Let’s talk about breakfast.

Coronavirus changed our work habits. Goodbye to the commute. Hello to Zoom and Google Duo. Goodbye to that brewed Venti. Hello to instant coffee. Breakfast at fast food restaurants took a big hit. However, Wendy’s breakfast – a newcomer to the morning meal – managed to leverage itself into a breakfast powerhouse. Wendy’s is now close to or actually replacing Burger King as the second biggest breakfast fast food brand.

Even with the constraints from Covid-19 lockdowns and its late entry into the breakfast category (right before the lockdowns), Wendy’s restaurants are now champions of breakfast. Wendy’s has McDonald’s in sight.

There are several reasons for Wendy’s breakfast success. 

1. Breakfast is a routinized meal: Wendy’s leveraged this.
2. Our bodies crave very specific foods in the morning. Wendy’s menu hit all the right buttons.
3. McDonald’s breakfast was suffering even prior to coronavirus. Wendy’s kept momentum going.
4. How people eat really matters. We eat with our eyes first. 

Breakfast is a routinized meal: Wendy’s leveraged this.

Most of us know we should eat breakfast. Yet, most of us treat breakfast as a routine. We tend to have the same meal every day. Unlike lunch and dinner, breakfast is the meal that repeats itself day in and day out. We have habits at breakfast. We do not mind eating the same thing every morning.

There are data showing that breakfast is a routine because we perceive this meal as being utilitarian. We need to start our day; jump start our system; start our day’s feeding cycle; or look for a convenient way to eat before work. Unlike lunch and dinner, breakfast does not have a hedonic goal. On a spectrum from physiological to psychological, breakfast is at the physiological end. Research by food purveyor Bob Evans Farms indicates that we see breakfast as both a priority and a chore.  

One reason for breakfast’s physiological urge is that our morning chemistry is different from our coffee break, lunch, afternoon snack and dinner chemistries. AM meals have different needs from PM meals. Scientists agree that energy needs, energy expenditures and energy utilizations differ by daypart. As one food scientist said, “What one prefers to eat turns out to be inseparable from the time of day one wants to eat it.”

Lockdowns, which halted some routines, also allowed us to create new routines. With a unique breakfast menu backed by heavy marketing and great pricing, Wendy’s was able to generate interest helping us create a new breakfast routine. As one food analyst told CNN, Wendy’s leveraged our lockdown boredom by offering a fun, new breakfast menu during the Covid-19 crisis.

Even though Wendy’s introduced its exciting breakfast just weeks before the lockdowns, CNBC stated that Wendy’s timing of breakfast was a plus rather than a negative. This is because with upended morning routines, people had the “opportunity” to begin new routines.

And, Wendy’s created foods that our bodies crave in the morning.

Our bodies crave very specific foods at breakfast. Wendy’s menu hit all the right buttons.

When we eat meals, we generally do not think about what our bodies crave at that particular part of day. But, what we reach for is based on bodily needs. Chemistry is involved. As one researcher put it, we do not get up in the morning craving ice cream. 

We are in a biorhythmic upswing in the morning. In the morning, we are energy depleted. We have not eaten for 10 or more hours. Our blood sugar is low; our insulin is down; our stores of carbohydrates are almost gone. We crave carbohydrates. Carbohydrates have a calming effect. Since mornings can be stressful, our chemical signals ask for carbs to smooth things out. As marathoners know, carbohydrates quickly convert to glucose. This helps us get going. Paired with some protein, we are ready to face the day.

Wendy’s Breakfast Baconator, seasoned potato wedges, its Frosty-ccino beverage and Honey Butter Chicken Biscuit are unique, delicious, carbo-rich, protein offerings. Wendy’s added a spicier Hot Honey Chicken Biscuit in February 2022.

McDonald’s breakfast was suffering even prior to coronavirus. Wendy’s kept momentum going.

