The rise of luxury wellness comes down to a convergence of different factors that have reshaped both the luxury and wellness industries.
Products ain’t what they used to be
Existing high-end health and luxury wellness
Luxury wellness and consumer behaviours
Wellness has become blended with health, providing opportunities for luxury brands.
GLP-1 changed everything
Products ain’t what they used to be
Before we dive into luxury wellness, it’s helpful to understand where the luxury industry stands at the moment. The strategies that have worked since the early 1980s now seem to have come unstuck. To make sense of this shift, it’s worth reviewing the past and current landscape.
The new luxury
There’s a perception (which I believe is largely false) that the traditional attributes of luxury have fallen by the wayside. Scarcity, quality, craftsmanship, design, and heritage are thought to no longer matter.
A classic example of this viewpoint is Jaguar’s attempt to discard its heritage and reinvent itself as something new. I would argue that while Jaguar may have been prestigious in automotive terms, it was never truly a luxury brand. Jaguars suffered from quality issues that should not have occurred, and they struggled in the premium segment of the market, remaining loss-making for years. Whether or not Jaguar will succeed in transforming into an electric competitor to Rolls-Royce remains to be seen.
Another aspect to consider is how global supply chains can now deliver products of comparable quality to those made by artisans. I have a bit more sympathy for this viewpoint. However, these global supply chains were originally trained to act as subcontractors for luxury brands that pursued massification, cutting quality standards along the way.
Consumers seem to undergo a ‘luxury maturity journey’. This journey is accelerating in certain markets. What Japan experienced over 30 years, China went through in just 10. Countries like Thailand are even moving through this journey faster. Over time, consumers in these markets have begun to move away from obvious logos and status symbols to place greater value on quality and experiences. This shift partly explains why quiet luxury is gained traction around the world.
In countries like China and India, local artisans and ateliers are highly appreciated. This shift means that historic luxury brands are likely to face disruption, just as other sectors have been transformed by Chinese firms. And this is happening at a time when many luxury brands are becoming less ‘luxurious’ by opting for a global mass-market approach.
The pioneer in this approach was fashion designer Pierre Cardin.
Pioneer Pierre Cardin
Luxury went downmarket through licensing, a strategy pioneered by fashion designer Pierre Cardin. In the early 1970s, he saw the potential of licensing, recognising that the demand for goods bearing a fashionable name presented a lucrative opportunity. Cardin’s insight was that luxury goods, in the post-war economic boom, were no longer only for the ultra-wealthy but also for the middle class. His brand signed over 850 agreements in 140+ countries, covering everything from clothing and accessories to furniture, household products, cars, and fragrances.
The ubiquity of Pierre Cardin products diluted scarcity, quality, and blurred the brand story. He later repeated this process with French restaurant Maxim’s, demonstrating that luxury was as much about experience as it was about the product.
When you could buy a Pierre Cardin wallet or suitcase from Argos, what did it say about you? It certainly wasn’t a great status symbol. Other brands, like Ralph Lauren, did a better job of choosing their licensees.
LVMH leads the way
Bernard Arnault supercharged a formula for Louis Vuitton that Henry Racamier had pioneered when he built out an international network of Louis Vuitton-owned boutiques, including Tokyo and Osaka, Japan by 1978.
Racamier’s formula consisted of two parts:
Louis Vuitton sold to the middle class as well as the very wealthy.
Louis Vuitton controlled its products route to market offering control over the experience, premium pricing and perceived aspects of scarcity.
For the next four decades, LVMH went on a remarkable growth trajectory, acquiring luxury and beauty brands, duty-free retail, and even hotels. LVMH rode the rise of Japan, up to the end of the bubble economy, then moved on to Korea, Singapore, and Hong Kong. China’s luxury market skyrocketed when the country joined the WTO, solidifying its place in the global economy.
The United States continued to be a steady consumer of luxury products.
During the 1990s, French retailer Pinault-Printemps-Redoute (PPR), now known as Kering, began replicating LVMH’s success, starting its own luxury conglomerate with the acquisition of Gucci in 1999. Meanwhile, Richemont acquired a number of legacy luxury brands as an adjunct to its predecessor’s tobacco business in the early 1990s and then continued to build.
The internet expanded access to luxury products through multi-brand retailers like Net-A-Porter and Farfetch, driving significant growth. These online retailers competed with top-tier department stores like Bon Marché, Lane Crawford, and Harrods, who slowly built up their e-commerce capabilities.
Eventually, brands embraced direct-to-consumer online stores to complement their global networks of boutiques. This shift is why newer mass-market multi-brand online boutiques have struggled:
Matchesfashion went into administration and took Browns with it.
Farfetch was sold in a firesale to Korean e-tailer Coupang.
YOOX was merged with Net-A-Porter and eventually bought out by MyTheresa from Richemont.
Even luxury brands themselves have encountered a few hurdles along the way:
The end of Japan’s asset bubble in 1992
2008 financial crisis
Xi Jinping’s move towards common prosperity which peaked in campaigns during 2013 & 2021
COVID-19 and post-COVID economy
Luxury sector fallout
By mid-2023, the luxury industry started to show signs of stagnation, with low or no growth. Multi-brand luxury e-commerce sites either went bankrupt or were bought out. A few notable beneficiaries included:
Mytheresa – a German e-tailer that focused on the wealthiest clients in this sector rather than broader middle class appeal.
Hermès – who are focused on the high end of the luxury market.
Brunello Cucinelli – a focused ‘quiet luxury’ brand known for their high-end cashmere garments
The key issue with many luxury brands (Burberry being a prime example) is that they lost the essence of what made them truly luxurious. As they shifted from style to fashion, and from artisan craftsmanship to mass production in China, they lost their uniqueness or incomparability as Jean-Noël Kapferer put it.
While champagne can only come from the region around Reims, most Burberry products are made in China, with only two remaining factories in the UK, including a textile mill.
The key issue with many luxury brands (Burberry being a prime example) is that they lost the essence of what made them truly luxurious. As they moved from style to fashion, and, artisan to Made In China – they lost uniqueness or incomparability as Jean-Noël Kapferer would describe it.
While champagne can only come from the region around the city of Reims, most Burberry products are made in China as well as a couple of remaining factories in the UK – one of which is a textile mill.
A second aspect of the change was blurring the line between streetwear and luxury brands. Luxury looked cheap and streetwear looked exceptionally premium. The nadir was Balenciaga’s collaboration with sports apparel brand Under Armour.
Ways forward
Given that the mass growth of luxury products has hit a ceiling, what options do luxury companies have?
The focus has been a slow pivot to services and experiences. For instance, Panerai has the Panerai Xperience Programme where purchasing a limited edition watch gives you access to unique experiences, such as training with US or Italian special forces operators.
LVMH owns three luxury hotel chains: Cheval Blanc, Bulgari Hotels & Resorts, and Belmond. Dior has spas in Cheval Blanc Paris and other non-LVMH hotels like The Dorchester in London. The increasing focus on wellness makes sense for luxury conglomerates.
Given the challenging circumstances in the luxury sector, Infosys’ outlook for luxury wellness presents a tempting opportunity. The global premium and luxury wellness segments have been performing well. The global market for luxury items was valued at approximately $366.2 billion in 2023 and is projected to expand at a CAGR of 6.8% from 2024. By comparison the Swiss watch industry is projected to grow by less than three percent.
Existing high-end health and luxury wellness
Luxury wellness has already been well established, there high end spas and resorts are in numerous countries, in particular Switzerland and Germany. Some of these are within large hotel groups like Mandarin Oriental.
There is also a range of multi-generation family owned businesses with low-key brands and expertise that would be hard to replicate. Some of these businesses may go back as far as the middle ages. For instance, Grand Resort Bad Ragaz can trace its history as a source of ‘health and vitality’ since 1242.
German doctor Alexander Spengler was responsible for attracting rich medical tourists to Switzerland in 1853, convinced of the benefits of clean mountain air.
Switzerland, in particular, started to benefit from an agglomeration of medical expertise; for instance Davos was known for specialising in pulmonary health with dedicated spas.
Switzerland’s continued lead in private healthcare has had a positive knock-on effect in wellness related products and services. This is particularly apropos given Swiss offerings focusing on longevity.
In marketing terms ‘Swiss formula’ is used to sell St Ive’s beauty products and a range of multi-vitamin products by various brands. St Ives has an American origin, being part of Alberto Culver, which was then bought by Unilever.
While Spengler was enamoured with Switzerland, Germany has a long history of health resorts especially thermal spas. It also has a network of world-leading private medical clinics similar to Switzerland.
German high-end health resort company Lanserhof is a relative newcomer. Over four decades they have progressively built their offering with a strong focus on longevity.
Luxury conglomerates have an opportunity, and are used to accumulating small family brands. But it it is a long term project for them to go into the market place. Blurring the line between its beauty products and wellness is an easier ask, hence, Dior’s spa offering.
Gulf countries are looking to provide services in this area and have made big strides in building capability to attract medical tourism, which is the backbone from which a country brand in luxury wellness can be built.
The current luxury wellness space is diverse fragmented and caters for a wide range of health needs from medical to relaxation.
Luxury wellness and consumer behaviours
More people are prioritising their health, taking a holistic view to wellness encompassing both physical, emotional and mental health, what Statista described as ‘omni-wellness’. They are driving demand for products and experiences that support this lifestyle. This includes everything from exercise, self-care, and sobriety to getting private tests run to double-check, or instead of seeing their doctor.
Coming out of COVID-19, there was an increased consumer focus on a number of different aspects of health and wellness:
Sleep quality
Mental health
‘Immune’ health
This intersects with the luxury market as consumers are willing to invest in premium products and services that enhance their well-being.
On the high-end what does luxury wellness look like?
Personalised wellness experiences. Consumers look for customised solutions based on their individual wants and needs. Technology and data enabled brands like L’Oreal and Unilever to offer individual recommendations and drive consumer engagement. Technology integration has been a key enabler.
Health and beauty interconnection. Consumers spend more in products and experiences that enhance their well-being, these are opportunities for the premium and luxury industries. Consumers see well-being products and experiences as an investment in themselves, with the concepts health and beauty as inseparable in their minds, particularly for younger cohorts.
Scientifically-backed products rather than more ‘new age’ or alternative therapies. Consumers have increased interest in beauty innovations that leverage technology and scientific evidence to address their needs. There is a latent demand for evidence around the world, Mintel cited 85% of Indian consumers agreed that beauty brands should provide more scientific evidence to validate their claims. This is notable given the rise over the past decade of guru Baba Ramdev and his brand Patanjali Ayurved that sells traditional products in the personal care category.
