the culture loves a man who loves his wife

zuck knows this

QUICK HITS

• Why celebrities stopped being cool

• Meet the Florida billionaire who wants to be a Newspaper Baron

• McDonald's Quarter Pounders have been linked to an E. coli outbreak

• Empty tables and rising costs push more restaurants into bankruptcy

• OpenAI and Microsoft are offering $10 million grants to local publishers who use their AI tools in the newsroom

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• Skims featured Olivia Munn’s breast cancer journey for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Speaking to Today, Olivia said when Skims approached her to do this campaign, it wasn't about her scar at all. "Then I was looking in the mirror, and I just thought, ‘I’m done being insecure about my scars,’" Munn said. "So I went to the Skims team and I said, ‘What do you guys think about showing my scars in this campaign?' They were so amazing, thoughtful, and wonderful. We talked it out, and we decided to do it."

  

• TikTok wants to help creators make and sell their own products. According to some inside information shared with Business Insider, TikTok is in the early stages of connecting manufacturers with creators to help them make their own products to sell on its e-commerce platform, Shop. There's definitely an upside for TikTok here—not every creator can sell product, but every creator likes to think they can. The more of the creator ecosystem TikTok can own, the better for their business. This will suck, though—a bunch of subpar products flooding the internet and the planet.

• Speaking of junk, Amazon is preparing to launch a low-price storefront to compete with Temu, and The Information just got the scoop that it’s imposing severe price caps on what merchants can charge for their product on the outlet, including an $8 limit for jewelry, $9 for bedding sets, $13 for guitars, and $20 for sofas. Sigh.

• While the media decides whether Rupert Murdoch is still powerful or not, he’s suing half his offspring and now Perplexity too. Murdoch-owned News Corp titles, Wall Street Journal and New York Post, are suing the AI startup Perplexity for copying copyrighted news content and using it to generate responses to users’ queries. You know the story. News Corp is not against AI per se; they just want to be paid. Actually, they’re currently in bed with Perplexity competitor OpenAI (which is currently being sued by The New York Times), in a deal that allows the tech company to use content from News Corp’s consumer-facing news publications, and could be worth $250 million over five years. All this while Perplexity is somewhere trying to raise $500 million at a $8 billion valuation.

• Out West in Hollywood, 10,500 actors, musicians, and authors, including Julianne Moore, Thom Yorke, and Kazuo Ishiguro, have signed an open letter condemning the unauthorized use of content for AI development. Really, they should be asking Gavin Newsom why he killed that AI bill. As a reminder, here’s why—you simply cannot bite the hand that feeds you, and that hand hasn’t been Hollywood for some time. Case in point: LA film production fell 5% in Q3, the weakest quarter of the weakest year yet, while unscripted production plunged 56% from the same period last year. Not only are studios producing less content, but many are also moving production to other U.S. states and increasingly abroad to cut costs. Sony CEO Tony Vinciquerra thinks the new union contracts are to blame: “We tried to convince the unions, we tried to talk to the unions about what we thought would happen, and now it is happening,” to which the head of SAG-AFTRA responded, “A cynical attempt to manipulate workers while masking the industry’s own business failures.” And AI hasn’t even properly entered the chat yet.

• Zuck’s PR team knows the culture loves a man who loves his wife. The other day, I said that there was nothing beyond branding—that includes tech billionaires. In the last month, Zuck has erected a statue in Priscilla’s image, bought her a custom Porsche minivan, and crowned her the disco queen. Some will say it's love; I say someone is giving Tree Paine a run for her money. Either way, this is the right kind of midlife crisis.

• Daze wants to be the messaging app for Gen Z, which is funny because I didn’t know there was a problem with WhatsApp or iMessage—or all the DMs on all the apps! Formerly a social calendar app, Daze offers freestyle messaging that takes its cues from social media. Messages can be crafted using a variety of fonts, styles, and graphics, with speech bubbles in different colors. The app is also leveraging AI to power some of its creative tools and plans to deeply integrate more AI-based technology in the future. If I were on the Daze team, I’d change the positioning from Gen Z to Gen Alpha. Everyone college-aged and older likes their messaging apps efficient and utilitarian—Daze’s UI is too overwhelming. But I know the kids would love this; my sister sends entire text messages to me with just GIFs, it's very stressful.