If you are going to take on your competition, it is good to have a weakened rival. Next to Wendy’s non-traditional breakfast menu, McDonald’s menu is rather conservative. McDonald’s is now promising to infuse its breakfast menu with more “modern, trend” items. However, according to CNBC reporting, in McDonald’s recent earnings call, breakfast was barely mentioned. CEO, Chris Kempczinski merely told analysts that breakfast “…was one area of pressure.” This is clearly due to the altered competitive landscape where Wendy’s has performed in a most stellar fashion.

With a strong marketing budget and an enthused franchisee community, Wendy’s entered breakfast with a bang. Wall Street assumed that other fast food rivals would counter Wendy’s. After all, breakfast is worth protecting. This did not happen. Instead, McDonald’s and others cut advertising, cut hours, cut promotions and did everything else possible to save cash. One of the first pandemic changes McDonald’s made was to end its all day breakfast.

Wendy’s also made a strategic move that helped the brand boost its new breakfast at the outset of the lockdowns. Prior to lockdowns, Wendy’s had made its first two and half hours of breakfast drive-thru only. Mobility at breakfast is critical. Also, prior to coronavirus, Wendy’s went on a hiring spree. So, although Wendy’s franchisees faced some staffing uncertainties, Wendy’s was much better prepared than its rivals. And, Wendy’s made sure that the changes needed to provide the new breakfast menu would cost franchisees only $10,000 per store. 

Of course, McDonald’s is still the leader in breakfast.  But, it appears as if its ring-fence around the morning meal is being challenged. True, its breakfast menu is familiar and comfortable, but there has not been much news in McDonald’s breakfast. Compared to Wendy’s, McDonald’s breakfast line-up looks tired. Innovation is a critical driver for Wendy’s. In fact, Wendy’s reports that menu innovation has been essential to the brand’s successful breakfast daypart.

Other morning breakfast brands, such as Burger King, are also looking at their menus, thinking about ways in which to refresh offerings à la Wendy’s.

How people eat really matters. We eat with our eyes first.

Yes, physiology matters. But, perceptions are important. Our eating is governed by our mind as well as our body’s needs. Our eating is actually quite mindful, even though we may be eating the same thing on autopilot

We eat with our eyes first. Then, as scientists relate, the food must pass the nose test, then, the mouth. The stomach’s cravings start with the eyes. There are many receptors that must be satisfied.

Food must look delicious. Then, food must smell delicious. Then, there is the satiation that comes from chewing and texture. All this before you swallow.

Portion size, size perception, bite height, texture and eating time are all signals for satiation. The fact is that when the eyes see a big portion, the brain signals that the food will be filling. If the food is dense, it will take longer to eat, which also makes the food seem more filling. When we see more food on the plate, we automatically expect to be more satisfied. 

Bite height matters. The wider you open your mouth, the more your brain tells your stomach “big food is coming”. The more you chew, again, is a signal of substantial food. The longer it takes to eat, the more our brain tells us “satisfied”. The denser the food, the more satiated we become. A potato is denser and more satiating than a croissant. Carbohydrate-rich and protein-rich foods are more satiating than snacks, confectionary and baked goods.

Wendy’s Breakfast Baconater is a big, dense, “open wide”, carbo-and protein-rich sandwich. The potato wedges are also dense and satiating. 

Prior to our coronavirus lockdowns, marketers would have said that people are not going to change their behaviors, let alone their breakfast behaviors. But, Covid-19 did something extraordinary. It gave people permission to change behaviors. From Pelotons to Amazon Prime deliveries to multiple streaming subscriptions, we made significant behavioral changes, including breakfast.

Yes, we mostly ate breakfast at home. But, many of us still used restaurants’ drive-thru’s for breakfast; we just changed our venue and our time for obtaining that breakfast. Furthermore, we really desired some newness to combat the stay-at-home drudgery. Wendy’s breakfast delivered on all fronts.