Longevity. Silicon Valley has been obsessed with longevity, the go-to example being Bryan Johnson. Kantar claims that a desire for longevity has moved beyond Silicon Valley. Consumers are prioritising longevity; looking for preventative solutions that support wellness at every life stage. This presents opportunities to offer products and services that for specific age-related concerns.
But medicince itself has thrown up a wildcard for the luxury sector including luxury wellness.
GLP-1 changed everything for luxury
I worked on the global launch of a weight management drug that went on to become used more by the rich and famous than the people it was intended for. If I had one a-ha moment, it occurred during an episode of South Park.
“Rich people get Ozempic, poor people get body positivity”
The rate of growth in these drugs is slowing down but not before GLP-1s had affected consumption habits. Size inclusivity that had been making progress in fashion was thrown into reverse.
There is anecdotal evidence that GLP-1 drugs don’t only change the patient’s relationship with food, but also affects enjoyment in general. This has hit premium alcohol sales and high-end restaurants. The idea of ‘lack of desire’ has implications for the concept of luxury in general.
Every trend has a counter-indicator
Trends are never a clean absolute truth. There is almost a Newtonian push in the opposite direction. Political and socially progressive movements begat a corresponding reactionary movement based around online personalities and political populism.
It would be remiss of me if I only showed you one side of the coin on luxury wellness. Haines McGregor have a perspective that claims that self-care has been replaced by indulgence, which feels at odds with the direction of travel for luxury wellness. Examples of indulgent brands include:
Where to start with multisensory marketing | WARC – 61% of consumers looking for brands that can “ignite intense emotions”. Immersive experiences that are holistic tap into people’s emotions and linger in the memory. It’s also an opportunity for using powerful storytelling to communicate a brand story.
How Ozempic is reshaping the resale market | Vogue Business – Poshmark’s data reveals a significant surge in plus-size women’s apparel listings on the platform over the past two years, including a 103 per cent increase in size 3XL listings, 80 per cent in size 4XL, and a 73 per cent rise in size 5XL. The company also reported a 78 per cent increase in new listings mentioning “weight loss” in the title or description as sellers look to get rid of items that no longer fit.
The consequences of the psychoboom are both logical and contradictory. As the Chinese economy has expanded and citizens have grown wealthier, the demands of everyday life have grown in number and kind, expanding from physiological and safety concerns to a desire for love, esteem, and self-actualization. At the same time, such desires run counter to traditional Chinese values like the age-old concept of Confucian filial piety and the relatively new ideology imposed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), both of which place the well-being of the collective above the happiness of the individual.
Foreign workers in Singapore parlance are people who come from around Southeast Asia and South Asia to do blue collar and pink collar jobs in the city state.
In a number of Asian countries including Hong Kong and Singapore; Filipino and Indonesian workers came to care for old people at home, look after children and conduct household tasks.
This group of foreign workers freed up middle class married women in Singapore and other countries to participate more to their economy, capitalising on their education and ability to earn more in fast-growing economies. They had higher levels of workforce participation than their female counterparts in Japan and South Korea.
The Philippines relies almost five-fold more on remittances for its GDP than similar countries like Indonesia.
What’s less reflected upon is the social upheaval and challenges that these foreign workers face in their new homes. They are in a different culture, away from friends and family as a support network. They have tremendous pressure to remit as much money as possible home.
They only have each other to rely upon. This skate team is just one of the activities that foreign workers do. From informal gatherings with friends to sophisticated beauty pageants, volleyball and basketball leagues. More Singapore related content can be found here.
Beauty
China’s beauty market is a sight for sore eyes | FT – The brand keeps prices of its products, from face powders to creams, closer to those of premium international brands, in line with L’Oréal’s Lancôme and Shiseido’s Nars. The rise of a domestic premium brand points to a significant shift in mainland shoppers’ buying habits as well as highlighting improvements in the quality of domestic products
Y3K: Futuristic fashion trend sweeps China | Jing Daily – Inspired by AI, VR, and the metaverse, and propelled by K-pop idols and Korean brands, Y3K is rapidly gaining popularity among Gen Z. – very William Gibson ‘Burning Chrome’ era
Economics
Diverging demographic destinies: Cars and the middle class | WARC – According to Pew, the American middle class has shrunk significantly in the last few decades. The top 20% of earners now take more than 50% of aggregate income because theirs has grown faster. 88% of Americans have less than $2000 in their checking account and 50% have less than $500 in savings. The average cost of a new car in 1984 was $6000 and the average household income was $27k. Today average household income is $80k [Fed] but averages conceal the widened gap between maxima and minima: the median income per person is around $35k [Census]. The average price of a new car is almost $50k, which is surprising enough that CNN wrote an article about it. They explain that “much of the reason Americans are paying nearly $50k for a car is that automakers decided to go all-in on expensive cars. The more they charge for a car, the more money they make off it.”
Whereas forty years ago an average new car cost about a fifth of an average annual salary, a new car is now prohibitively expensive for most. That’s why Americans have a record $1.6 trillion of outstanding car debt and delinquencies are rising.
Biden’s Move to Block US Steel Deal Is No Way to Treat Japan – Bloomberg – In the executive order preventing the deal on spurious national security grounds, staffers for President Joe Biden appeared to accidentally copy-and-paste the title of a previous presidential order — one ordering a Chinese crypto mining company to vacate property near an Air Force base. The left the Nippon Steel directive entitled: “Regarding the acquisition of certain real property of Cheyenne leads by MineOne Cloud Computing Investment.”
Luxury
Interesting research from two sources that don’t quite square with each other. Walpole’s The State of London Luxury 2024 report came out and painted a rosy picture about the ultra high end aspect of the London property market. Meanwhile over at the FT, Why London’s property market is stagnating points at the same end of the market as being moribund in nature.
This retrospective look at 2024 was inspired by a post from 2023. I reflected on the year’s events, with conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine, and numerous elections worldwide.
Generative AI and cryptocurrency sectors dominated the tech scene. The Farfetch-Coupang deal highlighted the influence of top luxury brands, while Richemont became a speculative takeover target.
L Catterton’s strategy of acquiring undervalued brands continued in 2024.
GLP-1 weight management medications trended in healthcare, with tirzepatide as a focus. Advertising saw a downturn in 2023, but a positive outlook was forecasted for 2024 by the IPA Bellwether report.
January 2024
IP
2024 marked the first iteration of Mickey Mouse, known as Steamboat Willie, entered the public domain. Copyright protection had been extended for 95 years due to political pressure from the media industry. Modern variants of Mickey Mouse remain protected.
Just in time for generative AI to conjure up new variations.
Florida bypassed intellectual property-based pricing by importing prescription drugs from Canada to reduce costs.
Mastermind?
In the trial of British citizen Jimmy Lai in Hong Kong, the prosecution alleged he orchestrated the 2019 protests, overlooking longstanding social issues highlighted by the Beijing liaison office. Lai’s Next Media and Apple Daily, sparked controversy akin to the Daily Star in the UK, but weren’t a counter-revolution.
If Mr Lai is the figurehead of the Hong Kong protests, it implied fragility within the Chinese state. Committing crimes like sedition and colluding with a foreign power doesn’t require being a mastermind.
Data Element – X
China unveils a three-year ‘Data Element – X‘ plan from 2024 to 2026, anticipating a 20% annual growth in data-related sectors—four times the current economic growth rate. Data Element X encompasses various industries and technologies, including machine learning, data processing, big data, databases, data gathering, digital transformation, smart cities, digital twins, cloud computing, and metaverse services. This initiative is poised to gain increasing prominence in international business and policy circles over time.
Luxury inclusiveness
LVMH bolstered its watch division, appointing Frédéric Arnault to oversee Hublot, TAG Heuer, and Zenith. Loewe experienced a surge in momentum, highlighted by a campaign featuring veteran actress Dame Maggie Smith and signed Jamie Dornan as a global ambassador for 2024, likely making it the most inclusive luxury campaign of 2024.
The month began slowly, with many decision-makers out of office until January 15th. Byron Sharp published a paper “The Market-Based Assets Theory of Brand Competition” in the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, challenging classical marketing methodologies of segmentation and targeting. Despite speculation about the demise of CMOs, research suggested it won’t happen yet.
WPP consolidated major PR brands H&K and BCW, leading to significant job consolidation, particularly in finance and HR. The rebranded business Burson signifies a departure from WPP’s usual naming conventions. The restructuring is expected to impact Europe and Asia-Pacific the most. Provoke Media provided insight. (Disclosure: I previously worked with Corey duBrowa at WE; and later at Burson-Marsteller & Colgate’s Red Fuse agency.)
CES 2024 expanded beyond consumer electronics, featuring products targeting enterprises. Notable highlights included logistics robots, vehicle microchips, and device operating systems. L’Oreal’s demonstration of 3D printed lipsticks marked a shift towards disrupting manufacturing, and their keynote marked a historic moment for beauty companies at CES.
Health was a key focus at the 2024 show, but more intriguing developments unfolded at JP Morgan’s Health Care Conference in San Francisco. CES organizers excel in gathering research on consumer electronics and technology, with one slide from their presentation catching my attention this year.
The slide examines US consumer technology spending, specifically focusing on software and services. Entertainment content continues to dominate, reminiscent of the 1970s, while retailers and e-tailers still profit from high-margin extended warranties like AppleCare. In contrast, digital health services barely register on the chart.
AI is as ubiquitous at CES 2024 as MSG on my favourite Japanese instant noodles.
Amazon implemented job cuts, particularly affecting its media divisions such as Prime Video, Twitch, and MGM, amidst industry-wide consolidation efforts. Additionally, Amazon Prime Video introduced an extra fee for ad-free viewing. Technology layoffs continue into 2024, focusing on realignment around AI, impacting companies like Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, and SAP.
According to Davos attendees I know, finance professionals discussed AI-powered trading models, prompting nightmares about Greg Secker becoming Goldman Sachs’ CEO.
AI-based trading models, previously reliant on fractal theory and the assumption of market organicity akin to Gaia theory, have gained traction. The work of one team was celebrated in Thomas A. Bass’ book “The Predictors,” yet risks remain, illustrated by Nassim Taleb’s Black Swan Concept and the Long-Term Capital Management failure.
Japanese novelist Rie Kudan discussed her use of AI in her life and writing.
