Megs gift shop wine

[AtIusvue]

As per the DM, we are told Meg is using Fairwinds Estate winery for her rose. Sounds nice.
But a Reddit user has discovered, that Fairwinds winery is just a brand under the umbrella of Wine gift shop. They do corporate gifts and print on demand. Oh Meg, as ever

https://winegiftshop.com

I’ve seen too many badly run businesses in my professional life to think this even comes close in terms of fuck ups. i shudder to think how much worse those businesses fuck ups would have been with this level of scrutiny.

She's been a controversial figure before, I seem to remember. I know you can't blame the woman for her parents, but her father (I think) had Nazi connections, which was embarrassing when it came out.

Well yes but I don’t see how that makes As Ever any better than any other badly run business. The scrutiny it’s receiving isn’t what has made it badly run 🤷‍♀️

If Meghan is looking for a billion dollar exit as she herself has alluded to, she’ll need to sustainably grow the business and be able to show multiple years financial statements in order for a purchaser to place a valuation on it (usually a multiple of profit before tax). So I can understand why they might take it slow ramping up capacity to make it sustainable (eg negotiating larger multiple year contracts or maybe even building a facility of their own now that they know they have demand).
Who knows but it’ll be interesting to see which route they take.

The over sold issue is not unique to as ever though. It’s not ideal and not something you’d want to do to your customers especially if you want them to become long term loyal customers. We don’t know how many it happened to but the free product probably made them a little less unhappy (maybe).

@RandyRedHumpback Thank you for posting the Scott Rouse video. I watched it over breakfast. His reaction to the flower sprinkles, the jam, and the tea had me howling.

After the whole Meghan polo cup incident, I saw an X post by a squaddie. It was a picture of Meghan in that white dress walking across the polo field. The poster praised Meghan for looking "old money". My own response was that Meghan was trying to create a sort of Ralph Lauren ad.

BTW, I've never watched Suits and hadn't heard of her before the wedding.

I appreciate it isn’t unique to As Ever, of course. It’s just a bit odd that they can’t re stock a generic, mass produced spread in a timely manner 🤷‍♀️

Who knows what they’re doing bts to meet demand, might be looking at longer term solutions.
But not gonna lie I would be pissed if it happened to me and would bitch about it to everyone I knew but I’m a grump 😂

"Sold-out" is a marketing gimmick that is well known to US consumers, especially when the "sold-out" item is usually restocked fairly quickly to capture sales from interested buyers who "missed out".

M is essentially running a drop-shipping business that has failed to restock certain items, when the whole point of drop-shipping is to avoid inventory stock-outs.

The roll out has been so chaotic that M's fan base has gone on Twitter to complain. M's subpar logistics is alienating her fan base which is not what a serious business owner would do.

It's caused some fighting amongst the squaddies . I saw a post on X from one of them asking everyone to calm down .

Lol everyone really does need to calm down. Love her or hate her Meghan really has brought people together to generate endless (and sometimes interesting) debate and even more (mainly boring and repetitive) column inches.

Which is all the more reason that MM and her ilk making out that the UK is like segregation era America is all the more heinous. And why I believe, as a person of colour, she has had a hugely detrimental effect on race relations in the UK, by leeching off an already rocky situation caused by Brexit/Trump/BLM.

You're welcome, it had me laughing too. The shortbread (I did laugh that he had to get his sister to make them because his wife is away - un-reconstructed Texan) seems to be the one thing everyone agrees tastes nice. Must be all the butter that needs to be added!

I don’t think Meghan has been a positive force in any way over the last 7 years. See Randy’s post above. She’s deviously exploited lots of situations to cause division, resentment, anger, hatred even, where these things didn’t exist before.

She’s a very divisive figure and she loves it, but her games have damaged a lot of other people and caused pain to her husband’s grandparents in their final days. Not cool.

I agree.

There's a quote about a British embassy dinner in the 1800s which was, although racist, really encapsulated the British primary emphasis on class.