Wendy’s managed to make breakfast 8.5% of total sales as of late 2021. In its latest earnings call (March 1, 2022), Wendy’s executives told analysts that US same-store-sales grew 11.6% on a two-year basis driven in part by growth in breakfast. Promotions helped drive “significant trial of breakfast with meaningful increase in buyer penetration, but also increased Wendy’s breakfast awareness.” Additionally, Wendy’s reported that “Looking back on the full-year, the brand made significant progress growing breakfast sales by approximately 25%….” Aside from promotions, menu innovation was a significant driver of breakfast. The menu news drove trial of Wendy’s breakfast while “further ingraining the (Wendy’s breakfast) habit….”

The Wendy’s executive team shared its belief that “…the breakfast business in the US will accelerate in 2022 by approximately 10% to 20%, taking average weekly US breakfast sales to approximately $3000 to $3500 per restaurant by year-end.” Furthermore, Wendy’s breakfast is sending a strong message about the quality of lunch and dinner at Wendy’s. Wendy’s is not just growing breakfast, but growing the rest of the day as well.

Barron’s, the financial news magazine, reported on March 21, 2022, that Wendy’s is an excellent stock. David Palmer, a food restaurant analyst at Evercore ISI, told Barron’s that Wendy’s is “… an accelerating growth story….” Citing another advisor, Barron’s quoted, “They’re (Wendy’s) getting more aggressive on digital, and not just mobile ordering, but incorporating incentives to keep customers coming back” through the loyalty program. “And, compared to other burger-focused competition, they’ve got a good product. Along with consistent, steady growth… those reasons make it a top pick.”

Kudos to Wendy’s. 

The home of the square burger initiated breakfast at an awful time. One would think that Wendy’s would have failed. But, no. Wendy’s turned awful into awesome. Wendy’s offered new, exciting, deliciously satisfying breakfast items fit for our morning needs and our lockdown mentality, along with exciting and affordable promotions. And, because Wendy’s gave us unique breakfast items while leveraging McDonald’s’ weaknesses, we changed our breakfast habits. Wendy’s lucked out. But, so did we.

Price hikes are par for the course these days. Brands from Nestlé (maker of Kit Kat, Nespresso) Unilever (maker of Dove Soap, Ben & Jerry’s, Hellmann’s), Procter & Gamble (maker of Tide, Swiffer), Mondelez, and Reckitt Benckiser (maker of Air Wick, Lysol and Durex condoms) are raising prices. 

But, as these brands know, price hikes only work if the customer perceives the brand to be worth the cost. If the price becomes too high relative to the total brand experience, then the brand is not perceived to be good value for the money.

First, value is more than price point. Value is what the customer receives relative to the costs. Customers have a value equation in their heads. A customer-perceived value equation is based on 1) how the customer perceives the brand’s total experience (defined as functional, emotional and social benefits) relative to 2) how the customer perceives the brand’s costs (defined as money, time and effort). Trust plays a critical role in the customer-perceived value equation as well. Trust acts as a multiplier when customers take mental assessments of a brand’s worth. If a brand has little or no trust, then there is little or no brand value. 

In other words, customers today perceive a brand’s worth to be the quality of the expected experience relative to the total brand costs multiplied by trust. This is the new Trustworthy Value Equation.

Second, to generate a Trustworthy Value Equation, the brand’s inherent value must be perceived as fair value. Fairness contains justice, Justice means that the benefits-per-costs equation is equitable, just, dependable, trustworthy and fair. Fairness is more than absolute price. Fairness means that the benefits-per-costs equation is equitable compared to competitive alternatives. A brand must be perceived as a fair value for the expected experience. 

Third, value begins with the customer: value is not determined in the conference room and not determined by the marketing department or by the CFO. Although marketers believe they are value creators, they are not. Marketers help to create brands to which customer ascribe value. Marketers determine pricing but not value. Instead of deciding what to charge, marketers should determine if the price they are asking will be a customer-perceived fair value.

