working is the worst approach for you to take to move forward.
Camille
But the lesson learned I get from that is understanding the human psyche is so critical to knowing how your customers respond and how you respond.
Bonnie
Yeah.
Camille
So she's given a task. Let's go find a way to do it. She's not aware that her human psyche selected the safest way of making content.
Bonnie
Yes.
Camille
Without knowing why, she's like, she just kind of told herself, oh, I like this. But an intelligent person that could say this doesn't really say anything. This person hasn't done it. But that override that exists in the human brain is that you choose that safer thing and just. And pretend it's the good one. And that's why you need a coach in these things, because you can be very smart, you can be amazing at your job, but when it comes to positioning and being creative out in the market, somebody's got to break through your internal governors and your psyche. That stops you from doing what you need to.
Bonnie
I would actually say that the reality is that most people that are super intelligent actually try to get themselves out of it by using their intelligence. The people who, I don't want to say aren't as intelligent, but don't tend to be the most cerebral super smart people are the ones that are killing it in content creation. The next statement isn't let's talk about Trump, but when we talked about last week on Trump And Bonnie Blue. And that was the whole premise.
Camille
Congratulations, by the way. Camille, on CNN and the Wall Street Journal talking about branding.
Bonnie
Thank you so much.
Camille
Crushing it.
Bonnie
Thanks so much. But the. When we posted that whole video, so many people were like, how do you learn from a Nazi sympathizer? This is. He's an absolute. He goes, there's nothing to learn. I'm like, he's literally the President of the United States. And I'm not comparing my first statement to talking about Trump as being, you know, less intelligent. People create content. I'm saying that when you look at these really intelligent, cerebral people, they write off Jake Paul, they write off Mr. Beast, they write off Bonnie Blue, they write off whatever the person that's often the leader in your industry who's doing the most videos, the most billboards, the most whatever. They are an idiot for whatever reason because they. They're not as good. They don't care. They put themselves out there. The sooner that over the reality that the really smart people, the people that are the best at what they do, are not the people that want to lean into engaging content formats that news Jack. That are controversial, that, to your point earlier, that actually say the things that you're feeling but you don't feel like you can say on camera. It's the sooner that you're actually going to become more credible in your industry because you're more intelligent than the person that's killing it. But you're not doing content that's interesting. So you're not reaching more people.
Camille
If I had the power to make some of our clients listen to me, it'd be powerful. Because again, it comes down to human psyche, the human ego, id, whatever it is, would prefer to be morally superior than to be effective. And so we get these statements that are absolutely asinine from people who went to Ivy schools saying, oh, I can't do that because I don't like what that person has done. It's like, no, you have a business, you have investors, you have customers. You have to learn from anything. You can learn to be the best at what you're doing. And some people will just not consider things because it's from somebody who has a different view on abortion than them. Like, there's smart people on both sides. Learn where you need to learn so you can do your shareholders or your family or your business the good it needs.
Bonnie
Well, and that's the other thing too, is like, especially when you talk about examples, people are. So they're looking for such a literal, perfect example that allows them to decide to do it. And the reality is it often doesn't exist because all of the people within your category, within that industry feels the way you do. So when I pull, and I start pulling from influencers or creators or people in other industries, if I take it from a realtor or if I take it from someone that owns a beauty company, it's too much work for them to try to find the pieces so that they can steal, like an artist opposed to, like copy and paste someone that they respect with the right level of credentials. That's doing it in a way that, that is extremely viral. Like, it doesn't. It's not compatible. And that's like, when I bring up that point of that text message I got, it's like you're literally telling me that you're about to invest. Not only, let's put the money piece aside at least two to three hours per week doing something that is proven to show you that it doesn't work. And, and what does that mean? Over a year of time, you have to get into this mindset of I'm prepared to do things different because that's actually where it's the best use of your time. If you're not going to do anything differently and you're going to show up and you're going to something that doesn't work, you are actually losing resources because you can't get those hours back every week. And you could probably make more money focusing those in your business than like, on a marketing strategy that's not going to work.
Camille
It's interesting because the ego comes into play again. You have a founder and they're like, oh, I don't really want to sell. I don't like selling. Like, my product is the best. People should just recognize it. And I'm like, don't let your intellect or ego get in the way of it. You actually have an obligation to sell, even if it means dumbing everything down. Because there are people who desperately need what you are providing and they don't know it exists there. But if you're not willing to kind of step off of your pedestal of enlightenment and get down into the dirty world of selling so you can get your product found, you're actually doing a disservice to people whose lives you would change totally.
