Uncensored CMO: How Brand Can Become Your Company’s Greatest Asset

Host: Jon Evans
Guest: Jonny Bauer (ex-Chief Strategy Officer, Droga5; former Blackstone; Founder, Fundamental Co)
Date: August 27, 2025

Overview

This episode delves deep into how brand thinking can be a company’s most crucial asset—not just from a marketing or advertising perspective, but as a core driver of business value. Jon Evans interviews Jonny Bauer, whose career has encompassed influential roles at BBH, Droga5, and Blackstone, and now with his own venture, Fundamental Co. The conversation explores why strategists deserve a seat at the table, the evolution of brand thinking in private equity, and how to integrate brand strategy into the DNA of an organization for meaningful value creation.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

The Often-Underappreciated Role of Brand Strategists

• Strategy vs. Creativity in Agencies ([01:43]–[02:35])

  • Jonny recalls how BBH uniquely valued strategists and gave them an equal seat alongside creatives, allowing strategy to inspire the work, not just post-rationalize it.
  • Quote: “They really had a seat at the table...not just used to sell work or to post-rationalize work.” — Jonny ([02:36])

• Cultural Differences in Strategic Planning ([03:11]–[04:04])

  • Strategy in advertising originated in Britain and was exported to the US, often dominated by expat Brits in New York.

Early Brand Innovation: Axe/Lynx and Shifting Emotional Territories

• Transforming Axe/Lynx ([04:09]–[08:50])
  • Jonny reflects on helping reposition Axe from a functional antiperspirant to a seduction tool for young men—an emotional territory that built a new category.
  • Innovative moves included the creation of entertainment properties: a TV series, a movie, a film festival, and more.
  • Quote: “If you put a different scent on it, you charge a dollar more for it and you reframe the benefit...as a seduction tool, essentially…” — Jonny ([06:54])
  • Extensive innovation pipeline emerged from honest, holistic insight into the emotional needs of consumers.

Droga5: The Rise of Strategy-First Creativity

• Building Droga5’s DNA ([09:43]–[13:37])

  • Jonny was recruited early at Droga5 and built the strategy department, with David Droga giving him power to shape it.
  • The agency’s philosophy: go beyond creative stunts—use deep strategic thinking to reduce reliance on luck and cultivate repeatable fame.
  • Quote: “We were trying to take the luck out of the fame.” — Jonny ([11:35])
  • Example: The fabled “Air Force One” viral campaign, which blurred reality and brought the notion of viral/earned media into sharp focus.

• Campaigns of Strategic Pride ([15:36]–[17:29])

  • Standout campaigns: Tourism Australia (Crocodile Dundee dupe), The New York Times (“Preserve Democracy”), Puma’s “After Hours Athlete”—all rooted in finding a differentiating category insight.
  • Quote: “At the time, they didn’t have the credentials to go after [elite] athletes…so we created a new category called the After Hours Athlete.” — Jonny ([16:47])

The Move to Private Equity: Brand as a Value Creation Engine

• Why Private Equity? ([18:08]–[21:08])

  • Jonny wanted to see if brand thinking could escape the “marketing silo” and inform wider business transformation.
  • Private equity provided “a radically different context” with receptive companies at inflection points after being acquired.
  • Quote: “Brand is...a set of ideas that you can truly organize a company around.” — Jonny ([18:49])
  • The PE shift: Moving from “efficiency-based” to “vision-based” value creation.
  • Quote: “What could this company’s next chapter be? What could it become over the course of this investment cycle?” — Jonny ([20:20])

• Integrating Brand Strategy Upstream ([24:02]–[25:31])

  • Bringing brand thinkers in early—rather than at the comms stage—aligns the business and clarifies decision-making across functions.
  • Alignment is the “biggest effect”—everyone knows what to do and how it’s measured.
  • Quote: “If we’re becoming this thing, this is your role in becoming it.” — Jonny ([25:26])

• Lessons Learned at Blackstone ([28:47]–[32:28])

  • Jonny learned to be more useful across many (non-consumer) business types—like infrastructure or data centers.
  • Quote: “Blackstone's portfolio is mostly not consumer...all these companies you don’t normally get access to or understanding from...” — Jonny ([29:59])
  • Brand can play a crucial role from acquisition diligence to “exit readiness.”

Bridging the Gap: Brand, Finance, and the C-Suite

• How Finance Sees Brand ([32:46]–[33:52])

  • Blackstone sees brand as central, both for itself and as a genuine differentiator for investments; brand foundations come before activation/advertising.

