ARO thread 2

[OneHeartySnail]

To continue the discussion...

What next? What did the launch aim to achieve? Did it get the desired result?

I completely agree.

I think if is set up more in the style of goop, Meghan should do well.

If selling tat on the web was so easy, surely everyone would be doing it?

Goop was set up a long time ago and Gwyneth is the ideal person to front an elite, high end brand. Meghan does not exude high class. She has no real persona other than embittered former royal. And the 'launch' has been so muddled, it's hard to see that she was a solid business plan.

One thing Meghan can do is sell things. She wears a dress and it sells out. Just about anything she wears sells out.

Is there any actual evidence for this?

There’s s reason tabloids write article after article about Harry and Meghan, and it’s because it brings people to their websites. Plenty of people want to read about them. (Meghan more than Harry I think). There’s a lot of interest.

Interest in gossip yes, but I think even that is declining.

Interest in buying what they are selling, not so much. Meghan's podcast was free and didn't manage to draw in a big audience after the initial curiosity, which is why Spotify dropped them. The Invictus documentary did not get many viewers either.

Clicking on a tabloid article is one thing. Spending your money on what she is o might be selling is quite another.

I do think American Riviera Orchard is too long. But I do think ARO works.

It sounds like a construction company to me.

I agree, @IcedPurple . "Embittered former Royal" isn't a great selling point.
Her clothes have never sold out. She's not a style icon, and wearing creased and ill fitting clothing - freebies? loans? - doesn't help that.

Wasn't 'Meghan's Mirror' some kind of affiliate link site? I wonder if there is any mileage in setting up ARO like that? Footage of Meghan in her kitchen using certain wares.

(Thanks to those who explained that American Riveria was a thing. When I saw this originally I thought it was 3 diparate words put together)

Yes, Meghan's Mirror, and I think, What Meghan Wore?

To be fair very popular people have tried that and struggled. Megan is demonstratably not popular with large swathes of the population and she is not aspirational to most. Certainly not the demographic she is aiming at, as their brand is one of gossip, entitlement and negativity, the victim mindset.

gwyneth is a whole different ballgame, she found a niche and it was a passion project, not her only income source. She is not contentious more cooky and quirky and goop is the same. She is not perceived in the same negative manner as Harry and Megan and the wannabe royals. Gwneth is very successful in her own right as an actress. Megan never achieved close to what gwyneth did in her acting career.

i actually think that investing in flamingo estate and leveraging their popularity was a sound thing to try, in fact an excellent idea. She would have been using something already hugely successful and aspirational and simply linking with it. It would have given her credibility.

if the rumours are true and the owner said no, then threatened legal action as she was going to try to copy him, then that’s a huge, huge mistake, he has a lot of contacts, and she’s then alienated a lot of her customer base.

She makes a bit of a habit of copying people. It’s her modus operandi. She doesn’t seem to have an original thought in her head.

Absolutely this! I don’t think any of this can know what that experience is like. Some press baron with friends in high places has definitely pressed the “destroy” button. I think she is holding up well in the circumstances.

If selling tat on the web was so easy, surely everyone would be doing it?

Good point @IcedPurple . Which brings to Blake Lively, and Preserve. A "curated" website she set up and spent a ton of money on a team in order to sell lovely things on the internet. Very similar idea to the lovely Duchess's.

It didn't last a year.

ETA: Did a quote there and can't unquote.

Yes, we are all sheeple. We only think what "press barons" tell us to think. Only people who admire Meghan have the power of independent thought.

I think the sulky, lying teenager pressed the destroy button first! Watching her manipulate and victimise herself on Oprah was telling. As people have said, she’s not a very good actress.

She always courted the press; that’s partly how she made money via Tig and blogs. As you need publicity, you could say it was understandable then for her “lifestyle career”and she knew how to play the game well. If you read Tom Bowen’s book Meghan pursued publicity and the paparazzi relentlessly to up her profile.

However post marriage she couldn’t give the publicity-seeking up. Her interviews with Ophra, podcasts and documentaries of their “escape” from the UK, endless photos and photo opportunities. But the narrative had changed. This time she tried to destroy her in-laws for no obvious reason. And dissed British people as cold and racist. Since then she still tries to “use” the media but it seems to backfire every time. Eg turning up at the Jamaica film premiere in a black ball gown.

However, on another level, she’s probably not a “bad” person (I don’t know her). She might be a nice neighbour. Be a considerate driver. Maybe a good friend. A pleasant and polite person to sit opposite on a train. There are lots of awful and nasty people in the world who are none of those things and they are perhaps much more deserving of our ire. However she is also preening, entitled and manipulative, and they’re hardly attractive traits.

I chiefly find her interesting for her competitive wokey coleyness, as I politically can’t stand all that. She is just one of many people whose political motives I question. When she suddenly recreated herself as as a wokey feminist with the whole word salad thing after spending years as a Tig girl.

BTW, she seems to have enormous self-belief. Remember comparing herself to Nelson Mandela. Loves standing up and making speeches to big audiences. She might hate the bad publicity but her narcissistic outlook means it’s unlikely she’ll stop seeking out more opportunities. The couple still seem to be on that runaway train, at least for now. Maybe time will make people forget and things will move on. However, they managed to upset a simply vast number of people (for no good reason) so it will be uphill.

Also, slightly interesting to watch as a subject in “how to try and make (big) money” in the modern world, as reflections in this thread on the latest Orchard thing show, comparing with Goop and others.

Yes. Designers want their clothes to be seen in the most flattering light, which means not creased and poorly fitted. They also want their clothes to be seen at prestigious events, and by as wide an audience as possible. Meghan does not attend such events, and she doesn't even have social media. And while she has her devoted fans, she is widely disliked. All things considered, hardly the person big brands want to be associated with.

What do you admire about her?

The idea that press barons either would or could do that is entirely fanciful

I don't see that as a problem - there's always room for the next big version of something, even if its been done before.

press barons with destroy buttons 😂
Ffs, this tinfoil hat business gets ludicrous!

It is impossible to miss the fact that they are feeding the press constantly themselves. If there is a destroy button they seem to be the ones pressing it.

I keep waiting for them to have a moment where they reflect. “We have met the enemy and it is us.”

But it also feels like a “mama knows best” attitude at play. Whatever they have been told works when dealing with the public, they are determined to do it a different way, to their own detriment.

Is it from the Sussex Squad?
Figures.

They don't take advice.
They're duplicitous and untrustworthy.
They're arrogant, self absorbed and greedy.
No "press barons" needed.

Yep that’s about it Geebray 😀😄😉

Seriously though, like the woman or not, doesn’t it make you feel uncomfortable that any young mother is pilloried to that extent, no matter who it is or what they have supposed to have done?

It does bother me and makes me more inclined to support them tbh.

And if I may say so, I don’t think threads like this on sm help. None of us know her. What we have seen of her has largely been filtered through a negative prism of press or tv interest. Oprah was out to make money just like the rest.

Most people on Mumsnet are reasonably articulate and intelligent. Most are aware of how the press and media makes a buck and it’s not through positivity.

Edited to say: I can’t be a member of the Sussex Squad because I literally do not know what that is!