Bonnie
And you also can't copy what up people are doing in your industry because if a bunch of people are doing it, you doing it is not more interesting or different. So when, like, I find a lot of business owners too are just like, oh, yeah, but like I have all these teams and, you know, we're super busy and we're doing all this stuff and I look at it, it's like almost an identical grid to everybody else that's doing it. Like, why would the algorithm reward you differently if the other people that have been doing it, that are doing what you've been doing have been doing it for 12 years. So like, they have an added edge.
Camille
Well said.
Bonnie
Gets me really, gets me really fired up. Okay, so next I want to talk about road. So really fascina in this past week, Hailey Bieber's road misses sales targets after the Elf Beauty acquisition as shares slip 7%. So I called it after this huge acquisition, the largest in beauty before caring and the l' Oreal deal. She goes into Sephora and they can't make target. What's fascinating is that although it's 7%, almost all of the fashion companies are up 6 or 7%. Prada's up, all of them are up. And it shows you that when your brand is built on scarcity and tapping into aspirational brand that is hard to access. It's hard to maintain that when you go mass market.
Camille
But it also shows you that if you can build a brand as a founder, you can get some MBAs in a giant public corporation to overpay for it because of your brand in addition to your product. And that's why it's very important for founders to focus on brand, because you get multiples that make you a lot of money. And then you can let the MBAs explain to shareholders a 7% drop, which is catastrophic.
Bonnie
I actually think that Haley specifically is dropping the ball post acquisition because she's almost retreated to being like more private and showing less of what's happening. And I think that for a lot of her fans, her getting this size of a deal and not showing what her day to day looks like in working and being a part of the like, I don't think this, like, I'm too cool to not show you anything and just show you what I'm, what I, you know, what I want to show you works in the current landscape of her company being purchased. I think prior to it being purchased there was this allure of there's this cool girl dropping products and we didn't really know the size of the business. But now that lack of looking into her company doesn't. She's not evolving with where her company has evolved. And I think that that change for the fan base, you don't feel as much like you can be Hailey Bieber. When you do know that Elf purchased it for a billion dollars. Like there needs to be an evolution. There's nothing on her page showing the formulation, how she's doing this, the behind the scenes, what her day to day look like. It almost looks like she's less involved than ever and her product is more available than ever.
Camille
Yeah. In the writing of that contract, probably, you know, you can write that you have to be involved, but it seems like Hailey Bieber should have moved almost more into the skims model of getting attention afterwards because after the deal's done, she's got her money, your heart's not into it anymore. And now what it, what is getting the attention to the product after the deal?
Bonnie
Well, she just had this big interview with the Wall Street Journal which was kind of, you know, they played the whole Selena Haley and you know, she made a statement which I didn't think was controversial, that she doesn't feel competition by people she's not inspired by. And like, I feel like that's a very fair statement. Like, this is a businesswoman who's saying, stop comparing me to someone that's not relevant to me. Like she might be relevant to you, but like, if rare isn't crushing her like Rhode is crushing in the beauty space. So there's nothing to take from this person that was a part of their past. So she had this and a part of the interview that really cool too is she talked about how she's never come into this amount of money and how this important this is for like family planning. And she's like really focusing on the brand because she, the way that the deal was structured, she doesn't get all of the money up front. Like there's a part of like her being involved. And then once so much time has passed and all of these benchmarks are met, she's able to like release more and more of the funds. And for that reason, I think that her. It's weird because there's this, like, there's, there's a disparity with message. There's a, you know, I need to be so involved because I'm no longer my husband's wife. Like, she's become as if not more relevant than Justin in a business setting. She's made way more money from a business context and from an individual deal. And. But she's not giving us any more of what it now looks like to be like a real executive of a huge company. Okay, cool. So that wraps up that section segment. Let's talk about Mr. Beast.
Camille
Well, as people may or may not know, there's a hundred million dollar lawsuit going on that arise arose from a 2020 partnership between Mr. Beast and this restaurant company, I think it's called VLC or something, where he put his name on this restaurant company and it catastrophically failed, like really bad. And now they're suing each other. To me, it kind of shows how brands can be different when it's a personal brand versus a product brand, because when it's a personal brand, people follow you and it's personal. And if your product doesn't match the brand, they see your brand, they take it personal and they completely reject it. You don't have the same leeway. And it seems like he kind of, he's overextending too quickly, maybe a little bit arrogant about his success where he thinks he can get into restaurants. I hear he's gonna start Mr. Beast Financial. Like there are, there are dangers when influencers or personal brands jump into contracts too quickly without having the right safeguards in place.