Fourth, brands can be perceived as fair value at any price point. This means for some people a Mercedes-Benz S-Class is a fair value while for others a Toyota Prius is a fair value. Marketers must aim their brand to be best values at whichever price point they choose. This treats pricing as a strategy not a tactic. It is the contribution of price relative to benefits that determines whether a brand’s customers perceive the brand to be a great or a poor value.

George S. Day, professor emeritus at Wharton Business School said it best:

“A winning position for customers is superior benefits for an average price. Most businesses position their offerings on the diagonal from the economy to the premium end and thus price their products to capture the customer value they created. How- ever, some of the competitors will be off the diagonal, by accident or design. Those charging average prices for lower benefits are offering inferior value. Below the diagonal is superior value. Above the diagonal is inferior value.” 

This leads us to the price raises in our current inflationary economy. Are brand owners inadvertently making their brands poor values based on higher prices?  The business press report brand owners are raising prices due to supply backlogs, smaller workforces, climate issues, soaring energy prices and changed customer behaviors such as hoarding.  Costs for ingredients and shipping are being passed on to customers. And, the raised prices are not static: some brands continue to raise prices on top of raised prices. Unilever announced recently that it is re-raising prices on some of its big brands. According to The New York Times, Shake Shack restaurants will be raising prices again in March after taking a price raise in October. This will represent a price hike of 6% to 7% over the last six months.

Brand owners have been quite open about the price rises. Mr. Luca Zaramella, CFO of Mondelez stated to Bloomberg BusinessWeek, “I’m worried about prices, particularly around logistics and transportation. We try to pass those to consumers.” For Mondelez, as with other companies it is all about margins. “We announced price increases around the world to ensure that we retain our margins….”  Nestlé CEO Mark Schneider told BBC News that “… it was a safe assumption that prices would rise this year. He said there was no place in the company that was exempt of inflation.” 

On the other hand, Reckitt Benckiser told BBC News that the company hoped “… to absorb most of the (price) increases.” Reckitt’s CEO Laxman Narasimhan said that the enterprise “… had ways to mitigate and manage pricing.” Reckitt’s CFO said that Reckitt would “… absorb a significant part of higher prices through efficiency and better buying. We are passing some pricing onto consumers but we minimise that through programmes we have… to absorb those cost increases.”

Examining some large brands, The Wall Street Journal wrote that Unilever was already completely dependent on higher prices for growth. For Reckitt Benckiser, two brands in three product categories have already suffered volume declines.

It is not just packaged goods. AB InBev, the global beer company – home of Budweiser, has been raising prices as well. The Wall Street Journal reported that AB InBev has been raising prices since fourth quarter 2021. AB InBev is also focusing more on its high-end, higher priced such as” Michelob Ultra, hard seltzers ready-to-drink cocktails” rather than its “value segments” of Bud and Bud Light.

With inventories extremely low after the manufacturing hit from coronavirus, car dealerships are maxing out prices on new vehicles. Prices are so inflated that, according to The Wall Street Journal, buyers are going miles and miles out of their districts to find an affordable new car. One individual flew from California to Nevada to secure a new vehicle he could afford. “In extreme cases, dealerships are charging $35,000 to $40,000 above MSRP on luxury cars that normally sell for $80,000 or more.” Customer comments in the article indicate that it is the brand that is taking the anger over the huge increases over MSRP. Some people have stated that they may never buy from a dealership again after deciding to buy from Tesla. With no dealerships, Tesla controls the sale.

Brand owners must recognize is that there is quantity of sales and quality of sales. Sales based on higher prices with lower volumes are dangerous. Fast food restaurants have this same challenge: raising prices when there is less customer traffic. Passing costs off to customers, brands risk turning off remaining customers.

