No. 005: Gap is giving us the comeback of the year
plus, Molly Baz makes history, Scrub Daddy & Dunkin' collab and do we really need another Erewhon smoothie?
Welcome to Volume 5 of my newsletter, Brandiose! You can expect brand news, deep dives, musings, and occasional founder interviews spicing up your inbox each Wednesday.
This one is a little longer but there was just so much to say!!!! Maybe it’s because we’re entering summer and there’s a bit of a spring in our collective step. IDK. Enjoy!
🧲 OBSESSION OF THE WEEK
Just yesterday, Molly Baz was featured in the new Kellogg’s Special K campaign, making history as the first pregnant woman on a cereal box.
This comes off the heels of her Swehl lactation cookie billboard in Time Square, which was “flagged for review” and caused a ton of controversy when it was taken down.
The Kellogg’s campaign is called “Special for a Reason,” and celebrates those with unique journeys and stories, so it feels like the perfect fit.
Plus the photography is incredible and honestly makes me want to go buy a box of Special K Strawberry right now??? But that could just be my strawberry obsession talking…
My friend and former colleague, Carly Dornbrook, is the Strategy Director on the account & campaign (hi Carly!!) and you can tell that it directly picked up on a moment in pop culture, which is the sign of a smart strategy. Love.
🍿 BRAND NEWS
Influencer Tinx and luxury skincare brand U Beauty launched a new lip balm called Rom Com. The artwork is giving major 90’s vibes and I love it, but people are not thrilled about the $68 price point for a lip gloss. Fair.
Poppi is getting sued for telling us that the minimal “probiotics” in their sodas somehow offset the sugar content. We’ll see how this plays out…
Canva did a super cringey rap performance but apparently they don’t care because now 50 million people now know about their enterprise offerings
Harry Style’s Pleasing brand went live, and it’s very retro 70’s inspired. Lots of suns, flowers, rainbows… and tracksuits.
A super interesting POV on building DTC brands in 2024; the TLDR is that we need to go more mass, less niche, which is line with what we’re seeing from Glossier, Warby, and so many others. Do you agree?
The Coveteur is closing for good after hiring Jenna Lyons as EIC
This Vox story titled “Your favorite brand no longer cares about being woke” is pretty dark and the TLDR is that people mostly care about price during times of inflation
This makeup play kit for kids is so Sephora teen coded, but it’s probably also a pretty great business
I saw an influencer post about an app called Pinstripe where you can discover vintage sales/popups and it’s pretty genius. There has been so much innovation happening in fashion this year — may have to be a deep dive soon…
Scrubdaddy & Dunkin’ collabed on a fun little product and we don’t need it but do we want it? Also maybe not
🎯 DEEP DIVE: GAP IS BACK, BABY!
Context
Gap is most definitely having a comeback, which is not surprising considering everything 90’s is so back.
With Zac Posen at the creative helm, they are definitely playing up the nostalgia, collabs, and red carpet moments to revive the legendary brand to its rightful place in culture.
The proof is in their stock price, which popped 20% after they announced their positive Q1 performance on Thursday.
The Details
Gap’s sales are up 3% year over year, to $3.39 billion from $3.28 billion in 2023 (CNBC)
CEO Richard Dickson, has a brand storytelling background and specializes in reinvigorating brands. Of the brand’s strong year, he says: “We are on a journey to become a high-performing house of iconic American brands that shape culture.” (YESSS!)
All four of Gap’s brands are up, in fact: Gap, Banana Republic, Old Navy, and Athleta
Why Now?
Red Carpet relevance. If you want to give your brand the luxury treatment, you’ve got to put it on the right people. Gap knows this, and they delivered.
In May, actress Da’Vine Joy Randolph wore a denim ball gown designed by Zac Posen to the Met Gala
Anne Hathaway wore a white Gap shirt dress to a Bulgari party in Rome, also a Zac Posen design.
Gap later dropped the dress on their website and (sadly for all of us) it sold out in within a few hours
90’s nostalgia. As mentioned, everything old is new again — and Gap is no exception to that rule. Millennials and Gen Xers are flocking to the brand, as are Gen Zs, who likely did not grow up wearing those navy blue and white Gap crewnecks but we’ll allow it.
Buzzy brand collabs. Gap has been killing the brand collab game this year. It’s one of the ways a brand can find its way into culture in an authentic way, while offering customers something cool & relevant — keep reading for my POV below.
DÔEN x Gap was well executed - I think they nailed the collection by making a bohemian brand relevant for a more “mass” customer.
Gap, Inc. just relaunched Banana Republic’s Soho store, designed in collab with Noa Santos of NAINOA. More a gallery than anything, the store is fashioned with travertine, brass, and Venetian plaster and will have a seasonally rotating art collection. It also has exclusive vintage collections from the 80’s and 90s. Plus, they have an entire Bespoke services offering, with personal styling & local delivery.
Brand > Product Marketing. The Linen Moves campaign featuring Tyla and Jungle’s viral “Back on 74” was a great example of putting the Gap brand front and center, rather than marketing a specific product.