Bonnie
Well, it was a really interesting article because he did this partnership with this like basically like a ghost kitchen where you could like Uber eats Mr. Beast meals. And it was like a perfect dovetail during COVID because when everyone's at home watching Mr. Beast YouTube videos, you too can eat the MrBeast burger at the same time. So it was like Mr. Beast food being delivered to you so you can consume more mrbeast. And it seems like a really interesting partnership. But whoever the business owner was, he couldn't maintain the scale. Like the huge headlines is like products were showing up to the door, like undercooked. They'd look completely different than the images. Like people were mad because of that discrepancy between standard set buying only because you love someone and then that universe not being met to create that whole picture. It lacked consistency.
Camille
It lacked consistency. That's perfect. He lost control over the product. Just thought he'd throw his name on it. It made good sense. But because he lost control over the product, it did hurt his brand totally.
Bonnie
And I mean, what do you think there's a learning from that.
Camille
I just think if you're an influencer, even at a smaller level or a brand, you have to be very careful about the contracts you're getting into. Don't get overconfident and make sure you have control over your new collaboration or partnership because if there is a mistake, it can affect your brand. And if you just give control to somebody else and put your name on it like it's A dangerous, it's a dangerous area to go into.
Bonnie
An interesting segue to that though is when you look at like, like Alex Earle had a really incredible brand partnership with Poppy and she exited on the sale of Poppy with a really big piece of that. So what Poppy kind of set the tone of is like we're gonna maintain a long term brand partnership with an influencer and they're gonna get actual equity in the company so that they're further incentivized to post and to do these campaigns well. And I think that it's, it actually is a more interesting conversation from a brand side because I see it from both angles. And the reality of what's the most disappointing is that brands assume one. It's frustrating for them to have to pay people to post about it. Like they don't kind of. There isn't a natural respect for what that trade off looks like. And then there's further from that, assuming that that's a silly reality that we probably shouldn't break down further. The second piece that's interesting is the disappointment for like a paid post and how much that is like 2D. And when you're really trying to tap into authenticity and we're having these more fruitful partnerships, not conversations with influencers, what that means for brands that can afford to do that.
Camille
Just getting into the legal element of Mr. Beast because I think it's interesting to see what goes on behind closed doors in the legal world. This type of lawsuit is manna from heaven, from lawyers, because what happens is egos get bruised. Mr. Beast's ego is bruised because his product reputation failed. So what he's going to see is it's all their fault, they didn't execute. And then the Ghost Kitchen conglomerate is going to say, it's not our fault. You didn't meet your commission, you didn't meet your commitments to promote it, to do this, to pay attention. So it's like a divorcing couple where they both are now just seeing the lens through hitting each other. And the lawyers are going to make hundreds of millions of dollars. There's no sense going through a lawsuit in this case. You make a mistake, own it. Mr. Beast should go up. I made a mistake. I wanted to send MrBeast burgers to people who follow me and love me. But I didn't make sure that the product was done properly. And that's my bad. I apologize to you guys. I'm going to move on. Doing what, what I do. That's amazing. Instead, he's in a hundred million Dollar lawsuit now spending a million bucks a day, probably on legals, who knows what's going to happen? It creates animosity and distracts him from success. Whenever you have these bad contracts, bad results, it's almost always better to walk away without getting into a big lawsuit because only the lawyers win.
Bonnie
I don't think he's wrong in suing for it. Like, if he puts his name on something and they don't maintain their standard, like, that's all that he has. That's like, all he has is reputation. If he's a YouTuber and he's like showing up every day and he's maintaining his reputation, like, if I sign a deal with you and it's. Everything I talk about is product story, experience and consistency, and then you launch an inconsistent product that I'm tied to contractually, like, that's all that I have is my rep. Once that's gone, like, that's what. That's all he's built, like years and years building up.
Camille
But that's why you have to protect your reputation. You just don't write a contract and then forget about it and then get upset that it wasn't done. Anything that's done with excellence. Usually the founder is paying attention, right? And if you just kind of sign a contract and assume it's going to be good, he didn't have, he didn't fixate on making sure that the product associated with his brand was great. And so then he blamed somebody else. He should have exited quickly, resolved it.
Bonnie
Right.
Camille
But people carry on these conflicts and just get more angry at each other. And then it gets into the media. Like, it's always good to get out of a contract or a conflict as early as possible.
Bonnie
Well, it also shows you, though, the power of people that the question is, like, you know, should they have power? You know, a lot of people that leaned into creating content early just have these massive platforms that. And that's where it's really complicated when I'm meeting with brands, is that, you know, when you, A lot of these huge influencers, they're. They're being paid $500,000 a post on, for infeed on Instagram. And that's why this conversation with, like, equity is, Is so pressing, because when you, when you're expecting these, these people to just, they're. They're building up these platforms as their, their way to make money so they don't owe you something as a business. And it's so interesting, the conversations I have is that a lot of these brands just Want the most relevant person, but then they don't have the budget to pay for what relevance costs.
Camille
So good, lots of good stuff going on.
