September 2026 introduction – (38)
Welcome to the 38th edition of my newsletter or as a bingo caller would say ‘Christmas Cake’.
A less pleasant use of the term Christmas Cake was used in Japan during the boom times up to the 1990s..Mirroring China’s current use of ‘leftover women‘, Christmas Cake was used as a derogatory way of referring to a woman 25+ by comparing them to the cake which would lose its market attractiveness beyond (December) 25th.
Changing social norms has meant that this is largely a historical footnote in Japan.
38 in Chinese is largely considered positive as a number, based on its component numbers of 3 and 8. There are also 38 slots on an American roulette wheel, giving the house a 5.26% advantage. The wheels used in Macau and across European casinos have only 37 slots in them giving the house a 2.7% edge.
The cooler wetter weather was a welcome retreat from the heat waves we’ve been having. But summer still feels as if it lingered longer than it should. I spent the first two weeks still in shorts.
The soundtrack this month is a set by DJ / producer The Reflex at Defected Malta Glitterbox ’25. It’s as fabulous as it sounds, even when accompanied by a pumpkin spice latte if that’s your jam.
if you are baker read through to the end for some pro-tips from my Mam.
New reader?
If this is the first newsletter, welcome! You can find my regular writings here and more about me here.
Things that I’ve written
Strain wave gearing and more stuff. A round-up of interesting things from around the web. Strain wave gears are the main limitation and inciting technology for humanoid robots due to their unique properties.
Apple’s MacBook Pro at 20. I can’t believe that I have been using MacBook Pro’s for the best part of 20 years, so went back in time to reflect on how it changed laptop usage. Going back tells us a lot about the future of computing too.
ICYMI – Top five shares on LinkedIn
- Gucci’s ‘Drip’ sneaker and the death of regional savoir-faire attached to nation brands as a pillar in luxury’s heritage sell.
- Why the hot takes on Kylian Mbappé’s move from Nike to On as his boot sponsor were wrong and what it really means at the moment.
- WARC’s Multiplier Playbook and their attempt to bridge the brand building / brand activating divide for sustained growth and pricing margins.
- How Boots the Chemist have been bringing together media and creative in a more integrated way to deliver better-performing performance creative.
- Novo Nordisk as an example of what happens when your brand narrative falls out of your control.
Books that I have read
Horse Under Water by Len Deighton – I first read Horse Under Water at 11 or 12. My Dad had a lot of these pulp novels that he used to devour at work. Reading it all these years later highlighted the differences that have occurred since Deighton originally wrote the book in there early 1960s. But it was a quick enjoyable read of adventure and treachery, not that different to John Buchan‘s The Thirty-Nine Steps or The Riddle of the Sands: A Record of Secret Service by Erskine Childers.
Susan Choi’s Flashlight fits uncomfortably between genres. It ties together the complex identity of Koreans in Japan, the North Korean kidnappings of Japanese residents, past secrets and the American expat experience at home and abroad. As the book unveils the story in a non-linear manner it explores loneliness, the failings of human memory and the nature of identity and belonging. It weighs on you.
Things I have been inspired by.
Snickers insight of ‘You’re Not You When You’re Hungry’ is a great ownable, yet universal truth. Take that insight together with the centrality that AI is taking in culture (mirroring the role of ‘the net’ in culture during the dot com boom) and you have a fantastic campaign, more over at LBBO. I really like the way they integrate GEO/AEO into their campaign execution.
Chart of the month.
I had been looking at an apparel project. It’s been a while since I have touched the sector and it was working with an agency on an aspirational clothing brand. Said brand were looking at a creative project related to the circular economy and the agency who had been exploring it gave me a budget to run a few quantitative questions in the last week of August. Here is the answers to one of the questions that we asked.
We got responses from over 750 people, it was a simple poll question where they had to pick one answer to “What is the most likely reason for you to keep something you don’t wear often”.
Things that surprised me in the responses:
- We didn’t have one response that indicated that they didn’t hoard anything and instead gifted their items or used the likes of Vinted or Depop. Implication: if you are Vinted or Depop, your customers are at best selling mediocre items. They are gatekeeping on the good stuff which offers challenges and commercial opportunities if it can be cracked.
- Durability kills circular economy velocity: ‘Quality’ and ‘preserving outfit options’ tied as the top reasons to hoard unworn garments. ‘It was expensive’ clocked a measly 8%. Quality and outfit options were the joint top reasons for keeping items despite them not being in circulation. Outfit optionality makes sense, but quality is an interesting space, particularly when ‘it was expensive’ ranked far lower at a mere 8 percent. Implications: There are implied perverse incentives to make things with lower quality at both the top end and bottom of the market – fast fashion and luxury brands. This has implications for the viability of the circular economy. It also begs the following hypothesis: it may not be price gouging in terms of value that is affecting luxury, but the inability to spend. The latter being a pretty damning comment on the current economic outlook.
Why I am able to share proprietary research
The project collapsed before kickoff because the client lacked both the internal sign-off and the actual budget. I ate a few upfront hours, the agency took the bigger hit, but I kept the research rights. Finding out early was the win.
If you need sharp strategic thinking, I have an unexpected project-shaped hole in my calendar heading into Q4.
Things I have watched.
