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But new research poses some serious questions about it's longterm success.
The next step in Meghan’s long awaited American Riviera Orchard launch seems to have been revealed over the weekend, revealing that Meghan’s latest-still-yet-to-launch product line may find a home in two American malls next spring. Is this a helpful strategy to crescendo the months of waiting? Spoiler alert: its probably not, from what new research shows.
Discover the latest update on Meghan's brand, American Riviera Orchard, including potential outdated plans and trademark status, along with valuable elegance lessons.
October dealt another blow to Meghan Markle’s brand marking the official fourth time her brand has been rejected, this time with a protest filing from the well-established gourmet brand, Harry and David. The well known pear-brand wrote a letter to the US Patent and Trademark Office outlining the likelihood of confusion between Meghan’s products and their “Royal Riviera” line. Makes sense, right?
This comes after weeks of reports that Meghan couldn’t find a CEO for this brand and the name alone, American Riviera Orchard, wasn’t trademarked due to the geographic reference to the American Riviera. Further, the logo itself needed to be updated due to indistinguishable lettering. The United States Patent and Trademark office has given her 3 months to update these things. According to their website, the submissions are marked as “pending”, so we will see what happens.
It’s officially been eight months since Meghan announced this brand to the world with an Instagram account and website. The website still remains a blank landing page, and the Instagram page is dropping followers as nothing has been updated to the page since then. She has yet to break 1M followers on the page, which will likely get there once there is some movement. If you haven't watched the breakdown from when American Riviera Orchard first launched all about the PR Mistakes made, you should definitely go check that out after this, especially regard the strange timing of this brand.
However, after months of silence despite a few placements on celebrity instagrams with ARO branded jams, dog biscuits, and a tease at a wine line, nothing has manifested. Some say it is likely because she wants to launch in tandem with her upcoming Netflix cooking show… but the trademark challenges tell another story.
This week it was revealed that ARO may be featured as part of a new retail strategy in partnership with Netflix at two mega-malls in Texas and Pennsylvania. This is a new and frankly surprising twist in the saga of this brand, but it may not get her where she wants to be.
Meghan's brand, which has been filed to sell everything from jams, to pillowcases and glass and cookware, is projected to be sold in the King of Prussia mall in PA and the Gallaria of Dallas. This is a part of Netflix’s initiative called “Netflix House” which aims to “lure consumers off their couches” and feature items from its most popular shows like Bridgerton, Squidgames and Knives Out.
Netflix House featuring Meghan’s products faces a myriad of challenges with this strategy to launch American Riviera Orchard, the first of which is an incredible demographic debacle.
Anyone who is creating a successful brand has to aim to attract a certain type of person… that is the number one defining decision for a business to consider and discern how to best connect with them. American Riviera Orchard, and Meghan’s brand overall has seemingly aimed to attract the affluent enthusiast who wants to live life like a “royal” and host elegantly. The price point on quality goods like this is likely going to rival Meghan’s favorite brands Goop and Flamingo Estate, that sell Olive Oil and Honey for $60-75-- a steep price point aimed to attract high-income earners with disposable income.
The trouble, however, is that this demographic is highly unlikely to be the same one that comes to Netflix House to purchase a Squidgame costume in the aisle next to Meghan’s line. In order to compete, she will have to lower her price to turn a sale and thus attract a different audience of consumers. In fact, the fact that it’s in a mall is likely already doing this.
Over the last decade, malls alone are on the fast track to closing, which is a dramatic difference from them as the central communal hub of the 80’s and 90’s. Just from 2017 to 2022, the number of malls declined 17% and the national mall vacancy rate is 110% higher than the overall average retail vacancy rate.
This is bad news for a prime location for a product launch. Further, the demographic has changed. Young people, aged 18-34 make up 58% of traffic to malls in 2024 (mainly because of the movie theaters usually housed in these locations) and the younger demographic is twice as likely to be there as those over 55+, the demographic that on average has the high income to purchase a $60+ sponge like the one's at Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop.
Certainly there are high-end brands like Armani at malls for the high-earners, but stats show this isn't as effective as their online store and they are intentionally going to purchase something from there, not look for something to pique their interest.
If this is the launch strategy Meghan is waiting on to launch her brand… why? And who is advising her on this? Is this really the best plan? From looking at these stats alone, it is a huge mistake for her launch. She already has everything she needs to open a simple Shopify store, sell online, and post to her instagram for traffic… only if she has all the legal issues resolved.
If she needs the status of Netflix to get her brand on the road, she is missing some key components to what makes the other brands she admires, like Goop and Flamingo Estate, successful. You would never find a royal brand, like King Charles’ High-grove brand, featured in a Disney store-- an equivalent to how she is trying to look vs the outcome.
Also, this placement in the Netflix House is billed as, “leaning into the Duchess’s status of being a “beacon” of inspiration and arbiter of affordable elegance.” Elegance is a hallmark of The Swish and certainly piques our interest, but is elegance something we can just slap on as an aesthetic?
Considering this strategy of bringing ARO to market as an arbiter of Affordable Elegance seems to be a total misunderstanding of elegance and a flippant marketing tactic. Elegance isn’t about making things look expensive or in Vogue (cheaply, as noted in the “affordable” verbiage) but rather, elegance is something so much bigger that has the legs to go further. Meghan has never really exhibited classically feminine elegance, (see the video analysis all about that, too) and certainly this move to have her branded dog biscuits sold right next to the Stranger Things Ice Cream doesn’t fix this. The description of Meghan's new brand by Netflix really highlights the commercialization of artistry and cinema that has become a cash grab… the opposite of elegance.
It is hard to imagine her products being a front-runner alongside other Netflix branded merchandise. There IS a way to do affordable elegance, with high-quality alternatives like lab grown diamonds , in fact the royally-backed brand called Analucia Diamonds is a great option for real affordable elegance. (Use code SWISH 20 for 20% off when you purchase that, or her new revolutionary jewelry cleaner-- highly recommend).
Affordability and/or wealth has little to do with real, true, elegance.
This same wrong approach to elegance that Meghan takes was highlighted over the weekend with Princess Catherine who was abominably placed in the headlines for her return to her duties and criticized grossly for “aging”. This story is nasty considering all that Catherine has overcome with her cancer diagnosis this year, but marks a real problem for feminists who criticize truly elegant women for not using botox and naturally aging. This is reprehensible and completely unacceptable.
Unfortunately, many women don’t see that real beauty, grace and elegance have very little to do with aesthetics and instead is all about values and duty. Elegance isn’t something you can just slap on a brand but is rather the deep embodiment of values, artistry, timelessness, and being attraction.
It doesn't just mean making something fancy, in fact it has nothing to do with money at all. By understanding real elegance and mastering it's art, we can use that power, like Princess Catherine has, to supersede the kinds of disasters that she experienced this weekend. I’ve been studying the Art of Elegance for years and outlined the frameworks of my findings in the Ultimate Elegance Guide you can download for Free.
Meghan seemingly has a mistaken approach towards elegance, and if she is simply looking for a cash-grab, then she should move forward with a retail launch of American Riviera Orchard. However, by looking at the statistics of this strategy, and the type of audience she is wanting to attract, it is clear she is in some real trouble here and this move is a big mistake.
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