Bonnie
So let's talk about the age of streaming. So this week Justin Bieber did a really interesting move and he basically launched a streaming channel. And he's gone on socials. He said, I'm gonna be streaming every day. Subscribe to my Twitch livestream channel.
Camille
Is that like watching the Eagle's nest with the little baby Eagles in it 24 7, literally.
Bonnie
But it's like just Justin Bieber like playing basketball, skateboarding, playing pool. So he created this like $20 million warehouse. But there's also in the back of, there's like a hundred foot screen where you can like see all this, the live stream comments. It's like he's like living in like the Truman Show. Like, it's like everyone can just watch him live his life, but in the back of the warehouse they have a full set so he can perform music live on this streaming channel. And what I think is really interesting about where I think this is going is this is how he's gonna monetize his music in an age of where music streaming is making no money. So this comes after Devin Booker launches $100 million man cave warehouse. And it's basically the exact same thing, but Devin Booker is doing it to get his guy friends out of his house. So he's basically created this like massive man cave. And he. They did some content on it. But when I did more research on this, Listen to this. In 2021, Bieber broke Spotify's record for most all time monthly listeners ever with a whopping 83.3 million streams. While those numbers are obviously impressive, Spotify reportedly pays 0.004 cents per stream. So for 83.3 million individual song streams, Bieber would only pocket $333,000. So what it shows you is the current model, the only way to maintain the money that he's used to making is to tour.
Camille
Yeah.
Bonnie
And he doesn't want to tour as.
Camille
Opposed to Taylor Swift like there.
Bonnie
Yeah. Like it's right. So if he wants to, if you want to monetize making money as an artist, where do you go? And I think what Justin Bieber has figured out because of how big streaming has become, he will start to stream music and showcase music to drive more album sales or whatever. Like I feel like there's a.
Camille
Who's buying an album? Like, how does that monetize? Because I don't think, I think this Is this is gonna fail spectacularly.
Bonnie
You think so?
Camille
Yeah.
Bonnie
Tell me more.
Camille
He's literally not that interesting. He's kind of interesting. Interesting. He has great music.
Bonnie
It breaks my heart that he's not interested.
Camille
He has great music.
Bonnie
So very sad.
Camille
Right? He has blessed with some good looks.
Bonnie
He did, but he was very cute.
Camille
But. But me watching him play basketball. Okay, good. You got a three pointer. Like Snore, like the scarcity is gone, right? Usually you want to get a clip. That's why paparazzi were following around to try and get a clip of what I said. If I can watch him all day long, it's going to make a few fangirls happy for three weeks. Where's it gonna be in two years when everybody has it? People don't have enough time in the day to pay attention to that shit. He's got to double down on concerts. He's got to go hang out with Taylor Swift and say, I know this is tough, but making money is tough. It's not about just playing in your warehouse. That's not interesting. And then you play one song a day. That's not tough. He's coasting. He's got bad advisors who are trying to take advantage of him, selling him nonsense. And he's going to fade away into obscurity unless he gets his ass back out on the tour and starts entertaining people the way that he's born to do.
Bonnie
I think you're right and I think you're wrong.
Camille
All right.
Bonnie
I think you're right on the. It's boring. You got to do the hard work. Making money is hard. All of those points was a mic drop moment. Where I think you're wrong is how big streaming is becoming and how much money streamers are making by doing something that doesn't make sense to us. This is for the next gen. Like the next generation is like really spending a ton of money and time on these streaming platforms. I think it's interesting for brands to start tapping into this. Like, I think that there is something interesting about having this view into what happens at a brand, how the business, how to do it in a way that is less on 24 hours a day and a different way to see into what happened. I think the brands that do this first, well, it's kind of break out.
Camille
It's kind of a version of OnlyFans, right? You just like if he's gonna sell a paid subscription to look at what he does in his warehouse. Like, you're just kind of paying to get access to stuff that's normally private. Yeah, it's an extension of only fans without the sex or whatever. But, you know, there's a limit to how much time everybody has, how many subscriptions they're gonna pay. So, yeah, I think it's growing now, but I think it's just gonna level off and then die because it's. It doesn't understand the market.
Bonnie
Where I think you're right is I don't think Justin Bieber is the right person. I think it's. It really breaks my heart, and it's a real sadness in my life that I've never met Justin Bieber. Well, I have, but not in this context when I was a super fan. But you can't meet your heroes. You can't watch him all day. He's not where he was when all of his hit songs came out. That allure has gone. So it's the wrong time. It's like when we saw the Backstreet boys in their 40s, and I'm like, this was the wrong time to go to the Backstreet Boys concert for the first time. Cause it just. It doesn't match that version you have in your mind. But I do think there's something to breaking that fourth wall and being able to see into spaces where you couldn't before.
