Monastery Madness ⛪️, Prep is Back 👕 and U.S. Invasion in Silicon Valhalla 🇺🇸. Accidental Insights #15 just arrived.
It's number 15, time for celebrations.
Hi, and welcome to this week’s Accidental Insights.
I’ve been sick almost since I sent the last newsletter. Even though I wanted to follow up on “Bagel Mania” and line up outside Village Bagels (rumour has it that the line was 100 meters long before opening the first day). A non-bagel-loving reader said that it was tasty and well dimensioned, but his wife thought the lox bagel was slightly too fatty. I’ll report back when I’ve managed to get there.
INSIGHT DOWNLOAD
The most interesting things I’ve read, seen, thought about, or debated the last two weeks. High and low.
⛪️ MONASTERY MADNESS. French students go to monasteries in order to study and prepare to get into the country’s elite schools. In the US, young people spend their summers in monasteries in upstate New York, and it has become a viral trend on TikTok, where #MonkMode was also trending earlier this year. If that wasn’t enough of Christianity for you, Clipse recently became the first rap group ever to perform in the Vatican.
Tiktok failed to load.Enable 3rd party cookies or use another browser
✉️ SUBSTACK TAKEOVER. Betches is moving into Substack, and so does i-D magazine. NyMag is entering Substack through writers such as Ochuko Akpovbovbo and a colab between Emilia Petrarca and Secret Strategist, as well as sending their Dinner Party newsletter from Substack. More Perfect is launching the initiative In Pursuit to create a dynamic “catalog of wisdom” for future generations of Americans. Among others, former presidents and first ladies such as Barack and Michelle Obama, George and Laura Bush, and Bill and Hillary Clinton will write on Substack. Kamala Harris just joined Substack as well. Swedish media has been slow to jump on the paywalled newsletter wagon, but it might be changing. Bon was re-released as partly a newsletter this year, and now Hint has been launched by Irena Pozar, Frida Olheden, and Carl Grape. They are aiming for “news-avoiding women between 20-45 years old”.
👕PREP IS BACK. This summer, Dior and Celine showed off preppy-inspired looks during PFW. Ralph Lauren has made an astonishing return and so has J. Crew. GQ claims that “at NYFW, everyone wants to be a preppie”. Jack Carlson of Rowing Blazers fame is now creative director for J. Press, and his inaugural show made a big impact during NYFW including a very talked-about umbrella. Accidental Insights HQ has always been about preppy style, but if you feel you are lagging, this podcast series from a couple of years ago will give you good foundational knowledge.
🇺🇸 US INVADES SILICON VALHALLA. Silicon Valhalla has been buzzing lately, but it might also be a U.S. invasion of Swedish tech startups right now. Klarna chose to conduct its IPO at the NYSE and not in Stockholm. Sana sold their company for ≈$1.1 billion to US company Workday. Stockholm-based founders usually invest their money back into the city’s tech scene and these two are following the tradition. Joel Hellmark tells Breakit that “I will continue to invest in Swedish AI companies. Sweden shall become the best in the world at applied AI” and Sebastian Siemiatkowskiwants, through his company Flat Investment to create a “dynasty comparable to the Wallenbergs”.
🪜 ENTRY LEVEL DEATH IN COMMS. I wrote earlier about “the entry trap” in big consulting firms. The same seems to happen in marketing and comms. According to Adweek entry-level gigs and internships are disappearing. In Sweden, fewer newly graduated students within communications manage to establish themselves on the labour market. The big question for the industry will be to understand how we can ensure that we teach a new generation the skills necessary for doing the job.
🚨 AI OVERLOAD. 23% of all content on Instagram is now AI-generated, and an American company promises to be able to produce an AI-based podcast for $1 an episode. They already have 5000 shows in their network and produce 3000 episodes a week. AI is taking over UK MPs’ speechwriting. “Vibes marketing” is AI slop content taking over beauty brands’ feeds. Sam Altman claims that “AI bots are making social media feel fake”. Workslop is “things like shoddy reports and slides made by gen-AI with minimal effort from the human”. What do people think about receiving it? 53% feel annoyed, 38% feel confused and 22% feel offended. At the same time, companies are hiring engineers to clean up the mess that vibe coders have created. Spotify tries to combat the AI overload with a new AI policy and has removed 75 million spam songs the last year.
🎶 SPOTIFY EXODUS. Andres Lokko wrote this August about a world post Spotify and about artists’ exodus from the streaming service of artists such as Xiu Xiu and Goodspeed You! Black Emperor. A key reason is Daniel Ek’s investments in AI weaponry research. Since then, WU LYF has left Spotify, and the latest news is that Massive Attack is now also leaving.