Stanley’s insulated tumblers gained popularity, with secondary markets like StockX seeing considerable mark-ups. The maximum price paid on StockX was £290.
Despite the Philippines’ healthy economic growth forecast of 6% in 2024, CNN Philippines shut down all channels: broadcast, mobile, and online.
In other news
During the 2024 New Year period, Japan faced a strong earthquake and a two-plane accident. Fortunately, passengers on one plane escaped without serious injury. In 2024, the UK lost veteran DJ Annie Nightingale, aged 83, known for championing new music, particularly various dance music genres stemming from house music, the warehouse scene, and digital production.
The US SEC approves the first cryptocurrency-based ETFs, while Korean Telecom (KT) shut down its NFT platform.
In Taiwan, Lai Ching-te and the DPP win the election but lack a parliamentary majority.
Unusual cold weather in the middle of the month was followed by strong winds, caused a large metal wheeled bin to roll down my road.
In Russia, a law is passed claiming territory previously held by Russia, including Alaska. Meanwhile, the UK considered introducing conscription due to tensions with Russia, but survey respondents express reluctance towards it.
An FT opinion piece discussed how views among young cohorts have diverged between progressive politics and conservatism, with implications for various political and social issues. Rob Henderson called it the ‘gender equality paradox‘ based on findings in academic research in psychology.
February 2024 saw the transition in the lunar calendar from the year of the rabbit to the year of the dragon. Flickr turned 20 years old.
Apple starts taking orders for the VisionPro. The Vision Pro generates lots of reviews. The general consensus was interesting, but not ready for consumer adoption and no one is clear what its ‘killer app’ is. It has this in common with the Mac’s launch some four decades earlier. We forget now that the Mac was seen by IT people as a toy. It didn’t have a ‘use case’ until Adobe and Apple partnered on the LaserWriter PostScript-powered laser printer. This allowed Aldus Software’ PageMaker desktop publishing software to print its designs.
The iPhone had a similar problem when launched, but the second generation had the app eco-system which sold the iPhone.
Apple Newton eMate 300
The first generation Vision Pro may be a future success, or an interesting diversion like the Apple Cube or the eMate. This explains why there was a high initial return rate of Vision Pro headsets.
nVidia’s quarterly result exceeded expectations by a large margin and the share price went up 17% overnight to 35x earnings. It felt like a bubble, here’s what Malcolm Penn of Future Horizons had to say:
nVidia’s right place, right time Perfect Storm. nVIDIA’s meteoric rise over the past year was triggered by OpenAI’s ChatGPT launch on November 30, 2022. Once word got out it was using 10,000 nVIDIA GPUs, the flood gates burst open. In a deluge of hope, hype and hysteria, not seen since the late 1990’s Internet driven Dot-com boom, AI is up front and center of every firm’s ambition with stock market investors swooning at dreams of an AI-overlord future. nVIDIA deserves its place in the sun and the chip industry thrives on legendary moments like these. Leaving aside the hype, AI will eventually make current products better and smarter, and enable new products to be build that were previously impossible, it’s what the chip industry does best, but no chip market has ever taken off based on a US$40,000 IC!
Chinese government contractor I-S00N was hacked and a trawl of data dumped on Github like Mosseck Fonseca. It showed the asymmetry of costs between hacking and being hacked.
A US Senate hearing spotlights online platforms’ harm to children felt different. Social media platforms faced severe criticism, with Mark Zuckerberg offering apologies. TikTok’s responses sparked debate on the hearings’ undertones, contrasting with Meta’s approach.
Good news for the Hong Kong economy ahead of lunar new year, with a 7.8% year-on-year increase in December. However, the rise masked challenges, including the popularity of warehouse shopping in Shenzhen, leading to less spent in Hong Kong. Retailers are grappling with the recent growth of Hong Kong’s e-commerce sector. Despite this, excitement was dampened by a failed attempt at ‘tentpole events,’ as an exhibition soccer match with Inter Miami saw the team’s stars benched. The match, organised by Tatler Asia, raises more questions than answers.
Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee likely had a better time than Labour Party politician David Lammy, who faced criticism from Indian business elites during a business trip to India over London’s violent Rolex robberies.
Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman brought his deflating rubber ducks art installation to Kaohsiung port in Taiwan this month.
Starbucks partnered with Gopuff for late-night coffee deliveries, challenging competitors like Shell filling stations and McDonald’s McCafe.
Novo Nordisk acquired another pharmaceutical company to grow Wegovy production, potentially affecting future price reductions.
Tod’s planned to go private in a deal with L Catterton, maintaining majority ownership with the Della Valle family and minority stakes for LVMH. This followed on from the L Catterton deal to take Birkenstock private and then relist at a much higher valuation.
Adidas and Nike shift away from scarcity models for sneakers, signalling a peak in the secondary market.
China aimed to revive its housing sector and economy with a cut in home borrowing rates over five years.
Marketing and adjacent areas
The Guardian used ‘dadcast’ to describe a podcast perceived as privileged and exhibiting toxic masculinity. There’s speculation about jealousy towards profitable podcasts catering to middle-aged men’s interests. Some noted on LinkedIn that ‘Dad’ is increasingly used in mainstream media as a disparaging term.
Vice Media undergoes significant layoffs, prompting reflections from the CYBER podcast team on the company’s decline. Amazon reports advertising revenue exceeding 8 percent in Q4 2023, largely at Google’s expense.
Amazon’s success is attributed to AWS facilitating data collaboration for media buys and Prime Video’s brand-building content. However, a study from Australia finds that brands shifting from linear TV to video on demand lose market share due to ineffective media planning.
The “bad neighborhood” effect may contribute to poor YouTube performance, with many ads promoting low-quality products.
Metalheadz celebrates its 30th anniversary with a collaboration with Stüssy. Burberry’s Harrods takeover got attention for dressing the doormen in ‘knight blue’ check.
i-D magazine shifted direction, suspending print and online publication but continuing daily updates on social media as part of a new business model and editorial leadership. This move reflected an evolving landscape of fashion publishing.
Condé Nast parted ways with Vogue China editor Margaret Zhang. Zhang’s background in translating Chinese youth culture for Western audiences in corporate settings may not have prepared her for leading a large editorial team profitably, especially in the digital age. Her lack of immersion in Chinese culture and experiences of online harassment didn’t help.
Despite challenges, Zhang initiated notable projects such as a mentoring scheme for Chinese designers. Luxury brands like LVMH explored product placement and financing Hollywood projects, tapping into the growing demand for high-end wardrobe in popular shows.
Taylor Swift’s impact on the Super Bowl contrasted with lacklustre advertisements during the event, while Lunar New Year ads felt safer than usual. Jollibee, a Filipino fast-food chain, succeeded on Valentine’s Day with its film “My Kwentong Valentine’s Day: 30 Dates,” showcasing its connection with customers through relatable storytelling.
Ring surprised customers with a 43% increase in subscription fees, from £34.99 to £49.99 per device per year for basic plan users, effective March 2024. The price hike sparked outrage among customers, leading to cancellations and tips on locking-in better deals for longer.
Rabbit AI, touted as the standout product of CES 2024, resorted to static ads on YouTube to boost pre-orders. This approach raised doubts about whether extensive global media coverage and event hype resulted in a substantial waiting list.
Humane AI, which launched in 2023, announced a delay in shipping their AI personal assistant. Meanwhile, the BBC updates its approach to using generative AI responsibly, a process evolving since October last year when initial principles were established. Kara Swisher published Burn Book; her memoir as a tech journalist, which is part-therapy, part dot-com boom to late state capitalism evolution of Silicon Valley. More in my review here.
Unbeknownst to many, the BBC has a history of innovation, evidenced by creations like the LS3/5A loudspeaker design originating from a 1972 BBC research paper. Over the years, the BBC has adopted a ‘co-pilot’ approach to language translation for its World Service, utilizing a service called Frank, initially funded under the EU GoURMET programme.
The recent BBC update focused on enhancing content propagation through different formats and more personalized marketing, raising concerns about reducing a common truth across diverse audiences and potentially exacerbating societal polarization.
In other news, The Body Shop appointed administrators, drawing attention to its challenges since its acquisition by L’Oreal.
The power of design
Europe doesn’t get to enjoy the bold design of the 2024 Lexus GX, which combines luxury with a rugged Tonka toy aesthetic, surpassing even Mercedes’ G-Wagen.
YouTube’s top car reviewer, Doug DeMuro, likened the GX’s impact to that of a Lamborghini Countach.
London Fashion Week was either hybrid or reminiscent of past eras, lasting just four days. Highsnobiety hosted events under the ‘Not in London‘ banner. London Fashion Week was 40 this year, as was UK magazine Gay Times, which underwent a process of reinvention as it slips into middle age.
Tate & Lyle updated designs for its Golden Syrup on plastic packaging and extensions, but not on its traditional tin.
How February 2024 memed?
Let’s steer clear of the conspiracy theories about Taylor Swift. Instead, consider the “AI-two step,” a term I got via Antony Mayfield. It describes the process of job destruction in knowledge worker sectors through the implementation of AI-enabled software: step one involves introducing these processes, followed by step two: gradual layoffs to avoid media attention. This phenomenon parallels last year’s “Patagonia vest recession.”
March 2024
March began with cold, rainy weather as I freelanced at PRECISIONeffect. In Rochdale, a veteran politician won the election, known for anti-Israel and pro-Russia views. The Washington Post obtained documents revealing Russian misinformation campaigns. The United States and the Jordanian air force airdropped food aid along the Gaza Strip coast after land delivery resulted in 100 deaths. Train fares increased, causing frustration with Avanti West Coast cancellations. Taylor Swift concerts were discussed for their geopolitical impact. President Biden addressed gender inequality in medical research, and Chalmers University in Sweden unveiled a computer model predicting 90% of lymphatic cancer cases.
Luxury
Omega ran a teaser campaign that harks back to its long association with the NASA Silver Snoopy award and the Speedmaster range of chronograph watches. The timing of this release was about getting ahead of the bevy of new products launched at Watches & Wonders trade show. It was yet another Swatch homage to the Omega Speedmaster, in white plastic and an animated Snoopy, which is like Gordon Ramsay shilling for Pepperami.
Omega
Bangkok, Thailand, now a hub of Asian pop culture, boasts local artists rivalling former Cantopop and K-pop stars in Southeast Asia. Louis Vuitton’s The Place in Bangkok offers a unique retail experience combining exhibition, immersive experience, restaurant, and luxury store.