Camille
No, I like that when it's controlled. Like videotaping a psychiatrist giving advice to somebody who's messed up. But there's patient confidentiality. But you just see that. You see them talking.
Bonnie
Oh, man. Like, I would that be, like.
Camille
Right.
Bonnie
That's sick.
Camille
Like, if you could have a Hollywood psychiatrist who just videotapes herself giving advice, but you don't hear or see who's.
Bonnie
And you try to guess who it is. Oh, my gosh. They're just so.
Camille
Well, that would actually be a good TV show. Great idea.
Bonnie
But I. So against the college guidelines, people.
Camille
Well, if you're not. If you're not disclosing patient identification or from a lawyer, you can do it, but it's just. You're breaking the fourth wall to see something you don't generally see.
Bonnie
Yeah.
Camille
It stops being entertaining if it's the same stuff all the time. Like, how many times can I watch him play basketball? Like, who cares?
Bonnie
True. Well, I don't. I don't think I want to watch him play basketball. But I do think that if it's hard, because I also don't. I don't. I didn't like his last album, and I don't feel like I'm actually really, like, a Justin Bieber fan anymore. Like, I'm like, OG Justin Bieber.
Camille
You know, he has to do. Is what you said before. He's not getting good advice. He's got to go away. Like, he's got to go. Like, Keanu Reeves was good. He went and did a philosophy degree and started a band. Like, he went somewhere else and came back and recreated himself, but he's just kind of lingering there on the edge, looking annoyed and upset.
Bonnie
I don't think Justin Bieber can ever come back.
Camille
I think that's he needs to come back and become like, a Michael Buble or Chris. You know what I mean? Like, he's got to go do something interesting, live in the Himalayas for three years and. And do something.
Bonnie
I agree with you, but I feel like there's things that we don't know that happened.
Camille
Well, we've talked about that, too, but that would be part of him coming back is to, like, stop distracting himself and just out P. Diddy. Like, let's. Let's do it. Yeah, well, let's get some justice.
Bonnie
It's dark over here.
Camille
Justice for Biebs.
Bonnie
All right, well, let's talk about the World Series. If there's a way to talk about Toronto sports, we will do it. And the Toronto Blue Jays are in the World World Series right now. It's a big deal in Toronto.
Camille
You know, I'm not. I'm not the biggest baseball fan, but every year that I'm watching the World Series, I'm always fascinating. Fascinating about what goes on behind home plate for however many pitches there are in a game.
Bonnie
Yeah.
Camille
And I think, like, it has a disproportional value to brands. When I look at those little ads underneath where the people are sitting. And then I often kind of look at who's got those seats, and I was looking at them, and then I was, like, shocked this year that I saw somebody look like Colonel Sanders.
Bonnie
Identical.
Camille
Yeah. And I was like, is this. Is this intentional? Because it's got such. Such value from a branding perspective compared to the commercials. But I bet you half the people didn't even see this Colonel Sanders guy sitting there. But it was, like, such a quiet placement that it's kind of like. What's that called? An Easter egg? That's. That's in a movie. So I wonder if that was part of the KFC advertising campaign, because it was brilliant. I couldn't stop looking at him. Once I saw him, I'm like, what? Like, he was just acting like a completely normal fan. It was like Colonel Sanders was walking Watching the game and from a, from a return on investment, from an ad spend, I think that that space behind home plate is incredibly valuable.
Bonnie
I wonder what the stance is from the mlb. Like brands have to have had to because it bypasses them paying the price for advertising that they would set by buying a seat, especially in Toronto. Like, compared to like Canadian, like people are really big fans of the Toronto Blue Jays, don't get me wrong. But from the a volume of people perspective, the cost of the Blue Jay seats are really not expensive compared to like what they would be at the LA Dodgers. So from a brand's maximizing that opportunity for seat cost to make a brand moment is actually such a strategic play.
Camille
Like when you look at how much it costs for a commercial, if I was a business and I could find somebody who had a seat there and pay them to wear my clothes or pay them to dress up, pay them for, you know what I mean? It's worth a couple million dollars in terms of visuals.
Bonnie
What I loved the most that you couldn't figure out if KFC did it or if they didn't do it. It actually made it so much more powerful for the brand, either directly or indirectly. Like they got a bump regardless because they did have ads playing throughout the mlb, but it's also kfc. So I don't. It wasn't weird that they have ads during the World Series, but they're gonna.
Camille
Try, they're gonna try to stop it because they're gonna want a piece of that if they start doing that.
Bonnie
But I wonder if they can. If the guy like, because it's like plausible enough, you just say, no, this.
Camille
Is how I dress and what I look like. It's hilarious.
