The Debrief No. 434: MUST READ: Italic’s $100 annual membership and selling luxury goods at cost — The intentionally ugly Gen Z aesthetic.

Tuesday's Big Briefing:

🔥🔥 Must Read: A $100 annual membership model and selling premium luxury goods at cost. Liz Segran takes a look at how Italic is ushering in a new era for the modern DNVB.

Why pay $1,500 for that Celine purse when you can get it for $200? | Fast Company

The Short Shrift.
Reading between the lines: Two of our favorites, Fast Company's Liz Segran and Jeremy Cai of Italic, unite in this one, a great read about Italic's brilliant approach to offering luxury goods at cost. In summary, "Italic sells luxury goods at cost. It’s a radical business model designed to take on the many DTC brands that launched over the last decade with the goal of selling quality luxury goods without the middleman markup. Unlike these other brands, Italic doesn’t make money from the sale of individual products but from its $100 annual membership fee. It’s a tricky business model at a time of intense economic uncertainty, when customers may not be willing to spend money up front to be able to buy goods in the future."
*FYI: Lean Luxe founder Paul Munford is an early Italic investor.

👉Get smarter: Read the report here...

Internal
Lean Luxe: Quarterly Sponsorships
New opportunities for Q3 2020

**Heads up: We're now taking sponsors for Q3 2020 (July - Sept) 🙌🙌
Under our new structure, which started in Q1, sponsorships are now open across two tiers: Gold Tier (9 total placements per quarter) and Silver Tier (6 total placements per quarter). We're limiting this to (4) partners per tier. Potential partners go to: Lean Luxe: Quarterly Partnerships.

Fun fact: The document is also something of a "state of the publication" report––so even if you're not a potential sponsor, you might enjoy the progress report so far. Sponsors are free to get in touch with me directly. –– Paul

–– Email for sponsorship opportunities (please specify your package!)

In Association with: Postscript
A Word from our Sponsor
Q3 | July 2020

Postscript: We’re entering a new era of customer engagement.

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Many thanks to Postscript today. Their support makes Lean Luxe a better product. Learn more at:

Insights Corner
Tuesday: Taking Stock
Lucid observations

Grab Bag: Moonshine connoisseurs.
Explaining the “everything is cake” craze. The latest banger from Quintana Partners. Car designers are really loving the Power Wheels aesthetic. StockX had a great month. Surviving on nothing but Chicken McNuggets. Riding the Trans-Siberian Railway. The Tesla of bikes. Made In’s blue carbon steel roasting pan. Liverpool’s in for Weston McKennie? “My mind is melting in suburbia.” An introduction to Impressionism. The new Substack class. Professors are stressing about going back. Summer in the South. Biden’s thinking beyond social politics. Strife at ESPN. A eulogy for The Outline. What’s lost with the end of office culture. Life in 2022. The LEGO Nintendo Entertainment System. Hood By Air is coming back. The New Yorker profiles Casa Magazines. Emily Schildt's favorite foods. And the moonshine connoisseurs.

The Verticale wants to become the go-to DNVB marketplace.
This is a smart move by The Verticale, reminiscent of Verishop’s initial mission––just executed with far less money and far less hype. The marketplace itself hasn't launched yet; they're currently on a waitlist with plan to launch towards the end of 2020. It should be said, however, that several folks have tried to tackle this problem of DNVB brand discovery over the last two years or so. Suffice it to say, none––if they even managed to launch––have cornered the market there. Even here, it remains to be seen whether The Verticale can get this right, but the thinking is certainly clear: "Currently, there is no single platform that showcases brands with purpose. Because of this, the onus is placed on the consumer to conduct their own research, ultimately, leading to brand fatigue. On top of that, everyday, our social media feeds are inundated with new brands and products, preventing us from purchasing the products we really want." Godspeed.

The intentionally ugly Gen Z aesthetic.
In our current cultural era, old seasoned wisdom takes a backseat to youth, and things that are "new" or "young" are given the microphone just by virtue of them not being old. Which helps to explain the growing fascination, bordering on obsession, of all things Gen Z today. It's a generation that is, for some reason, being looked at as the new cultural weather vane, and you’ll forgive us from thinking God help us if that becomes the case. That said, there’s a new piece tackles that deconstructs what they're calling the “intentionally ugly Gen Z aesthetic”. It's a direct reaction to the “old” Gen Y aesthetic which is basically an orderly minimalist design language draped in pastels. Gen Z, on the other hand, is basically Brutalist in intention, and has a heavy dash of Windows 95 running through it. The dichotomy is certainly interesting even if we're still baffled by the unilateral obsession with what Gen Z is doing today.

Jelly-gate: Sqirl and its moldy jam.
These days, it seems if there’s any news about a HENRY brand or company, then that news is bad news. That remains the case here with 'Jelly-gate' at cool girl LA cafe Sqirl (whose owner, Jessica Koslow, is pictured above). They specialize in making jam, and apparently they’ve been serving mold-laden jam to customers. Which is not good. This saga has gone viral in a certain corner of the internet, and while you can read about the full details in the link there, it’s this portion that about why it’s going viral that made sense to us: "But what makes the story so viral (or spore-ful) is watching a place that has built its brand not just on jam, but on the goodness of 'real' food get taken down for precisely what it supposedly does best. So far, no one has claimed to have gotten sick off Sqirl’s jam, but it’s shocking and disgusting and allows for everyone who never posted an artfully lit photo of the jam toast or the line down the block to feel incredibly smug."

––
👋Paul Munford, CEO / Editor
mpm@leanluxe.com
@leanluxe

The Community
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The Ticker
Fresh, hot links
Lighter fare

On Running drops a new shoe with Federer
And it’s...interesting. The Roger

Hypebeast films and shows?
Could be coming to a screen of yours soon. Hollywood Reporter

The Wing is late on rent
Uh oh. The Real Deal

New Brand: Two Front
A new entry to the dental space with a dash of whimsy. Two Front

Nuggs rebrands as Simulate
Makes sense since they’re expanding beyond nuggets. TechCrunch

Muji USA files for bankruptcy
Say it ain’t so. BoF

** News or tips for The Ticker?
Send tips on news, quotes, coverage, mentions in the media to info@leanluxe.com.

Comments, questions, tips?
Send a letter to the editor –– Paul Munford
mpm@leanluxe.com / @leanluxe

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