Crown Royal's purple bag might be the most famous packaging premium in history — the one piece of liquor swag everybody's grandma kept. Now Juicy Couture gave it the full Y2K treatment: rhinestoned velour bottle bags in three colourways matched to Crown's flavoured whiskies, plus velour tracksuits at $90 for the hoodie, rhinestone logos front and back, J zipper pulls, the works. WWD got the exclusive on the drop, which runs through December 31 — with $75,000 committed to RAISEfashion regardless of sales. Real talk tho: this collab wrote itself twenty years ago and somebody finally noticed. If your client's packaging is beloved enough, it graduates into apparel. Ask what their purple bag is.
Lufthansa and agency Serviceplan dropped the Travel Etiquette Collection, seven pieces printing the unwritten rules of flying: "Middle seat gets the armrests" runs down a pullover sleeve, "Text your mom after landing" lives on the tote, and a cap settles the clapping-on-landing debate. Here's the twist: none of it is for sale. Just 14 giveaway winners through Lufthansa's socials, and outlets from Riyadh to Mumbai to Milan covered it anyway — fourteen garments earned global press, because every frequent flyer who saw one had an opinion. That was the whole point. Scarcity did the media buying for free. Your clients all have unwritten rules their customers already argue about (the office, the gym, the golf course). Put them on a sleeve and let the debate do the marketing.
We said Halloween started early last issue. It's now fully an August business, and the drops got weirder (better). Disney's new Villains collection styles the roster as a vintage metal band — Maleficent headlining a "Villainous Tour," the Evil Queen in black-metal font — running $34.99 tanks to an $84.99 lenticular Spirit Jersey. Universal's Horror Nights 35th-anniversary line spans Stranger Things, Sinners, and Ozzy. Mickey's party merch leads with a $90 Headless Horseman Loungefly and a $110 glow-in-the-dark pin box — collectors, not costumes, drive the spend. Even Bath & Body Works went full Nightmare Before Christmas. The Q4 seasonal calendar starts in Q3 and if your clients' fall merch isn't in production this week, they're already late.
Pick any client. Take half a percent of their annual revenue. That's what they have to spend on promo, says sales coach Nicole McNamee, and the gap between that and what they spend with you is your growth plan. Top 1% seller, $50M+ career book, and now a commonsku partner. She and Bobby get tactical in our latest skucast. Listen now →
On Wednesday we streamed 15 Years Ahead, and if you missed it live, the replay is worth your lunch break. Panel one: Bobby Lehew talks the industry's next era with PPAI's Drew Holmgreen, Fairware's Denise Taschereau, Gemline's Jonathan Isaacson, and our own Catherine Graham. Panel two: Kara Parkinson makes the case that merch isn't stuff, it's media, with marketers who've run budgets at Campari and beyond. Supply chains, AI, and why branded merch is quietly beating digital for attention. Watch on demand →
📌 Disney's D23 wasn't a fan convention, it was a shopping event with panels. Collectors worked virtual queues like a second job for a $1,149 pin set capped at 1,000 per character.
🍩 Wear Pokémon merch into Krispy Kreme on August 22 and score a free Original Glazed. Merch as dress code, doughnut as reward. We're into it.
⚾ Chicago's own Pope Leo XIV inspired a White Sox hat giveaway so popular the team expanded it to every fan in the ballpark. Holy demand curve.
🦉 Drake's OVO teamed with MLB on a 2026 capsule covering the Blue Jays, Yankees, Dodgers and more. Baseball's fashion era keeps rounding the bases.
👜 Nordstrom's new limited-edition totes are being tipped as the next Trader Joe's bag craze.
🌮 Taco Bell, Tajín, and Peso Pluma cooked up a limited menu-and-merch drop. Three brands, one very spicy Venn diagram.
⚡ AC/DC is opening a pop-up in every Canadian tour city, with city-exclusive shirts on sale a full day before anyone else, plus a shot at a signed Angus Young guitar.
🏎️ Disney and F1 put Lightning McQueen on track at Monza, backed by a franchise where $19.1 billion of its $21.5 billion lifetime revenue is merchandise.
🧢 Timberland and New Era put MLB on the iconic wheat boot. Workwear meets fitted-cap energy, and honestly it works.
🍦 '47 and Baskin-Robbins turned ice cream branding into a wearable line. The food-merch summer is officially a food-merch fall.
🦫 Buc-ee's dropped Hey Dude shoes and they nearly sold out on the spot. Never bet against the beaver.
🍗 Buffalo Wild Wings brought back early-2000s fan favourites with a throwback menu and matching merch.
🎯 Stuck at a sales plateau? Nicole McNamee can diagnose it in five minutes (ask her about the TJ Maxx test). New skucast episode here →