Trade magazine Business of Fashion and Bloomberg called out LVMH quiet luxury brand Loro Piana over exploitation of indigenous people in Peru.
“In New York, Milan or London, the fashion house Loro Piana sells a vicuña sweater for about $9,000. Barrientos’ Indigenous community of Lucanas, whose only customer is Loro Piana, receives about $280 for an equivalent amount of fiber. That doesn’t leave enough to pay Barrientos, whose village expects her to work as a volunteer.”
Matchesfashion.com went into administration, three months it was bought as a turnaround target. This is the latest in a number of distressed multi-label boutiques. Farfetch was sold out Coupang at the end of 2023.
Marketing and related areas
My blog renaissance chambara turned 20 years old on March 13, 2024, and the stone tablets of advertising planning were made 50 years ago. BBH did a nice essay on the original JWT London planning guide here. It was 35 years since De La Soul released their iconic first album 3 Foot High and Rising – now remastered with bonus unreleased tracks.
De La Soul by DeShawn Craddock
Remember when Adidas parted ways with Kanye West (back in 2022)? Well, Adidas waited until March to sell the last tranche of shoes from the Yeezy range. Later on, they announced their first net loss since 1992. The resurgence of interest in the Gazelle and Samba shoes through spring and summer last year were not enough to plug the gap. Adidas hopes that China will drive double digit growth, though the Chinese market can be volatile and there are more homegrown and foreign brands to compete with. In the meantime, pain was piled on pain, with the German football association opting to go with Nike rather than Adidas from 2027.
The US Congress passed a law to force Bytedance to sell TikTok, or, face a ban from US app stores within six months. ‘The TikTok Ban‘ – so TikTok had user deluge politicians with calls. The advertising world went into a tizzy about THE TIKTOK BAN.
Less commented on was LinkedIn’s ability to embed video in posts like this, or create hyperlinks within articles using its editing functions became broken. Hence the move to images and writing this offline and cut-and-pasting back in which at least kept hyperlinks.
What was almost as important, but got a lot less coverage was the news that Meta was finally going to zuck CrowdTangle with a shutdown due in August this year. NewsWhip tried to step into the breach left by the demise of Crowdtangle.
The continued inflation pressuring low income households was good news for instant noodles. According to the FT, their long shelf life made them a hedge against inflation. Lower income customers bought instant noodles to make ends meet, Nestlé was pressured by ESG investors to pivot towards healthier foods.
Nestlé
Nestlé brand Maggi – is one of Asia’s most popular instant noodle, soups and seasonings, which is likely to fall foul of the ESG push.
CNN estimated that the Bud Light influencer marketing campaign with Dylan Mulvaney cost $1.38 billion in revenue terms through 2023. In the aftermath of the Bud Light backlash, AB InBev’s share of the US beer market declined by 5.2 percentage points in the second quarter, dropping to 36.9%. By February, the company had closed the deficit from its May peak by 1.2 percentage points, with a steady rate of ground gained every three or four weeks. However, the expenditure required to close this gap remains undisclosed.
Unilever announced the spin-off of its ice cream brands, framing it as a shift towards higher-performing brands. It’s surprising that Magnum and Ben & Jerry’s weren’t considered high-performing, suggesting a macro view on categories. Combining them with the Heart brands’ ice creams made sense from a supply chain and distribution perspective, possibly driving the decision.
Other news
Iris Apfel, known in fashion and textiles for decades, passed away at the age of 102. She began her career writing for WWD (Women’s Wear Daily) before founding Old World Weavers Inc., which reproduced textiles from the past for restoration projects. Apfel managed the business for nearly five decades before retiring in 1992. Her fame as a socialite grew from her client base, and soared after her retirement. Her unique style, influenced by five decades of travel, garnered attention, leading to the publication of her autobiography and representation by IMG.
We also lost science fiction writer Vernor Vinge, author of True Names – a predictor of the modern internet. David Brin wrote a poignant tribute to Vinge. Psychologist Daniel Kahneman died aged 90.
Joseph E. Chandler by Kerri Chandler
The term “house music legend” has been used casually, but it aptly describes veteran New York DJ/producer Kerri Chandler. In honour of his father Joseph E. Chandler, a disco-era DJ who influenced him, Chandler released 73 tracks for free download. His father would have turned 73 had he lived.
Karl Wallinger, frontman of World Party, has passed away. He is best known for his song “She’s The One,” famously covered by Robbie Williams.
How March 2024 memed?
The meme likely to define the year, akin to last year’sPatagonia vest recession, was coined by Scott Galloway: Corporate Ozemic. It encapsulates businesses’ adoption of LLM-based services to automate workflows and reduce staff. Klarna, a pay-later business, served as a poster child, admitting to displacing 700 former employees.
At SXSW, there was audience pushback against ‘AI’, a phenomenon not seen during the dot com boom. Big tech needed to invest heavily in political campaigns, lobbyists, PR firms, and lawyers.
The first photo of Princess Kate since her surgery was withdrawn by Associated Press for manipulation that didn’t meet their standards. Speculation ensued, leading to a popular meme identified by StickyBeak. Later a BBC video disclosed her cancer treatment.
April 2024
April started as a bank holiday in the UK and Europe. The global economy has very mixed data. In the UK, the NHS looked to roll out insulin pumps to a lot of people with type 1 diabetes. Google introduced its medicine-specific large language models. Health technology business ZOE lays off a number of staff.
Luxury
Industry exhibition Watches and Wonders 2024 saw new timepieces from fashion brands like Chanel and Hermés alongside watch-makers like IWC and Rolex. Rolex’ gold Deepsea is the most conspicuous luxury item that I have seen to date. It’s a sold wedge of gold, ceramic and titanium.
As a tool watch, the Deepsea is a ridiculously large slab of stainless steel. In gold it became surreal and garish due to its scale. Gold has very different physical properties to stainless steel, which is why key structural parts are having to be made from titanium and ceramics. It weighed in at 397 grams, or the equivalent of wearing two large iPhone 15 Pro Max’ on your wrist.
The Deepsea was the antithesis to the growth in women’s watches at the show like a last stand of toxic masculinity embodied in horology. Meanwhile export earnings by LVMH, were larger than the whole of France’s agricultural sector. Earth Day happens across LinkedIn. The best thing I read was the pointed critique why Vogue Business didn’t cover it.
No brand is doing enough to warrant a celebration of its impact on the planet.
Rachel Cernansky, Vogue Business
Marketing and related areas
JP Morgan announced a new advertising venture utilising Chase customer spending data. It was unclear whether this mirrors the brand partnership agreements like those of Amex, or if it entails a more programmatic approach.
An investigation of Forbes alleged that the publication was selling premium priced online advertising inventory on ‘spammy’ sub-domain for seven years. This raised yet more questions about the wisdom of using online media.
Hootsuite acquired TalkWalker; adding social media listening to its publishing and reporting capabilities. Meta’s Threads announces an intention to provide a Threads API in June and published developer documentation.
Google Podcasts is shutdown, more on the Google product death march here. Google leaked Apple’s plans for RCS support. Apple launched the first major update to VisionOS allowing for shared experiences. It was ideal for education or training scenarios. eBay UK went free-to-sell for individual sales of pre-used fashion, taking Depop head-on. News-focused Twitter alternative Post.news announced plans to shut down over the next few weeks. Humane AI’s pin device not well received by reviewers despite impressive engineering.
Other news
Pharrell Williams launched a new album called Black Yacht Rock, while creative director at Louis Vuitton. It was my album of 2024.
https://flic.kr/p/2pJAup9
Hong Kong’s ban on many single-use plastics comes into force, with criticism from retail and hospitality sectors. 1990s skate brand iPath comes back from the dead.
How April 2024 memed?
Probably the biggest story online was how Rishi Sunak wore a box fresh pair of Adidas Samba soccer training shoes to an interview and went viral online. Sunak later apologised for wearing the shoes, but the style damage was considered to be done already for Adidas (at least in the UK).
Rishi Sunak
May 2024
The end of April and beginning of May was uncharacteristically cool and wet. We had an impressively loud thunder storm. Universities in the US and Europe cleared out campuses occupied in protest at the Palestinian cause. This had a ‘Streisand effect’ like impact, internationalising the protests. Novo Nordisk looks for even further uses for semaglutide – looking at alcohol use and liver damage along with a trial currently running looking at potential benefits with regards Alzheimers.
For months previously, the political discourse I heard around me was that we need change. Sunak needs to go. Sunak announced a July 4th election with just six weeks of campaigning and most of the amateur pundits I knew looked as if they had been on the wrong side of a Power Slap championship match.
Premium priced streetwear brand Supreme turns 30, but it’s not all good news as Vogue Business claimed Stüssy’s drops are more popular than those by the younger upstart. Synthetic diamonds had a moment for a while in the US jewellery trade. But now that Danish jewellery brand Pandora has succeeded with synthetic diamonds it feels like global mainstream sales are just around the corner.
TAG Heuer teamed with Kith and brings back the Formula 1 at the 2024 Miami formula one Grand Prix race. It is a watch that sits somewhere between a scuba Swatch and the Luminox dive watch.
Luxury’s involvement in NFTs resulted in Dolce & Gabbana being taken to court over an NFT-related metaverse offering.
Can two turkeys make an eagle? Balenciaga and Under Armour seemed to think so with their collaboration revealed on social media at the end of May.
PDD Holdings, the owners of tat merchant Temu and Chinese e-tailing platform Pinduoduo became worth more than China’s Amazon analogue Alibaba. Tough market conditions for luxury and a decline in the consumer relevance of TMall vs. Pinduoduo may be partly responsible for this.
Marketing, media and advertising news
ZAK published a report on how different cultures are having a global influence. It tells a nice story that conceals a layer of complexity. For instance, Hallyu has been an overnight success, the best part of four decades in the making with the sales of international dramas and films. I do like their model on brand partnerships.
It was lovely to see a project that my former colleague Rohit worked on had won a bronze award at the New York Festivals Health Awards for a film that was made to explain a key concept that differentiated the client’s vaccine.
Marketers and long-time Apple customers complain about Apple’s crush! advertisement. YouTube followed Apple’s lead in censorship in Hong Kong, following a Hong Kong court ruling banning protest anthem ‘Glory to Hong Kong‘ from appearing online. Unlike YouTube, Apple didn’t need a court order to ban HKmap back in 2019 during the citywide protests.