Strong leadership. Richard Dickson has done this before, and it shows. He’s ex-Mattel, where he was President & COO during their Barbie era. Enough said. According to Forbes, once he got to Gap, he created a “reinvigoration playbook” for all brands and is thinking about each of their journeys differently (which is 100% the right move.) Zac Posen knows a think or two about design and red carpet relevance.
Hot Take 🌶️
Personally, I love that Gap is finding its way back into culture. Not only does the brand represent classic, cool, effortless, laid-back style (remember “normcore?” they invented it), but also it is a cultural icon and a brand that has always found ways to make waves in culture.
We’re seeing positive performance with other 90’s brands, like Abercombie & Fitch (I wrote about it here), Free People, Converse, Coach, and Foot Locker.
There’s so much to learn here.
Let’s breakdown the Brand Comeback Playbook:
Get back to your DNA. Gap may have had to do a little soul searching, but it’s clear that they now know what their core brand values are. These principles define every action they take from there (aka “brand behavior” in marketing speak). When you’re starting a brand, spend time defining differentiated brand offerings (this is a great exercise for that). That way, as you grow, you’ll always have a compass.
Fix your products!!!! This one should go without saying, but I’m saying it because unfortunately it needs to be said. Too many brands rely on expensive marketing strategies without getting to the root of the issue: does your product suck? What Gap did (via new top-tier design leadership) was actually create items shoppers wanted to wear. A buzzy marketing campaign may get you some incremental sales, but I’d like to see the return rates if quality is lacking. Plus, it’s terrible for retention when your product doesn’t live up to what you’re promising.
Lean on brand collabs. This may be my favorite tactic of all. When I was at DEUX, we relied heavily on a collab strategy to drive consumer interest, exclusivity, and brand clout. Put differently, it generated hype. The same can be said for Gap’s strategy. As a brand, have a list of dream collaborators handy. You never know when an opportunity to collab may come about.
Find brand-right cultural moments. Hiring Michael Dickinson and Zac Posen was an incredibly smart decision for the company for this strategy in particular. As mentioned, Dickinson’s legacy at Mattel was inserting Barbie into every single cultural moment to exist (not exaggerating), so investors are clearly hoping he’ll attempt something similar for Gap.
Rinse & repeat. Gap knows that this is just the beginning of a long road to recovery for the brand. A few “flash-in-the-pan” successes with red carpets and sold out pieces do not a comeback make. As a brand, whether you’re “coming back” or launching for the first time, the lesson is the same: you need many small wins, repeated over and over. For Gap, they’l have to map out a strategy that leverages this playbook in the coming quarters (and I’m sure they already have), but this initial traction gives me confidence in their ability to execute.
Because I’m feeling generous, here are some ideas I’d pitch the Gap team as part of their comeback:
A Netflix documentary; Gap is such an American icon, and I’d love to watch a documentary on their history, pop culture moments of note, and even some behind the scenes #drama.
What about a campaign featuring some of their in-house design team, led by Zac Posen? It would be so fun to see what it takes to get a garment from ideation to the sales floor (or better yet, the red carpet)
Honestly, even though we’re all over brand trips after the Tarte drama earlier this year, I thought the Ref In Residence one in Ibiza was pretty great and Gap could do something similar. Horse girl summer in Jackson Hole?
Gap, if you’re listening, call me.
P.S. I’ll reveal the results in next week’s issue. Last week, 100% of you picked the cucumber as the next brand muse over the lowly onion. I tend to agree.
✨ MUSINGS
Margot Robbie launched a “coastal gin brand” called Papa Salt in the UK (for now); she first launched it in her native Australia and it sold out within 48 hours. We definitely don’t need more celeb alcohol brands, but this feels a bit more intentional? Maybe it’s the “Australian botanicals”.
I recently decided I wanted to add some built-ins to my closet (without spending a fortune), and went deep on TikTok to see what the organization gurus had to say. Naturally, they had a solution — these $40 Target bookcases are such a steal!!!
In case you’ve ever wanted to crack LinkedIn engagement (a necessary evil TBH), I loved this piece on how the algorithm works in 2024
🎲 ONE LAST THING
Vacation (a retro-inspired sunscreen brand) and Erewhon launched a branded smoothie, called the Vacation “Sunscreen” Smoothie. (They also just launched new endcap displays at Erewhon, so the timing makes sense).
It’s coconut flavored and has virtually every form of coconut within it (milk, water, soft serve, “meat”, and whipped cream), which is cool, plus some other fun superfoods, but naming a food product after a sunscreen is kind of a branding fail?!
For the uninitiated, this is a good article on what it takes to launch a branded smoothie. Erewhon’s most popular smoothie, the Hailey Bieber’s Strawberry Skin Glaze smoothie does about $800k in monthly revenue. Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Winnie Harlowe, Marianna Hewitt, Sofia Richie have all created smoothies too, so I guess we’re entering an era where you don’t have to be a celeb or influencer to launch an $20 smoothie — just a cool vibey brand.
I’m wondering if we’ve reached peak branded smoothie? Are there other things we can brand? What about branded popcorn, my snack of choice? Branded chia pudding perhaps? I don’t know, but the people (me) are begging for an iota of creativity here.
That said, the smoothies are so good and there is something elitist about walking around with a smoothie to match your outfit in an Erewhon cup.
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have a great week.
- Sabena