Brand leaders should already have invested in price elasticity research. Understanding brand-price elasticity is key to developing and implementing a pricing strategy. Increasing prices can be effective for certain powerful brands. So, brand owners need to figure out in advanced just which of their brands are powerful enough to sustain continuing higher prices. And, since money is part of the Trustworthy Value Equation, if the brand experience is awful such as the car dealerships are creating, the brand’s worth diminishes. Furthermore, price gouging affects trust. 

As one financial analyst told BBC News, “Consumers may not be able to keep stomaching price increases and so there is a risk they purchase less of the popular brands and/or trade down to cheaper options. The big brand companies therefore face the risk of having to cut their prices just to maintain sales volumes.”

For example, a very well-known fast food brand thought a promotional price that had been used for years for a multi-item meal would work again. Using research franchisees were surprised to learn that the brand’s meal promotion would only sell at a lower price. The brand had lost so much customer-perceived brand value that the original price point for the meal was too high; the brand was just not worth the pirce. Once the price for the meal was lowered, customers started purchasing the promoted meal. Not knowing in advance what price your brand can and cannot carry is a sin. The question is whether brand owners are assessing their brands’ ability to carry those heavier customer prices at retail. 

Pricing strategy is critically important. Business sets the price, but customers set the value. Technology changes, talent availability, AI, financial and accounting software, supply chain and other issues are important. But, having the right pricing strategy reflecting the right customer-perceived value is very important as well. Without delivering value for customers, there will be little sustainable value for shareholders. 

The way you set prices does not just influence demand. Pricing drives brand perceptions. Pricing is a wallet issue, but it is also a psychological issue. This is more than evident in the customer comments from The Wall Street Journal dealership pricing exposé. Making sure the brand’s price is right is critical. Organizations must know the answers for these five rules for in advance of raising prices:

1. Understand how your brand is differentiated from its closest customer-defined competitor 
2. Understand the customer-perceived trustworthy brand value of this differentiation
3. Understand customers’ willingness to pay
4. Know what the price competitiveness is within the brand’s customer-defined segment
5. Measure and track changes in price elasticity

Unless there is customer-perceived value there will not be shareholder value. To increase shareholder value, a brand must be the most efficient and productive provider of a branded offer that customers value. As The Wall Street Journal noted, those brands that have “weak” volumes are brands that “… are more likely to lose market share when they raise prices….” Some brands are already showing fewer sales. The interesting point is that the Wall Street Journal states “Investors will soon learn which brands consumers can and can’t live without.” 

These are perilous times for brands. Do not let pricing be a mere tactic used to prop up margins. Make pricing a strategic variable for generating high quality revenue growth leading to enduring profitable growth.

It was not too long ago when several business pundits decreed that brand loyalty was dead. Their reasoning hinged on their observations that people tend to go for the latest and greatest gadget rather than stick with their known brand. For those brands that bought into this nonsense, too bad for you. Brand loyalty is not dead. There is ample evidence that people are still loyal. However, people may have switched loyalties during the pandemic for a variety of reasons such as availability, omnichannel shopping approaches and inflationary prices.

Recently several high tech service brands in earnings calls have offered that brand preference is making a huge difference in profitability.

PayPal stated the following in its latest Earnings Call:

“And clearly, there is no other digital wallet close to us in terms of scale, and there’s overwhelming consumer preference for PayPal in those wallets. And our super app is showing extraordinarily promising early results. Now we only rolled that out fully in the middle of October across all of iOS and Android, so we’re 3 or 4 months into it. But what are we seeing? We’re seeing double the average revenue per active account when somebody uses our app versus just checkout. When somebody uses the app their propensity to churn is 25% less.”

Additionally, PayPal said:

“And in fact, in some studies, it would suggest that PayPal is second only to debit in front of credit in terms of preference from consumers. And as I noted earlier, like you’re beginning to see more and more preference for brand ecosystems. And, we think that’s only going to become more relevant as we go forward, which is part and parcel to why we’re emphasizing our digital wallet strategy so much because when someone is using our app, is using our digital wallet, they’re much more likely to be engaged with us in other parts of our ecosystem, including off-line transactions.”