Something about a guest complaining about being seated below a black man, and being firmly told that the African prince outranked him and was not a commoner! (I can't search it because I don't want the only words I remember from the quote in my history)

My grandmother was working class, a full on socialist campaigner in her youth. She had severe dementia by the end, and they could only reliably get Asian staff to look after her (after she had a brief stay in a Jewish care home). She was always asking them concerned questions about how they were being treated in this country and told us that we must never, never treat immigrants badly because they were given a hard enough time as it was.

Race and class are very, very different issues in the US to the UK.

While H&M have made accusations about others regarding race, their own on the record comments about race and their supporters' social media are filled with praise for the white racial characteristics of A&L. For example,

-M effusively proclaiming her daughter had "blue, blue, blue eyes" while H chimed in about L's "golden reddish hair" in the reality show
-H sitting with Colbert and stating his "ginger genes stood up"
-The Sussex Squad and super fans gushing about M snagging a "white Prince"

It is actually quite disturbing.

And were those businesses run by multi millionaires with connections at the highest levels of commercial, investment and spending influence? Were they partnering with Netflix too, and advertising their products through the most popular, international streaming service? Did those failing companies have an army of staff, PR, lawyers, advisers all on 6 figure salaries? Do you agree that failure is relative?

But the items are just mass-produced generic 'products', so there really is no reason - other than poor management and/or a wish to be seen as 'in demand' - why all products would sell out immediately, with no timeframe for restocking. One or two lines maybe. But every single line? No.

I'm far from an expert but surely if you want a sustainable business you have to have a steady stock of inventory? Not just a few 'drops' per year? You also need to convince the wider public of why they should buy your rather basic product. What is special about it? Why is it worth more than a similar item on the high street?

I guess what I'm saying is, other than being married to the 5th in line to the British throne, what is Meghan's USP?

That's the burning question for me - what is it about her that made people become fans in the first place, what do they see in her that inspires fandom, what would she have to do to repel her fans, how do they align all her ridiculous talk of philanthropy when she has virtually nothing to show for all this talk?

It almost angers me in a way when I see her getting all this adulation when I can think of so so many people who are much more worthy. I'm on a bit of a crusade at the moment to raise awareness of one of my son's friends. He's a 31 yr old with terminal brain cancer (diagnosed when he was 25) who has completely overhauled his life, who has spent the last 6 years raising money for various charities, and who is undertaking a never-done-before venture in September etc.

THAT'S what I call I inspiring and worthy. Not some ridiculous woman with an inflated sense of self worth and no discernible talent, no decent moral compass or genuine desire to "show up and do good".

That was a bit of a rant, sorry. Maybe she does have a talent after all - for inspiring anger in people who are rarely moved to it!

Race and class are very, very different issues in the US to the UK.

I think this is a really valid point.

Race is the 'original sin' of American life, and still remains the primary faultline in the country. While racism certainly exists in the UK, as it does everywhere, class has traditionally been far more relevant, and arguably still is. I think a lot of Americans superimpose their own obsession with race upon British society, and view the royals through that rather distorting lens. It can be very hard to convince them that what is true in the US isn't necessarily true in Britain.

Surely she also needs a unique product?

Not cool is a massive understatement. She is a totally toxic woman.

Some of Meghan's behaviour that jars in the UK is also very American class-based. From what I can tell, there's a lot more respect for people who've "made it", whatever "it" is in the eyes of the beholder, whereas in the UK people are more inclined to be proud of where they came from than what they've become.

But my knowledge of that is slippery.

Thanks to whoever linked the Scott Rouse YouTube piece.

That spread is really runny, I can't see how it works on toast at all.

I'm not sure he is her target audience but it was interesting to hear him speak about her language in the interview he posted clips of. He obviously doesn't think she had much to do with the products at all.

Overall though it made me wonder whether the people who comment on the Sussexes are actually getting more revenue than Meghan herself.