💈RETHINKING OOH. According to a new report by System1 and JCDecaux OOH advertising is underperforming compared to other media. But it’s not about OOH in itself. There is a measurement problem in terms of MMM (Marketing Mix Modelling) having problems catching OOH effects. But most importantly, most OOHs fail to establish a correct brand attribution and fail to connect emotionally with consumers. Hence, the antidote is to follow the traditional playbook of advertising. Do emotional work that connects to consumers and is well branded.
🤖 AUTONOMOUS AI. Agentic AI is the latest AI hype, and the agents are becoming better. They are now able to make decisions and act alone with minimal human interaction. Google just launched a protocol for AI-driven automated purchases with a traceable paper trail. How does that affect us as marketers? AI Agents will need to make decisions between different services, solutions, and products just like humans. According to a recent “position paper,” this will, of course, change SEO but also brand marketing. Instead of just competing for human eyeballs, advertisers must also compete for AI agents' “context windows”. However, they haven’t figured out exactly how.
🇮🇹 MILAN MOMENT. Earlier this year, FT wrote about Milan’s financial market which is experiencing an expat explosion driven by the real estate market. Cultured asks the question if Milan will save the art world given that they slashed their VAT on art from Europe’s highest to Europe’s lowest. Via Monte Napoleone is now the world’s most expensive shopping street. If you are in that Milan mode, Tjoget is hosting “Milan Nights” tomorrow evening.
✈️ CATCHING FLIGHTS. Nike has launched the new shoe Air Max RK61 in collaboration with French art collective Air Afrique, which has taken name and inspiration from the now-defunct airline Air Afrique. French brand Maison Kitsuné has collaborated on in-flight pyjama sets as well as amenity kits with airline EVA. To activate the collection, they have also turned their Kitsuné Café in Marais into a boarding terminal. Earlier this year, Air France teamed up with Jacquemus to create a pyjama, and Lufthansa did the same with Tekla and Sho Shibuya.
🎛️ PERFORMANCE FALLACY. According to a study by Adobe and Marketing Management Analytics, more than 50% of marketing spend is allocated to performance marketing, but only 20% of companies believe they are performance-led.
💼 NEXT GEN CEOs. Two new Stockholm agency CEO appointments were made last week. Jesper Andersson is heading up BBDO Sweden, and Sara Wikberg is taking the CEO chair at Geelmuyden Kiese. Earlier this year, Axel Tesch became CEO of Save Our Souls. All of them are born in the 90s, and we might be seeing a transition of power into a younger generation of CEOs. Especially since there are also a chunk of indie agencies with founders born in the 90s. Will they have the chops to save Stockholm’s struggling agency scene?
🤫 THE SILENT AI REVOLUTION. It’s easy to be blinded by all the new shiny AI toys. But perhaps the real revolution occurs where you won’t even recognize it. Walmart is changing how they work with everything from physical operations to helping employees prioritize tasks. 911 call centers are so overwhelmed with calls that they are turning to AI to answer faster. AI is also bettering the electricity grid, and General Motors is using AI to mitigate risks in its supply chain. Vanta – an AI startup for compliance and risk management- is now valued at $4.15 billion. This might be the real AI revolution.
INSIGHTS EVOLVED
This section keeps building on already published insights with new observations and micro trends.
Conbini era: [1] Popeye Magazine is publishing an English edition [2] FamilyMart has opened its first clothing store in Tokyo.
Bookflexing: [1] Book culture is having a marketing moment, according to AdAge. [2] Screentime is down and bookreading is up among Swedish 9-12 year olds.
OUTBOUND INSIGHTS
Stuff I read, listen to, and watch. Some ladder up to bigger insights, and some are just great reading in their pure form. I’ll share them here.
📰 The New Yorker about Uniqlo’s quest for global dominance.
📰 Check out the first pictures of Demna for Gucci.
📰 A24 is entering the music industry.
📰 Uber Eats now delivers from Sephora if you live in the U.S. or Canada.
BEYOND INSIGHTS
Stuff that’s relevant for anyone in marketing. Hence, exciting job openings, new third places to freelance work, or random gossip.
💼 Obeya is seeking a Client Director/PR Strategist.
🤝 The Creative Open is a new creative conference on October 26 in Stockholm.
💼 Sana is in need of a Storyteller.
See you in two weeks, and if you liked this newsletter, don’t forget to share it. It means the world to me.