This week’s marketing winners, losers and newsmakers.
Marketing News & Strategy
Marketing winners and losers of the week
Victoria’s Secret revives its Fashion Show and Amazon tries a Gen Z catalog—plus, why it was a bad week for Walgreens and the new BOS Nation FC
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Victoria’s Secret revived its Fashion Show.
Credit:
Victoria's Secret
Winners
Victoria’s Secret: Consumers and analysts were abuzz about the retailer this week following its revived Fashion Show on Tuesday. With a new female leader at the helm—Hillary Super joined Victoria’s Secret as CEO last month from Savage X Fenty—the lingerie purveyor has been working to revitalize and rebrand following recent well-documented struggles. The show in Brooklyn, New York featured Adriana Lima, Gigi Hadid and Kate Moss as well as trans model Alex Consani, with performances by Lisa from K-pop group Blackpink, and Cher.
BMO Capital Markets Analyst Simeon Siegel reacted favorably in a research note, writing, “Recognizing we lack influencer license to opine and will therefore not endeavor to try, our lack-of-formal-training-but-prior-show-experience take was that last night offered a nice blend of nostalgia with tweaks speaking to more modern norms/expectations. As we were informed, the show was more female-driven and did not restrict itself to a single version of ‘beauty.’”
Amazon is out with a Gen Z-focused catalog.
Credit:
Ad Age | Adrianne Pasquarelli
Amazon: After recent success with its kids’ toy catalog, Amazon is now targeting Gen Z shoppers with direct mail. Many Prime members received “Unwrap the Joy,” a holiday catalog promoting goods from Gen Z favorites such as Kendra Scott, Stanley, Ugg and Sol de Janeiro. The book, which is already being offered on eBay for upwards of $12, also features picks from influencer Britney Nnadi, creator Josh Richards and model Emmanuel “Dream” Alejandro Molina.
Chinese automakers: German auto brands have long prioritized China, but Mercedes, Volkswagen and BMW are losing the battle for EVs in the country to Chinese brands such as Nio, BYD and Xpeng, according to Bloomberg. “With the switch to electrics, local brands have shown they can match VW, BMW and Mercedes on quality and beat them on price and technology,” the news service reported.
Losers
Walgreens: The drugstore chain announced plans to close 1,200 stores over the next three years and examine the potential shuttering of an additional 800 as it combats shifts in consumer shopping behavior. Some of the shifts include more customers buying prescriptions online, which has affected Walgreens as well as its drugstore rivals.
The PGA of America: The next Ryder Cup is still 11 months away, but people are already complaining about ticket prices for the U.S. vs. Europe tournament, which will be held Sept. 23-28, 2025 at Bethpage Black Course in Farmingdale, New York. Single-day tickets are priced at just under $750, which CNN notes is a lot more than what it cost to get into the last Ryder Cup, which was held in 2023 near Rome.
BOS Nation FC: The newly named NWSL Boston team received backlash this week. Fans objected to the team name, criticizing it for its dated “girl boss” undertones, and a “Too Many Balls” ad campaign was widely panned as being transphobic, among other issues. The objections resulted in an apology from BOS Nation, which also pulled the campaign.
True Value: It’s bankruptcy for the local hardware store chain. True Value filed for Chapter 11 protection this week. The 76-year-old Chicago-based brand said it is arranging a sale of most of its assets to competitor Do it Best.
Quote of the week
“Brands move based on whoever has the loudest voice—when George Floyd was murdered, it was diverse-owned companies and multicultural populations that were the loudest, and so they moved to those screams. Today, the loudest scream is coming from the right wing attacking DEI. [Brands] are all afraid of being sued, they’re all afraid of backlash … That’s the biggest driver [of waning ad commitments] to me.”—a Black-owned media executive, who spoke with Ad Age on the condition of anonymity, about new challenges faced by diverse-owned media companies.
Social post of the week
Read more: Inside the mac and cheese marketing battle
Number of the week
2.5% to 3.5%: Range that holiday sales are expected to increase this year compared with 2023, according to the recently released annual forecast from the National Retail Federation, which measures sales from Nov. 1 to Dec. 31.
On the move
Domino’s Pizza promoted Kate Trumbull to executive VP and chief marketing officer, effective Nov. 1. She had been senior VP and chief brand officer.
First Citizens Bank named Michelle Draper chief marketing officer. She was most recently chief marketing and sales strategy officer at Silicon Valley Bank, which is a division of First Citizens.
General Idea, an agency that has worked with Savage X Fenty, hired Nathan Jun Poekert as chief marketing officer, a newly created position. He had been working as a CMO advisor; prior to that, he was head of social media, content and digital innovation at American Eagle.
