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🪩 Volume 151 | September 9, 2026

 

So the thunderstorms in Florida this summer have been NEXT LEVEL, and the other night one woke me straight out of a dead sleep—a sleep in which I had, naturally, been dreaming about world-ending things. (Because it was majorly thundering outside, so of course that's where my subconscious went).

 

I woke up the next morning like: wow. We're all just sitting here on this big ol' rock that could, at any point, I GUESS, cease to exist? Existential crisis, anyone?

 

So when I sat down to brainstorm Funnel Cake, part of me was like does anything matter? And then, like any absolutely insane marketer would do, I looked at myself in the mirror and said yes, LAUREN, everything matters. We may all be floating on a rock in outer space, but I'll be damned if we don't try and make it a good time.

 

Ya know what's a damn good time? GOOD STORYTELLING.

 

This week is about brands who actually GET their audience, and tell suchhhhhh a good story with it that you feel it in your body before you can explain it. Let's get into it.

 

 

 

Two brands this week:

Both put out visual campaigns recently that stopped ME mid-scroll, and both work for the exact same reason: the positioning was solidified majorly BEFORE the camera turned on.

 

A meme to get you thinking (thanks, Brooskie boo over on LinkedIn!):

 

 

 

Equip is a grass-fed beef protein made from meat AND bones, slow-cooked like broth and then dried—but unlike COLLAGEN or bone broth powders, it's a COMPLETE protein (all nine essential aminos, including the tryptophan and cysteine that "beef protein" knockoffs leave out). It's dairy-free, it's never once wrecked my stomach the way some whey does, and it's freaking delicious. Founder is Dr. Anthony Gustin, a former sports-rehab clinician turned actual farmer. 🧑‍🌾

 

Their 10-year anniversary film is RIPE with visual and verbal storytelling—Gustin on the farm, talking about how loosely regulated the supplement industry actually is. Sayin’ things like "supplements are not supposed to replace real food." And then closing the film with "eat real whole foods. support local farmers and ranchers, and when you need a little bit more, we're here to help."

 

A protein company telling you to eat LESS protein powder!! This is a brand who knows exactly who it’s for. 

 

Their 10-year milestone came with a full packaging refresh; they said out loud that their old packaging felt clinical and generic and didn't represent what they stand for. Y’all they didn't rebrand to look trendier. They rebranded so the outside would finally match the inside. 

 

Then, in the last few weeks, they rolled out Equip Kids with the same visual/verbal DNA: different FAMILIES and their real-life protein needs.

 

A mom with a 3- and 5-year-old in the city.

 

A family on their homestead, outside all day.

 

A family at the beach, snacking. 

 

Nobody's yelling macros at you! They're showing you a life and letting you find yourself in it. (Also: the kids landing page is stupidly cute, and I can personally confirm my kids think they're getting a milkshake. They are thrilled. They are being tricked by whole foods!)

 

For your business: What does your brand actually BELIEVE, and could your customer repeat it back to you? Equip didn't "make content." They put the founder on a farm. Your version of the farm is whatever's already TRUE about you. Go find that before you spend a single dollar on production (or any other “campaign” related initiative, for that matter).

 

 

 

I've been a subscriber to Plant Paper since I first saw the Rumer Willis reel (early 2025 for me—the ad itself first dropped December 2024). And the thing that got me was never the product spec, it was the visual storytelling.

 

PlantPaper sells 100% toxin-free bamboo toilet paper—lab-tested free of PFAS, bleach, and formaldehyde—in a category where the incumbents (Charmin, Cottonelle, Angel Soft) have leaned on cherubs and cartoon bears for decades. PlantPaper's move: put actual humans on actual toilets and say the unsayable. Rumer Willis, breastfeeding her daughter Louetta, reading off "forever chemicals" like a cursed grocery list. Stephen Dorff, deadpan: "I know a thing or two about a—holes." Alicia Silverstone doing the cancer-risk talk in full Clueless-icon mode.

 

Look at that casting as demographics, not celebrity: the crunchy young mom, the dude, the Gen-X woman. Three buyers, three faces, one message. Half the internet calls it empowering, the other half calls it distasteful. (Polarizing IS the strategy. It's also not baseless: PlantPaper pulled a B-plus in the NRDC's 2024 "Issue with Tissue" rankings, so there are receipts under the shock value.)

 

 

Neither of these campaigns would've made a SPLASH without a genuinely deep understanding of the ideal customer underneath it.

 

And I say this because most brands skip it! They chase the pretty: a pile of static ads with no personality that leave the reader heckin' confused—when, especially in CPG and e-comm, the two things that actually move the needle are: a) an understanding of your customer so deep it lets you make visceral, specific, un-copyable content, and b) a website that works flawlessly for the human on the other end.

 

Both Equip and PlantPaper rebranded since I started buying from them.

Not to look prettier—to look more like themselves. Positioning gets discovered, then the campaign gives it a body. (Ballerina Farm pulls this off, too—just grabbed their protein + electrolytes this weekend, so I'll report back, but their marketing expertly nails both a and b.)

 

Specifically, why they’re one of the best places to put money ONCE you feel damn good about your positioning, how easy this gets for B2C brands who’ve done the work, and the other brands we think absolutely nail it. 

 

 

I'm obsessed with packaging innovation right now. Big Blueland girl over here (soap tablets you drop into a dispenser, anything that kills single-use plastic, I'm in). And I just found Fussy, a UK brand doing refillable, plastic-free personal care with a durable reusable vessel you keep and just refill. The concept is so clean! They're not fully in the US yet, so I'm waiting to actually try it—but I'm watching.

 

I almost did a very dumb thing. I caught myself mid-thought going "maybe we should rebuild our site with Claude" and then stopped, because EVERYONE is doing it, yes it looks cool, and everyone is starting to look THE SAME. Then Showit (what our site is built on) served me an ad making the exact same argument: AI builders mostly just stack the same pre-made pieces (same hero, soft gradient, three-column grid) into a very confident sameness. It might LOOK great. It also might not perform, like 9 times out of 10. Saving the full rant for another day.