How to keep your brand culturally relevant without chasing trends.
Studies show over 80% of people check their phone within ten minutes of waking. We’d bet most don’t make it to five.
Before your feet hit the floor, you’ve already consumed a full course of culture — hot takes, soft launches, brand flops, campaign drops, and a trend that peaked while you were still asleep. The feed never sleeps. And if you’re building a brand in 2025? Neither can you.
Within minutes, you’ve absorbed a week’s worth of discourse. Trends have already peaked and pivoted. Celebrity soft-launches vie for attention with Met Gala looks dissected in real time across your feed; a brand’s misstep becomes a meme before the apology statement is drafted; ‘brat summer’ gets co-opted by a presidential hopeful before you’ve even made it through the album. Campaigns that felt sharp on Monday now read like strategy decks left out in the rain.
This is the environment brands must learn to move through. With speed, yes, but also with precision and perspective. We know, we know. We often fantasise about giving it all up and living out the rest of our days on a small Greek island, too. But here we are, in the thick of it: a cultural landscape where attention is neither guaranteed nor static. Relevance doesn’t come from reaction alone, it comes from interpretation, and the brands that excel aren’t always the loudest or the earliest. They’re the ones fluent in the subtext, clear on their narrative, and confident enough to move at the rhythm of now.
Continue reading on our Substack, Public Opinion.