Nestlé launched its Vital Pursuit range in the US. This is a range of high-fibre, high protein foods with calorie-controlled portions aimed at consumers using weight loss medications based on GLP-1. Kao expanded its ambition for ESG, as Unilever went in the opposite direction.
WARC research predicted that Meta advertising will imminently equal or even surpass global linear television. This doesn’t include connected television, or indicate that Meta advertising has comparable brand building effectiveness to linear television. It also doesn’t include the wide variance in customer base. Meta has enjoyed a large amount of growth from China based direct-to-consumer e-tailers and apps like Temu and Shein.
Online media powerhouse LADBible expands its commercial footprint to cover south east Asia and Hong Kong through partner Val Morgan Digital. And the London Evening Standard stops publishing on a daily basis, moving to a weekly format thanks to changes in working amongst Londoners.
Other news
We lost Tony O’Reilly this month. O’Reilly was Richard Branson-like figure in Ireland. He was famous for creating Kerrygold dairy products way back in 1968. He also negotiated a distribution deal for Erin Foods with Heinz and ended up running Heinz up until 2000.
Film executive RogerCorman died. Corman’s impact on Hollywood was pervasive. He wrote, directed and produced cult classic films in his own right. He fostered talent that went on to great things and distributed important foreign films from French new wave directors to Akira Kurosawa.
Technology news
Apple continued to suffer from depressed sales in China and launches new iPad models for the first time in two years. OpenAI totally did not copy Scarlett Johansson’s voice in a creepy homage to the Spike Jonze film Her. As The Atlantic wrote at the time:
The Scarlett Johansson debacle is a microcosm of AI’s raw deal: It’s happening, and you can’t stop it.
This is important not only from a technology point of view, but from the mindset of systemic sociopathy had become pervasive in Silicon Valley. Meanwhile Goldman Sachs thought generative AI will eventually boost GDP and productivity.
Key details about how Google search works was leaked and poured over by search marketers and the media.
Spotify ended support for its Car Thing device and offering refunds to consumers.
How May 2024 memes?
Kendrick Lamar and Drake had a running feud. Lamar made allegations of Drake having a secret child and alleged that Drake slept with minors. A straw poll of people I know, seemed to show that on balance they were team ‘Kenny’.
June 2024
May 2024 ended in a similar manner to the way it had started with blustery showers, though we did get a bit of sunshine in between. I had worked through the end of April and May on a project for GREY / TANK Worldwide. It was a great experience working with GREY team members based in Copenhagen, Port Elizabeth and Mumbai, alongside a TANK team based in London.
We went into June 2024 with a UK general election hanging over us with voting due on July 4, 2024. Labour party candidates only finalised selection on 4 June 2024. IPSOS provided some of the best voter intent data.
It’s hard to communicate how little enthusiasm there was for the general election. The news agenda seldom touched on the election, but was captured by gambling related scandals that embarrassed both the Conservatives and Labour.
ITV hosted one of the worst formatted events I have seen for a television electoral debates.
The 45-second answer format allowed for little more than formulated soundbites rather than a nuanced informed debate. Neither candidate impressed. The 41st edition of British Social Attitudes (BSA) report, published by the National Centre for Social Research revealed a lack of confidence in UK’s system government and its politicians – which meant that all parties had an uphill battle ahead of them.
In Hong Kong, the authorities used Article 23 for the first time to arrest and charge seven people. This seemed to be an action to pre-empt any commemoration of the June 4th protest movement and subsequent Tiananmen crackdown. Among them was barrister Chow Hang-tung, who was already facing a possible 10-year prison sentence under the 2020 National Security law.
Chow faced an additional seven years in prison for inciting “hatred and distrust of the central government, the Hong Kong government and the judiciary” via social media.
All of this added additional complexity for Meta and Google in the territory and was at odds with Hong Kong government efforts to reignite its past status as Asia’s ‘world city’ through tourism and inbound investment. Cathay Pacific was pressured by the government to focus more on Middle East destinations.
Luxury
Karl Lagerfeld prodigy Virginie Viard left Chanel. Chanel had been commercially successful under Viard. Her departure was the final break with the Karl Lagerfeld legacy. Fendi announce their own range of in-house manufactured perfumes, selling for a cool £300 each.
OTB announced it is to sell NFC tagged items that would be verified via Aura blockchain. This will is rolled out in the fall / winter collections of Jil Sander, Maison Margiela and Marni. Expect this to become commonplace as European Union digital passport rules come into force.
LVMH buys L’Épée 1839 – who make decorative clocks and kinetic artworks. L’Épée 1839 is stocked in luxury jewellers like Pagnell and Bucherer. Speculation re-emerged about a LVMH acquisition of Richemont.
Frasers acquired multi-brand online boutique Coggles from THG.
A number of western luxury brands closed their Tmall stores (AMBUSH, NYX Professional Makeup, Mark Jacobs Fragrances). Commentators point out that the cost of running and promoting a store on Tmall had got too expensive.
Balenciaga created a haute couture dress that is designed to unravel after its first wear. It’s an ocean of nylon mesh that sparked concerns about luxury ‘fast fashion’.
Marketing, media and advertising news
Mainland Chinese restaurant and café brands LMM Lemon Tea 柠濛濛, Western Hunan fast-casual chain Luobo Xiangnan 萝卜向南, Takoyaki chain Gulugulu 咕噜丸子屋, and BBQ brand Xita Laotaitai 西塔老太太 shut their Hong Kong stores. An increase in Hong Kongers going to Shenzhen due to the strong US dollar (which the Hong Kong dollar is pegged to vs. the yuan) and a lack of tourists are thought to be partly to blame.
Spotify allegedly used audiobook bundling as a way to reduce payments to publishers and songwriters. ChiefMartec’s 2024 landscape of marketing technology finds that the amount of products has now grown by over a quarter to over 14,100 and claims that there are over 400,000 marketing agencies around the world. All of this is played out as marketing platforms from Amazon, Bytedance, Meta, Microsoft and Alphabet have steadily consolidated greater share of marketing spend.
The long-running discussions between Skydance and National Amusements which held the fate of Paramount Pictures in the balance were stopped. Discussions had been ongoing since the end of 2023.
The UK general election campaign was mischaracterised in the media as ‘the first TikTok election‘. According to GWI, the biggest platforms for political content in the UK were X (21%), YouTube (20%), and Facebook (18%). Labour had outspent the Conservatives on advertising prior to legal restrictions kicking in; but Conservative posts seem to have got the most impressions for their money.
Harley-Davidson took UK retailer Next to court over trademark infringement on clothing design. Vodafone’s The Nation’s Network creative work starts to appear. The insight tried to address the very human truth of wider feelings of disconnection in the general public. However, given that Vodafone had been trying to consolidate its network with Three UK, the tagline seemed disingenuous to some observers. Why would Vodafone need to merge with Three if it was already the nation’s network?
Design newsletter Sidebar retired (at least for a while), 12 years and the cost of running a daily newsletter hitting 90,000 subscribers took its toll. All of which makes Dave Farber’s Interesting People list seem even more remarkable. At the time, Interesting People had been running since May 1993.
WPP’s consolidation of brands continued with Burson .
The New York Times partnered with grocery delivery service Instacart on shoppable recipes. This was not only an opportunity for quality media, but a threat to the likes of Fresh Direct and other DTC meal kit companies.
Defunct radio station brand Atlantic 252 returned to the airwaves over 20 years after going off-line. the media pack claimed a 40+ target audience with whom the brand has some recognition.
Chinese brands were prominent sponsors of the UEFA Euros 2024: Hisense, Ant Group, Vivo, BYD, and AliExpress. Cannes festival of advertising saw a campaign that I was involved with shortlisted. The film was aimed at healthcare professionals in Greece and the Philippines.
2024 Cannes festival of advertising had a focus change towards audience enjoyment, while downplayed the focus on purpose. Ad agencies were reassured by platforms like Tiktok and Meta not wanting to squash them and steal their clients.
It didn’t take long for private equity funded YouTube channels to see an exodus of talent.
Speculation revolved around IPG agencies R/GA and MullenLowe.
Other news
Donald Sutherland, the offbeat tank commander in Kellys Heroes and arch villain in the Mockingbird film series died at 88.
Technology news
Mixed reality business Magic Leap announces a strategic partnership with Google. Magic Leap seemed to be focusing on its optical design, with Google handling software duties. Google got rid of its endless search results page.
Microsoft announced further layoffs limiting mixed reality plans to existing defence and enterprise contracts. There were also lay-offs in cloud services.
Raspberry Pi announced a low-power on-device AI option that could work for uses like facial recognition. This represented an opportunity for hobbyists and product designers. It wasn’t as powerful as Intel’s Lunar Lake or Qualcomm’s SnapDragon powered processors.
Apple WWDC 2024 saw generative AI techniques integrated into the company’s operating systems, applications and software development kits. Apple took steps to do as much work on device as possible and ensure privacy when cloud processing was used. Apple announced that Apple Intelligence related features will not be on EU phones in 2024.
Japan forced Apple, Microsoft and Google to allow third-party app stores. The EU introduced tariffs on Chinese manufactured electric vehicles and took legal action against the Apple app store and Microsoft Teams.
Several retailers and FMCG companies came together to call for the QRcode to replace the barcode on products as part of the GS1 standard. As regulatory standards like the EU’s digital product passport regulations come in, the barcode is no longer fit for purpose. Amazon started to compete directly with Temu and Shein.
Habbo Hotel returned. Illegal movie streaming site Fmovies goes offline. It turned out that the network of sites were run from Vietnam.
Goldman Sachs published a sobering analysis on generative AI from productivity gains to likely return on investment. This became popularised in July amongst investors and business leaders. It is at odds with Mary Meeker’s assessment of generative AI.
How June 2024 memed?
Across both Chinese and western social media, the ‘boyfriend photographer‘ trended. The general consensus was that boyfriends didn’t take the best pictures of their girlfriends for their social media account, at best they were snaps. Girlfriends looking for reciprocal pictures were better photographers.
July 2024
By mid-June it still hadn’t felt like summer had arrived, but silly season had arrived. Surrey police rammed an escaped adolescent cattle. The Conservatives polled as low as 23 percent prior to the general election.
As June rolled into July, the heat arrived and then went. For polling day we had bright sunshine and a pleasant breeze. Before the rain rolled back. We were well into the middle of July before the heat arrived.