• Advice on Bringing Brand Strategy Upstream ([34:20]–[36:42])

  • Start by asking: Not “why do you exist?” but “What kind of company are you—and what do you want to be valued as?”
  • Transformational change can mean either “becoming bigger” or “becoming something else of higher value.”
  • Quote: “Know that the right kind of ideas can take you from one categorical placement into another of higher value.” — Jonny ([34:37])

• Senior Sponsorship and Cross-Functional Alignment ([36:42]–[38:32])

  • CEO-led mandates ensure brand is company-wide, not siloed; essential to have everyone use the same language and metrics.
  • Quote: “If the CEO is saying, you all need to care about this...he or she can make it a thing everyone needs to care about.” — Jonny ([37:19])

The Fundamental Co Approach

• From Blackstone to Fundamental Co ([40:14]–[41:17])

  • After proving the model at Blackstone, Jonny spun out Fundamental Co, keeping Blackstone as an anchor client but expanding to serve other PE and public companies.
  • They offer value creation strategy—the intersection of brand, business, and investment strategy.

• Process: Value Creation and Roadmapping ([41:29]–[43:27])

  • Work begins with strategic alignment—defining the brand’s potential with input from all major stakeholders.
  • Roadmapping prioritizes the fewest, highest-value actions to reach the desired repositioned state.

• Execution: Custom, Not Cookie-Cutter ([43:28]–[45:25])

  • No one-size-fits-all playbook. Fundamental Co assembles bespoke teams and external partners as needed for each transformation.
  • Core focus: Making sure the change is visible and understood, internally and externally (especially to potential buyers or investors).

Application & Case Studies

• Recent Projects ([47:23]–[51:31])
  • Working with several top PE firms and their portfolio companies across industries (Spanx, power grid, SaaS, private aviation, and more).
  • Public company examples: Delta, Visa, and notably CLEAR.
  • CLEAR: Reframed from “the airport queue jump company” to a “connected identity company” supporting frictionless verification across travel, healthcare, and more.
  • Olaplex: Transitioned from repair-focused haircare to a “foundational health and maintenance” company—inspiring everything from internal R&D to advertising briefs.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On early strategy’s seat at the table:
  “I was very attracted to so much work that BBH was doing...Then I understood that they were quite unique with, you know, giving strategy a real seat at the table to help inspire work...” — Jonny ([02:36])

• The power of reframing:
  “The thesis was if you put a different scent on it, you charge a dollar more...and you reframe the benefit...as a seduction tool, essentially...” — Jonny ([06:54])

• On reducing luck and repeating fame:
  “We were trying to like, take the luck out of the fame. And there was a lot of like, deep, deep thinking and understanding to inform the creative and help steer it...” — Jonny ([11:35])

• The centrality of alignment:
  “So the biggest effect that I think that this has is...around alignment and...togetherness. And it sounds so, so obvious, but...we call this process like purpose propagation.” — Jonny ([25:39])

• Brand as business transformation:
  “Brand is...a set of ideas that you can truly organize a company around.” — Jonny ([18:49]) “What happens if we brought brand much further upstream in the sequence of value creation?” — Jonny ([22:51])

• Categorical transformation:
  “The biggest lesson learned is: for a company to become more valuable, one way is for it to become bigger. Another way is for it to become something else that’s of higher value.” — Jonny ([35:00])

• Execution and change management:
  “People need to see it from very far away. And we're getting pretty good at thinking how to do that.” — Jonny ([45:18])

• Making change visible to investors:
  “The only people to signal the change to are potential new investors that need to understand the value that has been created.” — Jonny ([46:22])

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [01:02] — Jonny’s early strategy training at BBH
• [04:09] — The Axe/Lynx reinvention and holistic brand thinking
• [09:43] — Building Droga5’s distinctive strategy-first culture
• [12:35] — The story behind the Air Force One viral campaign
• [15:36] — Standout, strategically-driven Droga5 campaigns
• [18:08] — Moving brand upstream in private equity at Blackstone
• [24:02] — The logic and benefits of integrating brand into business strategy
• [34:20] — How to move brand strategy upstream in your own organization
• [36:42] — The need for CEO/senior sponsorship
• [40:14] — Spinning Fundamental Co out of Blackstone
• [41:29] — The Fundamental Co process: value creation and roadmapping
• [47:23] — Real-life examples and application of the value creation model

Tone & Takeaways

The tone is candid, practical, and both reflective and forward-thinking—true to the “Uncensored CMO” premise. Bauer demonstrates how marketers and strategists can (and should) think bigger about their impact—inspiring companies to move beyond seeing brand as a cost or a communications tool, and to see it as the architecture for business transformation and valuation.

For practitioners:
If you’re a marketer, strategist, or business leader, this episode provides actionable insight into how to reposition the value of brand, get a seat at the big table, and rethink how your organization can create and capture value—whether in private equity or the broader business world.