• Boeing lost $6 billion in 3 months. Everything that could have gone wrong went wrong.

• Disney CEO Bob Iger says he’s “definitely” leaving after his contract expires on Dec. 31, 2026, only because he’s already left and come back, and people need to be sure this time. Following a board shakeup by activist investor Nelson Peltz earlier this year, James P. Gorman, a veteran Wall Street banker who joined the board in February, will replace Mark G. Parker, who is stepping down after two years. Gorman, who led Morgan Stanley from 2010 until last year and is now the bank’s executive chairman, is credited with helping Morgan Stanley recover from the financial crisis and building its wealth and investment management businesses. He has also received praise for managing the succession process at Morgan Stanley and will now be responsible for appointing Iger’s successor. There are currently four candidates in the running—parks chief Josh D’Amaro, TV head Dana Walden, ESPN head Jimmy Pitaro, and film head Alan Bergman, with the first two considered the strongest. Of course, Disney could always hire an external candidate, a scenario that becomes more likely as the process drags on. As Puck’s Matthew Belloni pointed out, “the delay suggests the internal candidates aren’t currently cutting it… none of the four candidates is a perfect package of experience and skill set.” Disney already got it wrong once, and in this climate, they can’t afford to let that happen again.

• Hugh Hefner's son wants to buy back Playboy. Lol that Victoria’s Secret show is sending all the wrong signals.

• Somewhere in that vicinity is the news that former Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries is facing charges for sex trafficking and interstate prostitution. According to charges being brought by the FBI, Jeffries is accused of having orchestrated a sex trafficking and prostitution enterprise that involved hiring dozens of men and transporting them around the world. Jeffries was released on a $10 million bond Tuesday afternoon, as was his alleged associate James Jacobson, who is facing the same charges. Jeffries’ boyfriend Matthew Smith, who is also accused of sex trafficking and interstate prostitution, is being detained. This man was the CEO of A&F for 22 years, at a time when the brand was owned by Les Wexner, who also owned Victoria’s Secret and has ties to Epstein. Some sick shit.

• Fishwife launched Caviar just in time for the holidays. At $99, it's their most expensive product to date. Each order comes with a custom-designed box by Danny "Danbo" Miller, as well as a fish-engraved mother-of-pearl spoon. As always, obsessed with their packaging.

• I also want to try Algae Cooking Club’s new infused oils; love that stuff. Two bottles cost $39.99, compared to $22.99 a bottle for their algae cooking oil. Still slightly bitter about their pricing but okay.

  

• I hear Taylor Swift is a Dave Portnoy fan, and vice versa.

• The median salary for a Social Media Manager is $80,000, with Finance offering the highest salaries, followed closely by Tech. The Entertainment industry ranks third, earning about $20K less, and the lowest-paying sectors are Small and Medium Businesses, Non-Profits, and Sports. I know this because I read Rachel Karten’s 2024 Social Media Compensation Report, which surveyed 2,280 respondents from over 350 cities across 35 different countries. So much good stuff.

• Back in August, someone somewhere leaked the news that Chick-fil-A was working on a new streaming service. The Chick-fil-A Play app will launch on Nov. 18 and feature various content, including an original animated series, scripted podcasts, games, recipes, and e-books—all designed to entertain families. “Everything on the Chick-fil-A Play App is designed to encourage more talking, laughing, and playing together, both online and in person,” said brand head Dustin Britt. Chick-fil-A is the third-largest U.S. based restaurant brand by sales, and this isn’t their first foray into entertainment. They’ve previously experimented with branded merchandise and launched Pennycake, a family-oriented games and puzzles offshoot brand last year. According to the boys at TBOY, Chick-fil-A will spend up to $400,000 per episode on one of their unscripted shows. We already know Amazon creates award-winning content to help it sell everything else, but this strategy traces back to Procter & Gamble, which invented the soap opera in 1931. The consumer goods company invested in TV and radio shows with romantic and family plot lines to connect with women who were often at home. OG product placements featured glamorous housewives using P&G products on shows like Days of Our Lives and The Bold and the Beautiful. Similarly, Chick-fil-A wants to own American dinner times. CEO Andrew T. Cathy shared that the company found that American families usually do two things after dinner: watch TV or play games. Kids' TV is in the toilet—ratings for Nickelodeon plummeted 86% from 2016 to 2023, while the Disney Channel fell 90% in the same period, according to Nielsen ratings. Instead, viewers aged 2-17 accounted for nearly 30% of YouTube’s viewership in July. It’s a crazy pitch, but there’s a real opportunity here.