Advertising and marketing news
The middle of 2024 saw some high profile interest in M&A activity. Following on from IPG-related news; WPP rebuffed a private equity offer to buy FGS Global. Carlsberg bought Britvic, the UK’s Pepsi bottler and a soft drinks brand in its own right. This will have implications for agencies as Britvic is integrated. Ford brought back the Capri as a mum truck. But the teaser campaign to build hype and ultimately disappoint car enthusiasts was pretty clever. The new 2024 Capri is a badge engineered Volkswagen.
Luxury
Private club memberships hit a slump in Hong Kong. Secondary market prices on memberships trade at a 20% discount. Factors include reduction in corporate memberships, less business being carried out in the city, less expats and less of a nightlife orientation for mainland 1000 talents visa holders from the mainland.
Boreham Motorworks
Ford partnered up with Boreham Motorworks and announces a continuation / restomod of the RS200 and the mark 1 Escort RS2000. Teenage me would have been very excited at this news. 2024 marked the 40th anniversary of the launch of the Ford RS 200.
Burberry decided it needed to become more accessible and replaced its CEO. Sunglasses oligopoly EssilorLuxottica bought Supreme from VF Corporation just as the streetwear brand had entered its wilderness period. Formula 1 dandy Lewis Hamilton became a brand ambassador and guest designer for Dior menswear. LVMH brand TAG Heuer became formula 1’s timing partner from the 2025 season, displacing Rolex.
Giorgio Armani moved out of fashion watches and into the luxury segment with the 11, made by Parmigiani Fleurier. Originally these had been launched as a 200-piece limited edition in 2022, but the advertising seems to indicate an ongoing product now.
Virgin Atlantic announced the cancellation of its last far east route; Shanghai finished at the end of October 2024. L Catterton bought into Bicester Village – a UK based luxury outlet mall.
Media and online
Twitter rejoins GARM as a move towards increased brand safety needed to start getting advertisers back. Social media network Noplace launched. It is designed to appeal to the nostalgia for better online times circa 2008. The Wall Street Journal fired Hong Kong-based journalist Selina Cheng for being elected to the HKJA ( Hong Kong Journalists Association) – a local professional association. The WSJ approach – espoused support for western values and progressive principles BUT not in China or Hong Kong.
Apple did a deal with Taboola for its Apple News service. OpenAI launched SearchGPT and Reddit barred a number of major search engines from crawling its service except Google. Over three years after Google planned ‘depreciating’ third party cookies, it took until July 2024 for the company to backtrack on this plan. Apple launched a web version of Apple Maps.
The IPA Bellwether report indicated continued increase in marketing spending.
Other news
During the US presidential campaign Donald Trump was shot at. President Biden declared that he wasn’t going to run for a second term. Kamala Harris became the candidate to run against Donald Trump and JD Vance. England went through to the final of the Euros. China’s third plenum signalled a continuation of the Xi administration’s economic approach with little change to take account of domestic conditions.
Shannen Doherty and fellow Beverly Hills 90210 star Luke Perry in happier times.
Beverly Hills 90210 was ubiquitous on television in the 1990s and its stars became some of the best known faces. One of the most famous, Shannen Doherty died on July 14th.
We lost Hong Kong film actress Cheng Pei-pei. Cheng was a martial arts star who came up through the Shaw Brothers studio system and made her mark as female protagonist Golden Swallow in Come Drink with Me. Over six decades she appeared in films shot across Asia, America, Australia and Europe. She reached a western audience in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon – reprising the wushu skills she’d used in numerous Shaw Brothers films.
Technology
Samsung launched a ring (Samsung Galaxy Ring) which monitors health-related data and syncs with the company’s smartphones and watches. Sasan Goodarzi at Intuit fires over 1,000 people for ‘poor performance’ as a big bet on automation. Apple mocked for ‘launching‘ a black Apple HomePod under a different name. Crowdstrike struck out countless enterprise Windows PCs through botched update to security software. On the plus side, it happened on a Friday.
I was wilfully ignoring the Olympics in Paris, but the sabotage of the high-speed rail system caught my attention. It reminded me of a 2002 attack on the BT network.
How July 2024 memed?
Change
2024 was a year of elections around the world. July 2024 saw two big elections, the general election in the UK and the French national legislature. The UK general election saw a new labour party government headed by Kier Starmer. This ended a 14-year run of conservative governments. In France, president Macron saw a European parliament election and national legislature election which rejected his leadership. It wasn’t a good time to be an incumbent politician.
August 2024
The end of July brought a heatwave. Early August cooled slightly and we had a bit of rain. The hot weather brought a febrile atmosphere to the UK, which resulted in riots.
The government did a slow drip feed of news about how broken the UK economy is in advance of the autumn budget. The conceit that they didn’t know in advance wore thin according to the Institute of Fiscal Studies.
I did my best to ignore the 2024 Olympics in Paris; but the William Defoe voiced Nike ad broke through. It’s a really nice piece of craft, it divided opinions. I would love to know what communications job was the advert supposed to do? Because only then can we really understand if it was successful or not. Nike would not have been happy with the negative criticism regarding the table tennis bat licking which was seen to be insulting China.
The Nike ad contrasted with the film Adidas did featuring Japanese olympian Nonaka Miho (Japanese names have the family name first).
But Nike was right winning isn’t for everyone; and their financial results were not winning for shareholders who had a lot of complain about through 2023 and 2024. The UK had a similar problem to Nike, not fulfilling its promise; Labour looked under hood and saw that £20 billion of spending plans were unfunded.
Luxury
Chanel launches a smartwatch / earphones combo. Other luxury companies had tried to play in the connected space in the past from an LG / Prada collaboration in the mid to late 2000s to TAG Heuer’s smartphone and smart watch products. Jing Daily, a luxury business publication focused on China finally launched its ‘pro‘ subscription-based tier.
Marketing
No sooner had Kelloggs broken into two companies, than Mars purchased Kellanova – the maker of Pringles and Poptarts. The Mars purchase is a bet against the transformation of grocery sales by GLP-1 weight management treatments. Agency consolidation is an area of obvious efficiency gains. Steve Bartlett, the Social Chain and Flight Group founder, had ads banned for Huel and Zoe.
Generative AI-assisted search engine Perplexity announced plans for advertising before end of 2024.
Online
MySpace turned 21 years old. US authorities win an antitrust case against Google.
France arrested Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov. This broke new ground in an attempt to regulate platforms. Twitter got banned in Brazil. BlueSky added support for video and features to limit dogpiling and hostile quote posts.
Middle class families in the UK and Ireland disappointed as demand and ticket touts outstripped supply of Oasis reunion tour tickets. I found Creamfields underwhelming.
Retail legend Myron E. Ullman III died. Ullman started at IBM, but then built a career driving successful retail operations at Macy’s, DFS (Duty-Free Shopping) now part of LVMH, Starbucks and JC Penney.
Technology
Google gets rid of the Chromecast, replacing it with a set-top box. Nvidia announced it was using an LLM machine learning model to aid in design of its graphics processing unit (GPU), central processing unit (CPU) and networking chips. Their intent was to speed up design process and increase the pace of chip development.
IBM shuttered its R&D facility in China. Technology website Anandtech, most famous for its deep thorough reviews of of significant products closed down. Online ad business The Trading Desk was rumoured to be developing a smart TV operating system in order get more advertising revenue and share some of it with TV set brands.
How August 2024 memed?
Misinformation
Cardiff-born Axel Rudakubana attacked a Taylor Swift-themed children’s party in Southport. He was charged with three murders and ten counts of attempted murder. False information on Rudakubana’s background, religion and immigration status spread across social media.
This sparked riots in Southport, Rotherham, Hartlepool and Sunderland. A mosque was attacked and at least some of the violence was put down to far right activists. The far right were involved in much of the online discussion of false information. Twitter received much of the blame for being a conduit of the misinformation. The UK government warned social media platforms of their obligations under UK law. The misinformation was repeated in WhatsApp messaging groups, causing one county councillor in Wales to resign his position after spreading false information. The evidence of Russian involvement in the misinformation activity is scant at best. Kier Starmer’s comment about ‘rot deep in the heart‘ of British institutions and politics could equally well be extended to British society.
A similar attack claimed by the Islamic State that happened in Solingen, Germany didn’t result in Southport-style rioting.
September 2024
I spent August in the north and much of the weather I experienced felt more like spring or autumn than summer. This wasn’t just summer showers, but the storm force winds that came with it. The weather seemed appropriate for the tempestuous feel of the United Kingdom at that moment.
September 1st, the temperature went back up to 27 celsius, with showers and thunderstorms, the torrential rain continued through the week.
Party conference was somewhat overshadowed by a drip-feed of low-level revelations of donor gifts.
Business news
2024 turned out to be an annus horribilis for large German industrial companies. Volkswagen announced a plan to shutter one or more German car plants. The company failed to recognise its sales problems stemmed from multiple issues including vehicle quality, a failure to build hybrid vehicles and poor pricing strategy for purchase vs. leasing. Ex-Bain Consulting executive John Donahueshown the door at Nike – after failure to recover from strategic and tactical decisions were dumpster fires at a time of increased competition from the likes of On Running and Hoka. Donahue’s actions cratered the Nike share price, it rose 10 percent on news of his departure.
Luxury news
Queen Elizabeth passed away two years ago This meant royal warrants, that are perceived as a mark of quality were changed to reflect the King’s views and tastes. Brands where royal warrants were lost, worried about brand impact. Brands that gained a royal warrant, gained some perceived value – but probably won’t have the impact it did when Elizabeth came to the throne.
Loro Piana and New Balance launched a co-branded version of the 990 v6 shoe. You paid $1,500 for the cobranded shoe, rather than $240 usually charged. The two-speed luxury sector continues into September 2024, with Burberry removed from the FTSE 100.
Gucci
Gucci got in on the act of having an older muse a la Loewe and with a campaign featuring Debbie Harry. Talking of an older muse, Donald Trump launched a $100,000 gold watch with a Trump branded dial. LVMH sold Off-White, the streetwear brand founded by the late Virgil Abloh.
Marketing
UK retailer John Lewis brings back ‘never knowingly undersold’ price promise. ASOS sold Topshop and Topman. Sony announces a free version of Grand Turismo 7 to celebrate 30 years of the PlayStation to be launched at the end of the year. China sees a 50 percent drop in mooncakes sold and threatened to blacklist western brands not using Xinjiang cotton, starting with Calvin Klein. The reasons are partly economic and partly health consumer attitude related as mooncakes are very calorie rich.