Bonnie
Most people don't know this, but Colonel Sanders lived in Mississauga for a really long time.
Camille
He actually saga is in Toronto.
Bonnie
Yeah, Toronto. Toronto. And he actually died in Canada. Like so he, because he didn't become a super successful man until, well, until his 60s, he actually was. It's a really crazy story of literally a man that like bullshitted his way through everything and like nothing ever stuck.
Camille
But he was rejected. It's like a business coaching story that he was rejected like 2700 times before somebody tried his recipe. And then he made it, you know, as he's approaching 70. So never give up. Kind of.
Bonnie
Yeah, never gave up.
Camille
Cool story. But I, I, you might find it creepy if you watched it and didn't notice it. And once you see him, you'll never unsee it.
Bonnie
Yeah. But it's also like that psychological video that you talk about a lot. Like the, the.
Camille
I don't want to ruin it for people, but. So pause this before, but just YouTube basketball passing attention challenge and watch the video and see if you notice what's in there.
Bonnie
But you've told me to pause it, so.
Camille
And now if you're back, now if you're back, you'll notice that because you're so fixated on counting the passes between the baseball, the basketball players that you don't notice that somebody in a gorilla suit walks through. Right. And so it was. But once you see it, you can't unsee it. It's unbelievable. So I think it's how many people.
Bonnie
Miss it when it's happening the first time because they're so focused on catching it. Which is why the placement of Colonel Sanders is so smart. Because it's not like he's not eating a bucket of KFC chicken. He's not wearing something that when he opens up his suit jacket, it says by kfc afc.
Camille
Like there's just a man standing when it's full count. Like he's doing.
Bonnie
Enjoying the game, dressed full blown, like Colonel Sanders.
Camille
We're gonna see Betty Crocker. We're gonna see all these people at the next game.
Bonnie
Honestly, it would be kind of a vibe and it would only be in the Toronto stands because of the price point for the J seats.
Camille
No, no, it's worth millions. Like I. People would pay.
Bonnie
I don't even know if you could buy them in the LA Dodger seats. Like, that's because of, like, who probably would own them. Let's talk about the best and the worst logos.
Camille
Let's talk about the best logos in baseball.
Bonnie
Yeah. So I've got my favorite best and worst MLB logos that I have prepared for. Have you prepared yours?
Camille
Well, why do you think a sports logo is important and what makes it great as an expert in branding?
Bonnie
Well, I think sports logos is the ultimate standard of creating a cult like brand. People wear the sports logos to signal what tribe. It's the most primal site of tribal branding in the current landscape. Right. Like it's evolved from where tribalism used to be. And sports allows that to proliferate within people that like tribalism. Like, my team's better than your team. This is my team. I'm going to wear it. So the ultimate, the whole point of the logo is for it to be worn and loved and to signal who's your team.
Camille
You know, your comment on tribal is perfect because sports has replaced combat and conflict. So as our society normalized and wasn't fighting each other's tribes all the time, that mechanism is now reflected in. In sports games where men or women are competing against each other. And you're either Tennessee, orange or Georgia, whatever, you're this or you're that. So there's a huge tribal element to it. And so you want to look cool in your tribe. And some sports organizations nail it and become iconic and they sell more merchandise and others don't.
Bonnie
I think the thing that's interesting, though, to me with sports logos is I feel like they should. They should do better.
Camille
Yeah.
Bonnie
Like, I. For how basic it is, it's. You should be hiring people that actually can create iconic brands. I think a lot of the. A lot of the sports teams that have opened recently or that go through this rebrand. Like, there's this. This desire to, like, hyper modernize, opposed to, like, studying what's the best. Like, number one for me, baseball logo is the New York Yankees. Like, when I see them playing on tv, I'm like, that is so cool. Like, they're so iconic. The stripes, even the way they tailored their outfits, like, they just look. Look so cool when they're on the screen. And I. When I see the New York Yankees, I instantly go, cool.
Camille
But that goes back to what you talk about in branding, is that it generally takes a long time to make an amazing brand.
Bonnie
Yeah.
Camille
So New York City, they're iconic. They've been around a long time. They've. They've stayed true to some roots.
Bonnie
Love that brand.
Camille
Their font is awesome.
Bonnie
Awesome.
Camille
But if you're creating a new logo today for. For a sports team, it's kind of difficult. But when you look at some of the new logos that replaced others, they're absolute disasters.
Bonnie
But I also just don't feel like they're asking the right people to come in and rebrand. I don't think that you've got people that really get brands within which you should in the organizations, but the proof is not there. Number two, I love LA Dodgers. I think that I've always loved the LA Dodgers. I love the riches of that blue. I think the brand is cool. All the different logo variations are cool.
Camille
Your first two are just fonts of the initials of the team of the city.