• A month into her leave for a sexting affair with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Vox Media has decided to “part ways” with Olivia Nuzzi. This whole situation is pretty bizarre, and the more I think about it, the more I grate at the fact that RFK has experienced almost no public fallout. It's actually wild. Nuzzi is now out of a job, and it's hard to see a situation where another top publisher takes her on, at least not for a while. She’s also still locked in a messy legal dispute with her ex-fiancé Ryan Lizza, who she accused of hacking and leaking the story of her Kennedy relationship. He denies all, of course. Meanwhile, RFK—of brain worms and dead bears and anti-vax propaganda—has somehow managed to remain above the fray.

• Carine Roitfeld, former editor-in-chief of Vogue Paris, and her son Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld, chief executive officer of CR Fashion Book, are launching a new publication dedicated to sports and fashion. The yet-to-be-named biannual magazine and digital platform will debut in spring 2025, with Dwayne Wade as the inaugural guest editor. “Fashion and sport are two powerful forms of expression that inspire millions around the globe,” Roitfeld said in a statement for WWD. “We aim to create a space that celebrates this fusion and showcases the unique stories that emerge when these worlds collide.” You already know I think this is hot. LVMH is sponsoring Formula 1 and acquiring a women’s Paris football club, ASAP Rocky is also allegedly in talks to purchase an English football club, and Chanel is sponsoring this year’s Oxford-Cambridge infamous boat race. Sports is like the Switzerland of culture right now—everyone is game, everyone wants a piece.

• Alaïa climbed 12 spots to become Q3’s fifth-hottest fashion brand on the Lyst Hottest Brands Index. Miu Miu is back at number one, while Balenciaga fell ten spots. Victoria Beckham, Chloé, Totême, and Ralph Lauren were new entrants to the chart. Coach also rose five spots, but now I’m thinking about Casey Lewis’s theory that the brand might not actually be that trendy with Gen Z. If Coach bags seem ubiquitous online, we might have sponcon to thank for that. Sales for Coach, parent company Tapestry’s largest brand, were flat for Q3, but I have to say that anecdotally, they seem to be everywhere girls my age are.

  

• Your local pharmacy probably isn’t doing too hot right now. Last week, Walgreens announced it would be closing 1,200 stores over the next three years. CVS, which has shuttered hundreds of stores over the past few years, announced this month that it planned to cut nearly 3,000 jobs. Rite Aid closed most of its stores after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in late 2023. Meanwhile, Hims just launched prenatal gummies for men, and Lemme is thriving on the spoils of fake Ozempic. Walgreens and CVS make their money in two main ways: selling prescriptions in the back of their stores and selling everyday goods up front. Most people I know are getting their prescriptions online, and Amazon pretty much owns the convenience goods business. Meanwhile, Walmart announced yesterday that it plans to begin delivering prescriptions across the U.S. early next year, something Amazon is already doing. Prescriptions will be delivered in as little as 30 minutes and should be available for over 86% of American households. Seven in ten Americans take some sort of prescription medication, and pharmaceutical expenditures in the U.S. hit $722.5 billion in 2023. So prescriptions are prime recurring revenue—a steady revenue stream for any company with significant market share. (Things I could talk about but won’t: 1.) the Uberification of everything and 2.) the slow, painful death of American brick-and-mortar retail.)