Nike
As Nike lost its CEO, the settlement of a lawsuit between Nike and A Bathing Ape allowed the sports apparel brand to collaborate with BAPE founder and current Kenzo artistic director Nigo.
Nike
Quote of the month
The biggest fallacy in marketing is that consumers want more choice, they don’t, they want more confidence in the choice that they make – Professor Scott Galloway on his podcast The Prof G Pod (September 18, 2024).
Media
Authorities in the US issued an indictment against Tenet Media for work carried out for state media company Russia Today. US government goes to court with regards Google’s ad tech business.
Meanwhile GBNews owner Paul Marshall bought The Spectator for a reputed £100 million. The Observer was put up for sale.
Gracenote’s provided ‘pop-up video’ type trivia for large video platforms. These kind of pop-up facts and reactions are more commonly used on Asian TV programmes in the likes of Japan and South Korea. Hoonigan, the automotive parts, lifestyle and media brand founded by Ken Block filed for bankruptcy with over $1.2 billion in debt due to over-expansion.
Online
Twitter still banned in Brazil, fined $900,000 per day by Brazilian courts. TikTok went to court to try and prevent a ban of the platform in the US.
Other news
Loewe muse and star of stage and screen Maggie Smith died at the age of 89.
Technology
Generative AI company Anthropic launched Claude for Enterprise; which supports enterprise features like SSO (user single sign-on). In what was believed to be a supply chain attack, thousands of pagers and walkie-talkie handsets used across Lebanon and Syria detonated at the same time. Israel was considered the likely culprit.
Maja Pawinska Sims wrote for Provoke Media about how the US presidential race, to Charli XCX and Taylor Swift had been using the power of joy strategically in terms of their influence campaigns. I recommend going to the article and giving it a read.
Storm Ashley battered the Atlantic coastline of Europe, reaching the west of Ireland first. It trended as a hashtag trended across social media platforms.
Luxury
Rolex opens first wholly-owned store in China. This follows a year on from the Bucherer acquisition. Watches of Switzerland purchased Hodinkee, which explained why the watch publisher withdrew its retail offering. On Running launches collection with Loewe – the Cloudtilt collection.
LVMH announced poor financial results and uncertain outlook. This was for a few reasons: China’s economic outlook, the strength of the Japanese yen vs. the Chinese yuan. Middle class financial health had declined from 2020 highs.
2024 marked a 12% drop in sales for the Swiss watch industry. Into this change, Patek Philippe launched their first new range of watches in 25 years. The Cubitus was designed to reach a new generation of watch wearers. It’s a divisive design, GQ collected the positive takes, others like pre-owned watch dealer BQ Watches were less enthusiastic.
Godfather of streetwear Shawn Stüssy dropped his first collection under his S/Double moniker in a decade. Stüssy had announced his return in July. This first collection was Australia and New Zealand only, done in association with the Hill Brothers who are behind Globe.
Media
Meta allows brands to shut down comments on ads. Reuters introduced paid online consumer subscription. WPP warned markets over economic uncertainty going forwards.
Online
Twitter allowed in Brazil again, after it paid its fines and blocked banned accounts; Elon Musk also had spent time cosying up to the Russian government. Dutch police arrest people behind Bohemia and Cannabia dark web marketplaces. Roblox alleged to have inflated metrics and become a ‘pedophile hellscape‘ for children. Meanwhile, the UK prosecuted its first person for using generative AI to create child pornography.
The Internet Archive’s ‘Wayback Machine’ was hacked, responsibility claimed by pro-Palestinian hacktivist group. Content delivery network Cloudflare breaks RSS for many sites across the web. London online car service Addison Lee gets bought and plans to expand to other cities including Liverpool. YouTube rolled out a controllable playback speed across videos. Rather than picking from a number of predefined speeds you now can speed up or slow down using a slider.
Technology
Apple made a ‘subtle‘ change to the iPhone’s contact-sharing permissions that make it hard for address book based growth hacking of apps – while still facilitating usage, but at a slower pace. IronNet which was founded by Pentagon veterans as an enterprise security firm filed for bankruptcy. Chinese scientists reportedly used a D-Wave quantum computer to crack AES and RSA and published a paper on it. Amazon refreshed its Kindle range. Apple Intelligence launched but failed to impress partly due to a more intentional, integrated approach and general bugginess.
How did October 2024 meme?
Anxiety and glee respectively greeted razor fine margins between both Republican and Democrat presidential candidates in the final weeks before the election. There was the bizarro headlines to contend with as well. It all made grimly compelling watching, rather like the Dickie Davis-narrated Mega Crash series of motor racing accidents compilation VHS tapes.
November 2024
October ended with an uncharacteristically late storm (Super Typhoon Kong-rey) hit Taiwan causing hundreds of injuries. November started cool and dry, though you could cut the air like butter with the tension surrounding the US election and Rachel Reeves’ first budget. Collin’s Dictionary made ‘brat‘ one of its words of the year killing off the summertime meme. Donald Trump had a decisive win in the US presidential election. Speculation started on what a Trump president would mean across all policy, economic and social areas.
Luxury
Loro Piana took over Harrods windows for the Christmas shopping season with its workshop of wonders.
The Vatican launches its manga style mascot, designed on their behalf by Tokidoki. Hello Kitty turned 50. Christmas advertising spend rose 7.8% from 2023. The Onion bought InfoWars – the media outlet of Alex Jones. BlueSky saw a boost as Twitter faced an exodus of high profile users. Sony made a bid for Kadokawa Corporation. Kadokawa publishes manga including the Gundam series, owns the BookWalker platform – a kind of Kindle store for manga, computer and gaming magazines, anime films and TV series, record label, role-playing table top games and computer games including Elden Ring.
At the end of the month, two things showed a difficult future for the UK media industry. A UK parliament report reflected on both local and national news media futures. UK TV programme exports dropped slightly in 2024 by 2%.
Online
Amazon launched a sub-$20 offering called Amazon Haul to compete with Temu and Shein, in plenty of time for Black Friday and Cyber Monday. It allowed free product returns. Ted Baker returns as an online store. Which? launches a class action suit against Apple with regards to iCloud storage options.
In a sign of a weak economy, John Lewis partnered with Klarna.
Other news
Record producer Quincy Jones died. Typhoon Toraji prompted a T8 warning (gale force winds and very heavy rain) in Hong Kong, later lowered to T3 (equivalent to a UK amber weather warning for rain). It historically has been unheard of to see a typhoon this late in the year, typhoon season is typically in July, August and September. In the UK, storm Bert lashed the country with uncharacteristically warm weather, high winds and torrential rain.
A Hong Kong court sentenced 45 former opposition politicians to up to ten years in prison. The heaviest sentence was given to Benny Tai. Tai is a former associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong and the most prominent thinker. Tai used his expertise in constitutional law to help the Occupy Central sit-in, 2016 Legislative election and the 2019 district council election upsets.
Ireland goes to the polls, given its proportional representation system, the vote counting (and recounting) took a while.
Technology
Amazon’s assistant Alexa turned 10 years old. Long time technology journalist Om Malik wrote about the decline in rate of growth for the internet. ChatGPT turns two.
December 2024
It was a damp start to December. The Irish general election results were slowly trickling out and thankfully the Irish electorate rejected some of the far right candidates.
Business
Novo Nordisk announced trial results for its latest weight management treatment CagriSema, the share price dropped significantly. To add insult to injury rival Eli Lilly were allowed to use their rival weight management product to treat sleep apnea by US regulators. Unilever abandons its pioneer position in sustainability, mirroring the thinking in Nick Asbury’s The Road to Hell.
The Guardian agrees the sale of its Sunday newspaper The Observer to Tortoise Media. Apple+ TV celebrated its 5th anniversary. Taylor Swift’s Eras tour which had ran through much of 2023 + 2024, finally finished. The 149 shows grossed $2 billion in ticket sales. Group M announced that global media spending for 2024 past $1 trillion – over half of it going to technology platforms.
Marketing
McDonalds brought back its McRib burger, complete with a Christmas themed advertisement and jingle. For the UK’s main Christmas ads, I put them all together here. IPG acquired by Omnicom in deal announced. Expected to go through in the second half of 2025.
Online
Foursquare shut down its City Guide app, it looked like they will be merging some of its features into their Swarm app instead of you having to use two apps. The revised Swarm app is due to appear sometime in 2025.
Chinese social network RenRen went offline. A notice on their site dated December 2, 2024 talked about a fundamental upgrade, comparing the existing service to a petrol car and the forthcoming new service to an electric vehicle (literally translated new energy vehicle – which covers electric vehicles, plug-in hybrids etc).
Data showed Amazon had biggest Black Friday takings ever. Krispy Kreme got their online ordering system hacked. The hack had a material effect on Krispy Kreme’s financial results.
Pre-owned online retailer musicMagpie was acquired by the AO Group.
Other news
I got to see Front 242 perform their last show in the UK at the Electric Ballroom in Camden. The Black Out Tour was their last tour. After this tour, they retired. South Korean president Yoon declares martial law and then cancels the declaration of martial law hours later. The Assad regime ruling Syria collapses in the space of a week.
Ozempic face, the thinner but aged look of the wealthy who have managed to lose weight rapidly with the help of semaglutide injections given for aesthetic rather than medical reasons.
To bring you up to speed, The Economist did a really good podcast about this category of drugs.
Given that I worked on Wegovy, the planner in me feels a little disappointed that we didn’t get Wegovy to verb. Ozempic instead stole brand gold mainly down to Novo Nordisk suffering from ‘unprecedented demand’ at US launch until now. At the end of May, semaglutide had its own episode of South Park.
The money quote from Cartman:
“Rich people get Ozempic, poor people get body positivity”
South Park: The End of Obesity
On June 10th, 2024 Novo Nordisk CEO Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen went on Bloomberg Television to explain that they haven’t created, nor are they responsible for the social media hype surrounding semaglutide medications.
Later that month it even appeared on the runway at Berlin fashion week. At least Ozempic face is better than ‘skinny jab‘.
The sales pitch.
I am now taking bookings for strategic engagements from January 2025 onwards; or discussions on permanent roles. Contact me here.
An advertising archive can come in all shapes and sizes from a hobbyist love of a particular brand as advertising archive through to professional resources for academics, marketers and intellectual property lawyers. I am not going into an argument for what is, or is not advertising as I don’t think it would be particularly productive for this post.
Without further ado let’s get into all things advertising archive related.