August bank holiday, I revisited a few John Carpenter films. I started with Escape from New York. I started into it after speaking with a friend who suggested that it felt very now. The film reflected a deep distrust of the government, which one can see in the divisive nature of politics and Netflixation of political debate and the political process.
As a film it looks much more expensive than it was. Stylistically it influenced the colour on black aesthetic that I bring to my own slide ware and even this blog (once I had the skill to edit the WordPress theme), you can see it in my charts of the month. What I didn’t realise about the film when I first watched it years ago was why it was so different and why it resonated so strongly.
Carpenter wrote the script in 1974 – 1976 towards the end of the Vietnam war and through the Watergate scandal. The film was shot towards the end of the Carter administration while there were still American hostages held in Iran. Operation Eagle Claw had failed in April and this came out the following summer. Carpenter’s work always had a degree of social commentary in it, so the urban decay was a concern of New York in the 1970s and early 1980s. The film owes a debt to Sergio Leone’s films and features a raft of Hollywood greats including Leone star Lee van Cleef and Ernest Borgnine.
Looking back on it now it uses techiques that were only starting to come in at the time including low light shooting including long tracking shots. The science fiction conceit hides some of the great acting performances in the film. Ultimately it’s great fun to watch. One thing to look out for if you do watch it, look at how well Escape From New York does matte backgrounds compared to the poor work done on matte backgrounds in The Terminator shot a few years later by James Cameron.
The second John Carpenter film I watched was Prince of Darkness. I am not a horror film fan, so it took me far too long to to sit down and watch it. Prince of Darkness features a plethora of actors that had appeared in other Carpenter films previously appeared in Halloween and Escape From New York. Victor Wong had appeared in Big Trouble in Little China.
Secondly the film is actually a science fiction film dressed up as a classic horror film and Carpenter plays with nods towards the Quatermass science fiction films and George A. Romeo’s zombie trilogy. In some ways the film feels close to The Thing.
Useful tools.
I was recommended Claude Academy by Neil Perkin in his newsletter Only Dead Fish. I have focused squeezing the most juice out of my Google Gemini subscription but I trust Neil’s judgment on this.
Tidy is a cross-app service that uses an on-machine AI model to fix grammar and make your writing more concise.
AI Toolbox is a browser extension for Chrome users that gives you a view of your AI chats in one place making organising them into folders or saving them down in Markdown or PDF really easy.
Thoughts for Mac is an app that sits in the menu bar and allows you to capture ephemeral thoughts.
The sales pitch.
I am a strategist who thrives on the “meaty brief”. The kind where complexity, business goals, and human culture collide, requiring synthesis into actionable insights.
I have a decade-plus of expertise across the UK, EMEA, and JAPAC, I specialise in bridging the gap between high-level strategy and creative execution. I have been embedded within Google Cloud’s brand creative team, where I helped navigate the “messy steps” of global pivots with the rapid rise of Gen AI. Following the completion of this engagement, I have continued to partner with agencies and founders on high-impact projects. My recent freelance work includes architecting the brand narrative for a fast-moving startup, driving strategic creative for new business pitches, and developing a dynamic sports partnership activation.
I focus on what actually works: balancing long-term brand growth with short-term sales. I do not just write presentation decks; I build campaigns that actually ship. Clients hire me to develop or perform strategic QA on their ideas before they go live, helping leadership teams avoid expensive mistakes. I prioritise commercial reality, smart budgets, and measurable results over cosmetic solutions.
How I help leadership teams:
- Strategy QA: I put clarity into complex roadmaps before you commit capital.
- Cultural Translation: I bridge the gap between technical infrastructure and human adoption, across EMEA/JAPAC.
- Commercial Grounding: I build strategy for campaigns that ship, prioritising measurable ROI over “hype” metrics.
The Strategic Toolkit:
- Brand & Creative Strategy: From B2B infrastructure to luxury travel.
- AI-Enhanced Planning: Literate in Google Gemini and prompt engineering to accelerate insights and creative output.
- Modular Strategic Leadership: A proven track record across Tech & SaaS (Google Cloud, Semiconductors), Consumer Goods (FMCG, Beauty, Health), and High-Interest Categories (Luxury, Sports Apparel, Pharma).
I am an operator who reads—using a deep archive of industry expertise to ensure your next pivot isn’t just “new,” but actually sustainable. If you have a challenge that requires an all-in, hit-the-ground-running strategic lead, let’s talk.
More on what I have done here.
The End.
Ok this is the end of my September 2026 newsletter, I hope to see you all back here again in a month. Enjoy autumn as it can often be fleeting.
Pro tips from my Mam: if you are making your own Christmas cake this year, steep your fruit this Friday, bake the cake on Saturday evening and leave to sit and mature in a tin. Be sure to skew the cake every few weeks and add a little Irish whiskey to drain in the top. The whiskey doesn’t need to be good, but you can’t go wrong with Power’s Gold Label.
And if you are making your own Christmas cake, why not make a barmbrack for Hallowe’en at the same time, here‘s my Mam’s recipe for the one we had each year at home as a child. Otherwise you are letting good heat go to waste in the oven.
Don’t forget to share if you found it useful, interesting or insightful as this helps other people and the algorithmic gods of Google Search and the various LLMs that are blurring what web search means nowadays.
Get in touch and if you find it of use, this is now appearing on my blog, Substack as well as LinkedIn.