Bonnie
Well, what's hilarious, you're right. Number three for me is the Boston.
Camille
Red Sox, which was. Which is again the B. But it's done well. But that shows you that the artistry behind branding is in the small, so iconic.
Bonnie
The Green Giant. I love that they don't feel the force to change. I love also their other logo of the socks. Like, I just feel like it's so cool. Number four. I do think the Toronto Toronto Blue Jays is a very cool logo. And I actually not because I'm from Toronto. Toronto Blue Jays is a team where I've gone all over the world to random corners of the world, like a random restaurant in Japan, as one example. And there's a Toronto Blue Jays hat. Like, it's a very distinguished, distinguishable brand. And I do. I do. Like, I don't like the modern version of how they made it soup. Like, I don't like the. The one right now, but I do like this brand overall.
Camille
They took a bit of a risk and they. They.
Bonnie
It really stands out. It's completely.
Camille
They nailed the Blue Jay. Right? It's interesting because it's interesting in baseball that the. Like, you have the Orioles, right? You have the Cardinals.
Bonnie
I put Cardinals. Next Cardinals for me is number five. They're pretty cool.
Camille
But it's interesting that there's so many birds in baseball. But, you know, I always like the Tigers. Detroit Tigers again, which is another great font. And the Tigers have this cool.
Bonnie
For me. No, no, it's not for me. The Milwaukee brewers also is not for me. But I respect what they did.
Camille
It's. It's kind of interesting. There's one that looks like a toilet in there.
Bonnie
Oh, that's this one. So that's the Cincinnati Reds.
Camille
Yeah.
Bonnie
Legit toilet seat.
Camille
Yeah.
Bonnie
Like, how do they not oversee. Like, it just. It's like when you look at the B.
Camille
When you look at the B versus the C, there's a different level of.
Bonnie
I actually put that as, like, really A. No, thanks. I also. The Washington Nationals is legit. The Walgreens W. I don't know what.
Camille
Predated what, but it just seems.
Bonnie
I also really don't like the Marlins either.
Camille
Yeah. You know, it kind of captures what Florida is. You know what I mean?
Bonnie
Exactly. What I don't like about baseball.
Camille
Yeah, but it captures what you don't like about Florida in a way, in that it's. That kind of tacky. It's tacky.
Bonnie
Marlin, black and purple.
Camille
You can see people walking. Walking around in flip flops. You know what I mean? Like, it's kind of. But that, hands down, the worst one. Where's the one that replaced the Cleveland Indians? What are they?
Bonnie
The Cleveland Guardians.
Camille
The Cleveland Guardian.
Bonnie
It's so bad. It's like a 3D. It's this, like, 3D. Looks like it's from like 2005, but.
Camille
That C from Cleveland is if you actually look what it is and you know, cover your ears if you don't like politically incorrect things. But the Cleveland Indians was one of the best logos ever. Iconic for Native Americans. Loved having a team. It's like the Washington Redskins were the most popular football team amongst Native American Indians in the United States was the Washington Redskins. They loved that thing. And then awfuls. You know, forgive the term changed it because they didn't like what it did for Native Americans. And so I think when you're looking at logos, you know, you don't want to be chasing political correct trends. You want to stay what's good and have the courage to stay with what works. I don't think there was a need to change the Cleveland Indians logo. It's iconic. The new one is just an absolute disaster, probably done by some committee of people who are behind changing it in the first place.
Bonnie
Well, it's an interesting case study on. I don't think you set that up well considering the actual data that you have. Like, you've. You've done a lot of work with indigenous peoples and they've all told you how like there's. There really is within the community, like a reverence to being acknowledged in sports. Like, they, they don't see it. Of the people that you have spoken to en masse have not seen that as like the racial injustice for them to fight. Like, they've got, they've got bigger bones to pick.
Camille
No, I just said they're most. The most popular football team in the NFL for.
Bonnie
No, no, I'm not arguing that. I'm saying where. Where it. This is actually a really interesting point for brands is the data you get like the signal versus the noise, right? Like, there was a lot of noise that was coming from like PTA moms of like, how outrageous it was in whatever year 2022, we would still have have teams of this name that they wanted to feel so virtuous on not having these things in society that they wanted to be a part of a change when who they wanted to make change for. That's not where they wanted change. They want change in so many other areas that is not tied to you redoing a logo on a football team.
Camille
But there was an amazing moment on. On Fox News yesterday where they were talking about the Blue Jays pitcher who started game one and he started the year in the minor leagues and nobody had ever pitched against me. He's only 22 years old. And so for him to be starting Game 1, the World Series is amazing. But when they said. When they showed his first game of the year, it was like he was playing against the Hammerheads and there was 300 people there. But in terms of a, you know, in terms of a team name and a logo, the Hammerheads. I know maybe you want to look like a shark, but it's probably not the best. Probably doesn't have the best brains working on that. That logo and slogan.