The list
Absolut Ad
Absolut Ad – a hobbyist website that collects Absolute Vodka ephemera as a one-brand advertising archive.
Adaily
Adaily – Adaily has a ChatGPT-like interface that allows you to interrogate its advertising archive of award-winning campaigns for inspiration. Their database currently only goes back as far as 2018.
Ad Branch
Ad Branch – a blog that hasn’t been posted to since 2013 that presents advertising work from some of the best known American brands.
Ad Forum
Ad Forum – Ad Forum has a wide range of award-winning ad formats from a range of awards including its own PHNX awards – which covered campaigns from around the world.
Adland
Adland Superbowl Commercials – Adland is a great source of US advertising industry news. Their advertising archive of Super Bowl commercials represents some of the best examples of video TV advertising creativity.
AdsMagic
AdsMagic is a YouTube video channel as advertising archive. It hasn’t been updated in four years, BUT, is still full of creative inspiration.
Ads of Brands
Ads of Brands – nice searchable site, lots of yellow if that’s your thing.
Ads of the World
Ads of the World – part of the Clios Network of sites, created around the advertising awards. It has global reach and well respected.
Ads Spot
Ads Spot – subscription based advertising archive with global reach in terms of its content examples. The search function is just ok.
Advert Ge
Advert.Ge – minimalistic design of the advertising archive with global footprint and details on who did the creative. Good for inspiration, but can’t be embedded in a presentation.
Agency Asia
Agency Asia – good for discovery of inspired print and television advertising. The video is embedded from YouTube.
Best Ads on TV
Best Ads on TV – while the website feels as if it was designed in 2003, it surfaces some great inspirational advertising.
Campaigns of the World
Campaigns of the World – is based on user-submitted campaigns, lots of good stuff there, but I wouldn’t be surprised if at least some of it was student projects rather than advertising used ‘in the wild’.
Creative Brief
Creative Brief – a rival to the likes of Contagious in terms of ‘marketing intelligence’. Creative Brief’s content skews progressive and UK market focused. Your mileage may vary.
Creative Criminals
Creative Criminals – a useful site that leans more towards the need of strategists having case studies rather than creative inspiration.
Daily Commercials
Daily Commercials – an advertising archive built by agency submissions with a range of international markets represented in its archive. In terms of completeness, it could challenge some of the sites based on award entries.
Deck of Brilliance
Deck of Brilliance – the advertising archive is grouped into 52 creative provocations using the ads as examples that illustrate the theme rather than a conventional brand / category / country organisation that you might see elsewhere.
Famous Campaigns
Famous Campaigns – a mix of campaigns and activations with a big focus on the UK.
History of Advertising Trust
History of Advertising Trust – supported by some of the UK’s largest brands and agencies. It has over a century of searchable archives.
Internet Archive
Internet Archive – although overlooked the search function of the internet archive is a great place to go for inspiration as you have an advertising archive in different formats for many brands. Its content isn’t indexed that well in the major search engines. An honourable mention to Flickr which always pleases with its serendipity.
Little Black Book Online
LBB (Little Black Book) is a more accessible resource than the likes of Campaign or AdWeek. It has managed to collect some great work together in one site in their Creative Library section. They also build profiles of ad folk based on their Immortals awards programme, here’s mine.
Lürzer’s Archive
Lürzer’s Archive – Lürzer’s Archive is the Wallpaper* or Monocle of the advertising archive world. A strict paywall and a love of print and typographic design with usefully themed books as well as the digital archives. It’s beloved of university students who think that they are creative saviour that the advertising industry needs, client services drones who want visually appealing coffee table decoration and pretentious strategists like your humble writer. Their archive is surprisingly good but focuses on quality rather than being comprehensive in nature.
A mix of email newsletter and online collection. What The Inspiration loses in comprehensiveness as an advertising archive, it gains in not being attached to a pricey subscription.
The One Club related archives
The One Club for Creativity (One Show Awards archive) – an archive of award-winning campaigns for inspiration as advertising archive focused on the healthcare sector. Check out their archive of winning entries for the Young Ones student awards covering a range of consumer-facing brands ONE Screen focuses on advertising film entries here, the ADC award archive only covers the past decade of the awards century plus activity, so while vast in terms of area of brand related design from architecture to typography, it could be so much more.
.Coffee
.Coffee – the great thing about .Coffee as an advertising archive is the grouping of examples around industries like travel, tourism & transport or beauty.
Creative Moment – is a free to access archive of campaigns curated by creatives for creatives. It covers:
Advertising
Broadcast
Experiential
Out of home
Print
Public relations
Social
Video
Packaging of the world
Packaging of the World – Mark Ritson wrote a recent article about the importance of product for marketers. The gist of Ritson’s argument was that product is central to marketing, yet most brand marketers tend to focus on the communications part of the marketing mix. With that in mind, I thought it made sense to share packaging of the world.
Two more things
Portfolios such as mine also act as an advertising archive that you can explore. I have compiled a complete and ongoing list of advertising archive related links in the Pinboard social bookmarking tool. If you haven’t subscribed already, I would strongly recommend it for research and inspiration purposes – once you get used to it it’s life-changing.
The idea for this 2024 Christmas advert collection was two-fold. Collect and reflect on the European ad industries most creative period of work, which tends to happen at this time of the year. In advertising at this time of the year, we’re usually head-down getting things done until the middle of December, so it made sense to pull it all together.
Aldi
Aldi do Christmas adverts right. I don’t mean the the creative is amazing, but they get basics right. It builds on previous campaigns linked by Kevin the Carrot. It has engaging storytelling. It’s the communications strategists Christmas ad rather than the height of creative excellence. Consistency, fluent objects stacking up its brand building power to reinforce memory structures about what Aldi is at Christmas.
Amazon
Amazon’s Midnight Opus was designed to be used in the US as well as Europe so it has more of a ‘holidays’ than Christmas vibe to it. But the emotional storytelling is top-notch.
ASDA
If Aldi is the communications strategist’s Christmas ad, ASDA’s is the copy-based creative’s Christmas ad. It’s based on the kind of wordplay that fuelled the likes of the comparethemarket meerkat.
Barbour
Leaning into Barbour’s favoured status with the rural set in the UK, the Shaun the Sheep collaboration makes perfect sense.
https://youtu.be/8XS_SG76kQ0?si=xzSFyCeIE9aSk4Gw
Boots
Boots 2024 advert was something I had only ever seen in a cut down 15 or 30 second spot centred around ‘slaying’ scene in the advert. In totality it made a lot more sense and was based on some nice insights. The advert implies that Boots is expecting to be the destination for last-minute present shopping – which puts it in an interesting cross-segment competitive space alongside the local off-licence as much as department store beauty counters.
Christian Dior
Christian Dior’s Ball of Dreams is as visually opulent as you’d expect from the luxury brand. Its vibe is very similar to the 2022 Christmas Christian Dior advert The Atelier of Dreams implying a certain amount of campaign consistency. While I won’t swing around on a chandelier I do like Dior’s Eau Sauvage.
Disney
Disney’s 2024 Christmas advert focuses on the brand’s core strength of storytelling. It manages to make the customer the hero, rather than leaning more heavily on its IP library too much.
JD Sports
JD Sports would find it hard to top last years Christmas ad that tapped into something deep in a working class Christmas. This year’s version is more like a fever dream of vignettes, definitely relatable but not the joyful apex of last years effort.
They are tapping into similar ideas about family that Tesco did, but taking it in a very different direction. It also represents a vision of an ‘imperfect’ Christmas, rather than the usual ideal.
John Lewis
John Lewis has high expectations on their adverts. Their 2024 Christmas advert ‘The Gifting Hour’ captures the generosity and self-imposed stress of giving.
Lidl
Lidl’s 2024 Christmas advert A Magical Christmas has a nice twist on the Christmas ad with it leaning into Lid’s Toy Bank to help local communities. It looks like they did a pan-European ad to give it a Christmas card feel.
M&S Christmas Food
M&S keep consistent in their ‘this isn’t just food, it’s M&S Christmas food’ in their voice over harking back to when Nigella Lawson used to do their intros. This is more interesting in production than the vintage food porn M&S historically used.
Morrisons
Morrisons uses oven gloves as fluent objects, but the benefits would only be appreciated if it is repeated as a creative motif in future campaigns a la Aldi’s Kevin the Carrott. As an ad it could have been screened anytime in the past forty years and not stood out, its curiously atemporal in nature.
Sainsburys
Sainsbury’s draws on the intellectual property rights of Roald Dahl’s books with an appearance of The BFG. It’s a big production but could it have worked harder creatively?
Shelter
Homeless charity Shelter moved beyond the usual poverty porn of NGOs in their World of Their Own film and humanises their clients. The creative and storytelling are both on point. If this doesn’t win awards next year; it’s probably only because they didn’t enter.
Tesco
#FeedYourChristmasSpirit is a solid highly emotive Christmas ad. It challenges what many younger British people feel about family such as tightly knit house share friends like the 1990s era show This Life and its American counterpart Friends.
Tesco pulls it back to traditional familial ties and memorable moments that home baking creates.
Vodafone UK
Vodafone makes an interesting play on its heritage to differentiate itself from the likes of Three, EE, and the mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs). From a brand perspective, it’s the last network standing. Creatively, they’ve done a good job of incorporating emotion, which has led to strong performance in System 1 testing.
Interesting that they didn’t have a Roman Kemp-fronted advert, which would have been more consistent with the rest of the creative that they’ve ran this year.
The cynic in me suspects that this ad could also be a way for the marketing team to pre-position themselves ahead of political manoeuvring for roles, should Vodafone UK and Three UK merge. This would likely be a first step in enabling their owners to exit the UK’s low-growth, financially challenging market.
Waitrose
Waitrose put a greater focus on the product with its dramatisation of ‘Sweet Suspicion’ a minor Enid Blyton-esque mystery. Clever, but is it emotionally engaging?
Honourable mentions
Aldi Australia
Aldi Australia offers a very localised perspective of the Christmas experience. Part work-of-art; part comedy.
Deutsche Telekom
Deutche Telekom looks at the higher calling of telecoms rather than the way its knit into our daily lives with its 2024 Christmas advert. The production is beautiful. It’s a direction that Three or Vodafone could have taken given their global footprint, but Deutsche Telekom manage to carry it off.
McDonald’s Philippines
This 2024 Christmas ad for the Filipino part of McDonald’s features the local chairman George Yang and Jose Mari Chan – a well-known singer-songwriter. The tonality and twist in the tale are so well done.
