Day One FM

Welcome to Tum Town. Long time listeners will know that we often center our distaste for marketing slop and feral commercialism around a few brands, namely Crumbl, Blank Street, and MrBeast. So in our final episode of the year, we decided to actually try the stuff for ourselves and review it live. Stay until the end for a small crumb of analysis on brands trying to “tap into culture.”Here’s what we got: Crumbl (6 pack): The Cookie That Stole Christmas, Chocolate Crumb Cookie ft. OREO®, Holiday Red Velvet Sandwich Cookie, Candy Cane Brownie Cookie, Peanut Butter Cup Cookie ft. REESE'S, Confetti Cake Cookie Blank Street: Iced Strawberry Shortcake Matcha, Iced Blueberry MatchaMrBeast: Feastables BarPrime: Ice Pop, Mystery flavor

We talk about how Saudi Arabia has renewed Dakota Johnson’s faith in film and Clara eavesdropping on Gen Alpha sleepover semantics. We also dive into the broader implications of younger consumers’ preference for Buy Now, Pay Later, Gary Vee evangelizing livestream shopping, and how frictionless access to credit has allowed the creator economy and the trend ecosystem to rise at scale. 

Amy Francombe is a contributing editor at Vogue Business and writer of the amy_coded newsletter on Substack. We talk about why news is out and gossip is in, moving from a post-truth society to a post-meaning one, how unplugging became luxury’s most valuable currency, entertainment vs. conversion, why engagement metrics are junk, whether or not it cheapens a brand to have TikTokers sitting front row at fashion week, restoring fashion brands to a level of cultural leadership, and more.

We talk about Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy’s desire to “go back to an era where we didn’t wear our pajamas to the airport,” real bread lines at Meadow Lane, only doing charity if it’s a good content opportunity, and being “ghosted” by brands.

Annie Rauwerda is a comedian, long-time Wikipedian, and founder of the must-follow @depthsofwikipedia Instagram. In this special live episode, we ask her about the current right-wing attacks on Wikipedia, the Wikimedia awards, what it takes to be a Wikipedia editor, “Corn” being such a controversial entry page, muffins, why she’s optimistic about the next generation of internet users, and a wonderful story about making life-long friends from her “Perpetual Stew.”

The crew unpacks Zohran Mamdani’s electoral victory and what it says about a younger generation of New Yorkers who are looking to claw back a sense of agency, power, purpose, and connection beyond the “brand universe.” 

Anu Lingala is a trend strategist and founder of the must-read Substack, WHAT’S ANU. We get a crash course in trend forecasting methodology, and then move on to who killed cool, the collapse of the irony/sincerity cycle, why people are trying to escape being seen by brands, Anu’s new theory on “trend bipolarity,” why we need to return to the basics of brand strategy, Anthony Bourdain, shareholder value, the Grimace shake, Peter Thiel, and more.

This week on the pod we unpack what stunt movie marketing, the rise of fan edits, exclusive Glen Powell pics, and the not-advertising-advertising of the Louvre art heist reveal about what it takes to make a film relevant.

Daniel-Yaw Miller is an award-winning journalist and writer of the newsletter, SportsVerse. We talk to him about whether or not streamers and influencers are welcome disruptors or interlopers, not watching upstart sports leagues out of principle, what makes Stone Island a “smart collaborator” brand, depth vs. breadth, Loewe and On’s partnership with stone skipping GOAT Kurt Steiner, and NIL.