Bonnie
I think the Hammerheads is great. If you actually think about, like, people who want to support second and third tier sports, that actually taps into it way more than calling it that, like the Braves, you know, like, you actually. That's why the Savannah Bananas, they do so well. Like, the people that want to go to those games, they want to be, like, extremely entertained. I. It's sports on the budget. It actually taps into more of what that fan is more fun. It's way more fun than it being serious. So don't go for the Hammerheads. I like them.
Camille
It's kind of funny. But they didn't take themselves too seriously where. I think Cleveland tried to take themselves too seriously with their.
Bonnie
I think it's exactly what I said. It's people who want to feel like they're a part of making the world a better place without realizing where the problems lie. Like, that's not the core issue. Like the Washington Redskins, the people that love those, they love the team. It's had that name for forever. And people who are indigenous are like, it's a great team. We love it. We love to be represented in sports. It's awesome. That's not where they feel the injustice. There's a ton of other places where they. Where they are mad about. It's not renaming a team, and it's. And it's literally the signal and the noise. It's like, look over here. We're gonna do this because this is super important. And then they're like, it's not really that important. We've got way more other issues over here.
Camille
Can we look at education, health care, access and from a business perspective, for God's sakes, your merchandise sales die.
Bonnie
Died.
Camille
Like, die. Cleveland and Washington like their merchandise sales.
Bonnie
The teams die because they don't have something that holds them together. Like, these brands are tribalism. And it's not even about. It's people who aren't into sports making decisions for their fans, for the customers, and then that's where you lose the customers. It's the same thing with Victoria's Secret. The person who was wanting to watch the Victoria's Secret fashion show was not the same person that wanted to tear down the ideals of what models should look like. That is valid that people don't want to see that and don't like that. But don't bring that into a brand where that wasn't where that brand was founded within. So it's that discrepancy of where is the what is the brand ethos, who is the brand's customer, what is signal, and what is noise.
Camille
Well, obviously, we want to know what you think about the logos in baseball. What's the best, what's the worst, what's a disaster, and what your thoughts are on Colonel Sanders.
Bonnie
Yeah, I'm dying to hear what you guys think of our assessment of all these logos.
Camille
If we've missed one, let us know. But we'll do a little poll and see which one is the worst and best logo in baseball.
Bonnie
Otherwise, we will see you guys next week. Thanks for tuning in for another week of Art of the Brand.
Hosts: Camille Moore & Phillip Millar (Third Eye Insights)
Date: October 29, 2025
In this lively and candid episode, Camille and Bonnie (aka Phillip Millar) dissect the seismic shifts happening in branding, with a sharp focus on risk-taking in marketing, the evolution of luxury and mass-market brands, influencer authenticity, viral moments, and the rise of streaming culture. The hosts analyze case studies from recent events—like the Louvre art heist ad, the changing fortunes of Skims and Burberry, failed influencer product launches, and Justin Bieber's leap into 24/7 live streaming—to explore what’s working, what’s failing, and how brands must adapt to the new attention economy. Notable for its blunt advice to founders and business owners, the episode pushes listeners to seize moments, embrace controversy where appropriate, and never settle for the safe route in branding.
Louvre Art Heist & Crane Co.
Crane Co. on the Louvre heist:
"We're going to do an ad campaign that says this crane works really well." – Camille [00:06]
Leadership on risk:
"Leadership is not just getting an appointment and then doing everything safe and everybody loving you. That people aren't taught that leadership is actually really hard." – Camille [06:06]
On authenticity:
“I want to follow if Martha Stewart was posting on her stories.” – Bonnie [00:21/14:58]
On success and controversy:
“You're nobody until somebody hates you. If you haven't done something that pisses somebody off, you're not doing anything.” – Camille [15:38]
On Skims’ viral drops:
“It’s an entire campaign strategy designed around only getting 10 minutes so that people talk about skims.” – Bonnie [21:26]
On Burberry’s British campaign:
“There's a charmingness to how they do it, there's a politeness, there's an elegance that’s aspirational.” – Camille [25:54]
On safe content:
“Our brains at this point have accepted the bare minimum if we have to do content.” – Bonnie [40:45]
On intellectual resistance:
"The human ego… would prefer to be morally superior than to be effective." – Camille [44:14]
On logo rebranding failures:
“You don’t want to be chasing political correct trends. You want to stay what’s good…” – Camille [76:15]
Camille and Bonnie invite listeners to vote and comment on the best and worst MLB logos and share thoughts on all the debated campaigns and issues raised.
End of Summary