Let’s understand the relationship between brand preference and brand loyalty. Preference and loyalty are not the same. A brand must have brand preference if it wants to grow brand loyalty. Brand preference is the necessary stage for reaching True Brand Loyalty.

Think of a ladder.  The goal of marketers is to move your brand up the brand preference ladder, the pinnacle of which is True Brand Loyalty.

A brand preference ladder is a staircase leading from non-usage to True Brand Loyalty. The context for the brand preference ladder is the audience for the brand. This ladder is a reflection of the strength of the customer’s commitment to the brand relative to competitive offers. Moving the customer up the ladder from commodity consideration to True Brand Loyalty can have a big impact on revenues and profitability.

PayPal stated that their strategy is aimed at building brand preference. And, building preference leads to True Brand Loyalty. True Brand Loyalty leads to quality revenue growth which, in turn, leads to enduring profitable growth.

Every brand desires sales. But, there are two kinds of sales: quantity of sales and quality of sales. Brands must build both. A lot of high tech brands focus on building quantity of sales, in other words gaining subscribers or daily users. Think of the ongoing streaming wars. The headlines are always about the number of subscribers. However, at some point, as Netflix is finding out, there is a limit to the quantity of subscribers. Quality of sales reflects building sales based on brand loyalty. Brand loyalty anchors quality of sales. This is why it is critical to move customers up the brand preference ladder.

Commodity consideration is the first rung on the brand preference ladder. With commodity consideration, customers view a set of brands as being basically the same. The customer is actually indifferent and is willing to consider any of these brands. “Willing to consider” is not the same as “I would put this brand on my short list of preferred brands.” Commodity brands deliver the very basics – the greens’ fees – of the category. In most cases, the only differentiator is convenience and price.

The next rung on the brand preference ladder is Short-list brands. Short-list brands are the small set of brands that are among the customer’s top three choices. There are reams of data indicating that most people tend to have a set of three brands; more than three brands being too many. Being on the customer’s short list is good, but not good enough to be a truly strong brand. It is better to be the preferred alternative within the short list.

The stage of building brand preference is next three rungs of the brand preference ladder: Top Three Preferred Brands, Second Choice and First Choice. Top Three Preferred Brands means each of the brands is a preferred brand. If your brand is one of three, your brand can only be picked 33% of the time. Second Choice and First Choice reflect the customer’s “ranking” of these brands. Obviously, you want your brand to be the First Choice.

A preferred brand is a favorite brand. Preference is a much stronger concept than satisfaction. For example, customers may be satisfied with a particular brand of printer. However, they may also be satisfied with two or three alternative brands. When shopping for a printer, they may default to price. Satisfaction is necessary but it is not sufficient. You may have a car that needs service. The service you receive is satisfactory. However, you may be unhappy with the car brand because it needed this service.

The ultimate goal is to move a customer from preference to True Brand Loyalty. Loyalty is not the same as frequency. Too many so-called loyalty programs build frequency but do not really build loyalty. Frequency can be bought by bribes. Bribes build deal loyalty not real loyalty. As many streaming brands now find, having a free trial period does not always translate to subscribership. Free-trial users may be going for the deal in order to watch special content.

True Brand Loyalty is based on a customer’s commitment that this brand is the best value, where value reflects the total brand experience (functional, emotional, social benefits) relative to the total costs (money, time, effort).

True Brand Loyalty is the highest rung on the brand preference ladder. True Brand loyalty brands are preferred even though there may be a price premium when purchasing. Imagine that a customer’s second choice brand costs 10% less than the first preferred, favorite brand. Data show that a truly brand loyal customer will still choose the preferred brand even though the second choice brand is 10% less. The ultimate goal is to increase the number of people who feel this way. Again, data show that a brand does need a lot of these true brand loyal customers. Having 10% of your customers as true brand loyalists can be very profitable. There are examples showing that 10% core loyalists can account for 40%-50% of sales. Several years ago, Macy’s noticed that it hard core loyalists in its loyalty program accounted for 49% of sales. 