• I don’t mind being like all the other girls—really, I don’t. So when I read that sales of women’s Frye boots jumped 96% from October 2023 to October 2024 because every Gen Z woman wants them, just as I’m tracking down a pair myself, it didn’t make me feel basic. Not at all. Honest.

  

• Kailyn Lowry is basically the book world's Alex Cooper. She also has one of my dream careers. The 32-year-old former Teen Mom 2 star has 11 million social media followers, including 3.3 million on TikTok. She’s currently the seventh-most-followed reviewer on Goodreads, and her podcast, Barely Famous, features conversations with famous authors like Jodi Picoult, T.J. Newman, and Colleen Hoover. Lowry’s fan base—mainly 18-to-45-year-old women—includes among the 2,600 members who pay $5 a month for access to group discussions and her latest recommendations. She’s clearly very famous; still, I had never heard of her until today. My friend and I were talking about the publishing industry yesterday and how we think it’s ripe for innovation. From celebrity book clubs to new projects like TikTok’s 8th Note Press and a thing or two’s 831 Stories, there’s a lot of exciting stuff happening in the space. But the core of the industry is still so opaque and weird; I hope some cool shit happens soon.

• Anastasia Beverly Hills’ main investor wants out. Six years ago, TPG Capital took a minority stake in the premium cosmetics brand at a reported valuation of $3 billion. This was during the days of full-face looks—strong eyebrows and deep contouring—before anyone what glazing or buttering was. Between 2014 and 2017, ABH sales grew by an average of 64% annually, topping over $300 million at the time of the TPG investment. But when TPG made its investment, it retained the right to redeem its equity for cash after six years if the company hadn’t sold or gone public, and it’s now exercising that option. Also looming are more than $600 million in loans due next year, which, according to credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s CCC- grade, the company is unlikely to repay. A default or debt restructure is likely, an acquisition is not.

• I'm not sold on the J.Crew x Christopher John Rogers collection, but these pants are everything, and so is this coat. Okay, the sweater is cute too.

• The Ritz-Carlton teamed up with Madrid-based fashion label Late Checkout to create a capsule clothing collection that looks very Sporty & Rich. I only noticed because they made a short film starring Josh Hutcherson that looks very Wes Anderson. I love when brands have fun with their merch. It’s all becoming more elevated these days, perhaps thanks to this GQ essay. I’m into this Ghia blanket and Glossier’s new chrome beauty bag. Rolling my eyes at Rare Beauty’s new lip gloss shaped dog toy, but at least it’s creative. Do the rhode phone cases count as merch? As for these short films brands keep making, they’re often gorgeous, but the metrics are never great. Reminds me that brand building can be such a black hole of good intent.

• In 45% of U.S. opposite-sex marriages, the wife earns as much as or more than her husband, a share that has roughly tripled over the past 50 years, according to a 2023 report from the Pew Research Center. Another study found that dads represented 18% of stay-at-home parents in 2021, up from 11% in 1989. Behind many powerful women on Wall Street is a doting “househusband.” I know many women who like the idea of a househusband and many men who swear they could never be one. But if I’m being honest, I know far more women—young, liberal, middle-to-upper-class, college-educated women—who say they’d much prefer their husbands to earn as much or more than they do. Some would consider leaving a relationship if this weren’t the case. It’s funny, though, because this is always said with the assumption that they’d still be high earners themselves—their partners would just be wealthier. And it’s never about the money; it’s always about “keeping the peace.” Everyone seems to have a story about a marriage that went south because the woman was the breadwinner. It’s actually quite sad. And culturally confounding. If you’re as online as I am, you probably know who Maya and Hunter on TikTok are, also known as “stay-at-home husband and his wife.” The comments section of videos like this give me hope. Conversations with actual people do not.

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When I wrote about pistachios last week, I did not expect the excitement that was unleashed in the comments and my inbox.

You guys really love pistachios—like, a lot. Maybe three people also pointed out that pistachios were trending in fragrance as well, directing me to the D.S. & DURGA Pistachio perfume. If you enjoy gourmand scents, check out Scentlab’s Pistachio Dream perfume; it’s great.

Anyway, I reached out to the founders of Pistakio, a pistachio spread company, just to let them know people were excited about what they were building. It turns out one of their co-founders, Fran Voit, is an “avid” as seen on reader :)

When given an inch, I love to take a mile, so I sent over a few questions to learn about why they started Pistakio, how the pistachio trend is affecting their business, and their thoughts on the nut’s premium positioning. Thanks Fran and Nicola!

ON THEIR ORIGIN STORY

I'm originally from Italy and came to the US to play college tennis. On the tennis team I met Fran, who had gone to culinary school in Italy prior, and we quickly bonded over our love for food and the communal aspect of food that Italians share. When we got together, Fran was often cooking tons of dishes and finding ways to infuse pistachios into those dishes. We noticed that when we went looking for pistachio products in the US, there was practically nothing available. So, even if nuts were having a moment (because there WERE tons of different nut spreads, alt-milks, etc), pistachios were still extremely untapped. The little products we did find in the market were artificial tasting, super sweet, and didn't taste like the real flavor of pistachios.

We knew that they had so much potential, because Italians were already using them in sweet and savory dishes, so for my senior project in college, we decided to start working on a brand that reimagines pistachios by exploring their potential outside of a "snacking nut". As part of my project, we went to the local farmers market to test some initial prototypes of our spreads, and we were blown away by the love we'd received from fellow pistachio lovers asking to purchase our prototypes. Fast forward -- we graduated from college in 2023 and moved across the country to launch Pistakio! We had to pivot a few times, being so new to this world, but we officially hit the market in April of 2024.

ON THE PISTACHIO TREND

Part of the reason we started this was because we saw pistachios as the underdog in the US market. To have begun our pistachio journey last year when no one cared for them, and jump over to now and see them trending more and more, it's definitely made an impact for us. For the past year and a half, we've been focused on building a community of pistachio lovers (we started back in college before even having a product to sell!), so we like to think we also had a small impact in the pistachio trend by growing organically all over social, and growing quickly in stores where people can find us. Even before starting, we knew that pistachios were one of those nuts that if you love them... you REALLY LOVE them, so we're super happy to fill that gap in the market for real tasting pistachio spreads.

ON RAISING FUNDING

We started in college with the $3,000 we had in our savings, which was barely enough to buy a small blender and the first round of ingredients. From there we expanded to 175+ stores and we're now at a point where we need more capital to continue to grow and keep up with demand. Crowdfunding seemed a good way to go about it to engage our community, as they can invest in our business while getting Pistakio back (with 20% interest!). CPG is a very expensive industry to be in, especially for emerging brands like ourselves, so we're definitely keeping an eye out for the right investment at the right time.

ON MAKING PISTACHIOS APPROACHABLE

We HATED that pistachios were always considered a luxurious item and pistachio spreads were only something that you'd eat a spoon of once a year on Christmas. It was all a marketing play that justified the steep price people were paying for pistachio products, which, most of the time, barely had any pistachios in it. We went the opposite approach because we truly just wanted people to start getting creative with the ways you can use pistachios. If our pistachio spread was priced at $35 a jar, people would only eat like a teaspoon of it at a time and be afraid to try it on new things -- which we would hate for them to lose that opportunity of exploring its uses on sweet and savory dishes.

Outside of deciding we wanted to be priced lower than traditional pistachio products, we had approachability in mind at every aspect of our journey. We carefully picked our ingredients to be as accessible as possible (gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, palm-oil free), designed the packaging to be fun and authentic (no gold-foil on the label), and tried to be the opposite of a corporation in the way we go about community building and social media. All this goes to say that we created the highest quality product we could in the meantime, with only real ingredients, and more than 100 pistachios per jar!

ON FRAN’S FAVORITE NON PISTAKIO PISTACHIO DISH

When she's in a good mood, Fran makes an amazing pistachio carbonara. She made it for the first time on my birthday a couple of years ago and that's when I knew she was a keeper.

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Now go watch The Brutalist trailer and lie to me that you did not get goosebumps!