Reviewing Snap’s latest earnings, The Wall Street Journal wrote that one of the reasons Snap is “faring better than Meta” may be Snap’s user preference. “For years now, Snap has touted its popularity among a younger crowd. That appears to be paying off now more than ever as Meta deals with attrition of some of its younger users. Snapchat daily active users grew 20% year-on-year and 4% sequentially in the fourth quarter.” The Wall Street Journal commented that investors, spooked by Meta’s ‘gloomy” results and outlook, punished Snap with a sell-off. “This time investors were wrong. On Thursday, Snap reported fourth-quarter revenue growth of 42%. This was 12 percentage points above the midpoint of its guidance and more than 10 percentage points above Wall Street’s estimate.” Preference is a big deal.

Additionally, The Wall Street Journal commented on Twitter’s recent unremarkable earnings. Somewhat bewildered by Twitter’s ad engagement strategy, The Wall Street Journal pointed out, “Twitter’s superpower is its highly engaged superusers. The people who love Twitter would probably tell you they can’t live without it.  But their value is in their loyal usage, not their ad engagement. Unlike those of Instagram, YouTube or TikTok, Twitter’s most active users aren’t idling on the network in hopes of relaxation or escape. They are there to work, to learn or to get specific information they need. That kind of use case doesn’t seem like the best place to expect customers to engage with more ads….”

At some point is a brand’s lifespan, there are no more costs to cut, no more ads to run, limited users to reach. The successful brands will be the ones that focus on the quality of sales and the True Brand Loyalty of users. True Brand Loyalty requires that brands build brand preference, moving customers us the brand preference ladder.

In a loyalty program report, Deloitte, the global business service company, wrote that a first priority for loyalty programs is to drive specific behaviors that will help brands reach financial, customer and brand objectives. Knowing which behaviors will move a customer up each rung of the brand preference ladder is a key to success. Or as Deloitte stated, “(Loyalty) is a tangible value creation lever… that is becoming increasingly essential across industries.”

Climbing revenues, brand value and profits require customers climbing the brand preference ladder.

Horizon Media, the media services agency, just issued a report outlining the latest trends to which brands must respond. Two of these trends, Restivism and Untact, create the platform for one of branding’s biggest challenges. Brands need to market to my physical and virtual shared experiences. Brands must address my simultaneous experiences in the real and in the ideal worlds. Both are me: one is the corporeal me while the other is the essence of me but not physically me. One is me and one is meta-me.

Untact is all about contactlessness. It is about QR codes, virtual reality, artificial reality and avatars. It is about simulated reality but a reality nevertheless. Restivism is all about putting my mental and physical health first, moving away from the demands of “work hard, play hard.” Restivism promotes napping, walking and exploring. Restivism happens in current society.

What we learn from the Horizon Media report is that brands should understand 1) the drive for self and communal meaningfulness while at the same time, 2) address the drive to escape to an alternate self in a different plane where life can be meaningful as well. 

There once was an Age of Me. The Age of Me was the flowering of the Boomer culture. It was self-focused and self-indulgent. The individual ruled. Now, there is substantive me and simulated me. “I am he as you are he as you are me, And we are all together” … this finally makes sense.

A primary piece of understanding market segmentation is that people have different needs based on different occasions. In other words, what brand you want is due to who you are, why you want this brand and in what context (how, when, where) you want this brand.

This idea still holds. The difference is that the who is now me or meta-me; the why is what I need for me or meta-me; the context is reality or metaverse.

In the real world, I may need to find brands that advance my physical self. In my alternative reality, I may need brands that enhance my virtual self. In my real world, I attend to myself so I stay sane in the game. In my alternate world, I am the game and can game the system.

Horizon Media highlights six other trends. Privacy, civic integrity, our focus on the mystical, our embrace of NFTs and the role of tech in saving the environment.  But, the idea that we can now be real and virtually real, with needs and occasions on both sides, is unique and challenging. This is more than meaningful moments and virtual test drives. As Horizon Media stated, these trends are designed to wake up brands to a new world where people are “…acting with agency in order to do better, be better and build better.”

Yes, but, these trends also point to the idea that we have two options: apparent and alternate realities. One option is current, real society; the other is simulation of reality. This theory owes a lot to French philosopher Jean Baudrillard who wrote Simulacra and Simulation in 1981. As Monsieur Baudrillard described the simulated environment, it is “the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time.”

Some brands are already focusing on satisfying our me’s and our meta-me’s. Let’s look at the world of restaurants. For the substantial me, Chipotle makes Food with Integrity easier to obtain. Chipotle’s brand experience is heightened by its use of technology. Ordering is made hassle-free via its Chipotlanes drive-ups and its Digital Kitchen which only takes online orders. For the meta-me, Chipotle now has creative content for Twitch, Tik-Tok and Roblox, the online game and game creation platform, with its own currency Robux.

A restauranteur, Stratis Morfogen, is resurrecting the Automat concept for the digital world. It is a modern contactless experience. The old Automat required customers to buy food from vending machines using coins in slots. Mr. Morfogen has today’s technology in mind. Customers can order via kiosks or phones. Selections are placed in compartments waiting for pick-up. It is the epitome of Untact.

Then, there is the explosion of virtual brands. Virtual brands exist and do not exist at the same time. Virtual brands exist in ghost kitchens. In one case, a restauranteur has created “virtual turnkey brands” that restaurants can use to expand their offerings. Per Restaurant News, a lunch only virtual brand can now provide breakfast or dinner by using one of the turnkey virtual brands.

The meta-me environment goes well beyond eating. According to the Horizon Media report, we seek personal well-being in reality. We wish to enhance our physical self. At the same time, as reported in The Wall Street Journal, we can engage in metaverse exercise. “With a Meta Quest 2 headset and virtual-reality workout apps like Supernatural, FitXR and Holofit, you can burn a lot of calories in the metaverse. Just mind the motion sickness, and wear a sweatband.”

Where do you want to live? While we seek an easier home life in reality while learning to cope with the complexities of endemic coronavirus, we can also be owners of palatial real estate in the metaverse. Financial Times just wrote a long article about the millions of dollars that are being spent on buying virtual property. “For many homeowners, the Covid-19 pandemic forced a change in perspective on where they wanted to live. Why stay in a cramped apartment in the smoggy city when you can Zoom into your meetings from a country farmhouse or Edwardian manor or Martello tower?”

Where do you want to shop? Many brands from the “real world” are buying space in a virtual mall where they sell goods. As shoe brand Adidas stated, use the platform “… as a way of expressing our excitement around the possibilities it holds.”

What kind of sports fan are you? We can follow the NFL teams vying for the Super Bowl win in reality and we can experience soccer in the Etihad, the Premier League champions’ home stadium. Again, according to Financial Times, Sony and Manchester City FC are creating an “… accurate metaverse version” of the Etihad. Your avatar could visit for free, for now. Sony and Manchester City FC describe this effort “as an exercise in the elusive fan engagement that clubs so desperately want to get right….” In other words, expanding the fan base.

Farhad Manjoo, an op-ed columnist for The New York Times wrote that we are living in a world where the physical and virtual mingle. He wondered if our physical world “… can even function in a society where everyone has one or several virtual alter egos?” 

Who knows?

In the meantime, brands now face the challenge of marketing to multiple me’s in two separate existences. 

There is ego and alter ego. There is me and meta-me. 

Welcome to the Age of Me’s.