Each week, we spotlight Marketing Brew readers in our Coworking series. If you’d like to be featured, introduce yourself here.
Kathleen Braine is chief marketing officer of 818 Spirits, the tequila brand founded by Kendall Jenner, and Sprinter Spirits, the canned-cocktail brand founded by Kylie Jenner. Prior to 818 Tequila, she held marketing roles at AB InBev, MetLife, and Samsung.
Favorite project you’ve worked on? My two top contenders are the 818 Outpost at Coachella and our recent espresso martini collaboration with Chamberlain Coffee. Outpost is a fun one because we’ve grown what we’re doing there year over year— from starting with just a presence at the Revolve Festival and surround-sound OOH to this year hosting our own mini-festival that came to life as a Pioneer-style western town. It’s awesome to see consumers so excited and engaged with the brand as they keep coming back. I also really liked our limited-edition espresso martini collaboration with Chamberlain Coffee because we brought two culturally relevant brands together to tap into a worldwide trending cocktail moment in a really fun way. That one especially was a great example of knowing your audience and looking for a compelling insight that resonates with them when building creative campaigns.
What’s your favorite ad campaign? As a marketer, I’m always looking to expand the medium of advertising beyond what people think advertising can be, so it’s no surprise that my favorite campaigns expanded what people thought was possible for advertising overall. A few that come to mind over the years are Dollar Shave Club’s “Our Blades Are F***ing Great” Campaign, which was a phenomenal piece of creative that also heralded the newfound power of digital and social advertising, or Reddit’s QR code Super Bowl Ad, which used an old technology (QR codes) on a relatively old medium (TV advertising) in a new and unique way. I also love that one for kind of thumbing its nose as the traditional concept of a Super Bowl ad and a massive ad spend. I am always a big fan of that kind of irreverence in advertising when it lands.
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One thing we can’t guess from your LinkedIn profile: I have an almost-10-month-old baby girl at home. Being a working mother at a startup like 818 Tequila has been a new challenge, but I have found that I have a better sense of how to prioritize my time and look for efficiencies throughout the workday.
What marketing trend are you most optimistic about? Least? For a while, with the advent of digital advertising, it was very trendy to talk about real-time marketing, but fundamentally, marketing tapping into culturally relevant moments is always going to continue to be a trend in my mind. I think the key is to ensure the work is authentic to your consumers and your brand—and that it’s built on real insight versus just something random that’s happening on social media. Additionally, we need to figure out the role of AI in marketing. I’ve found ChatGPT helps kick off brainstorms, but there’s no way it’s a replacement for human creatives. There’s a place for it, but we need to figure out how we work with it in a way that is positive for the industry as a whole.
What’s one marketing-related podcast/social account/series you’d recommend? I always say subscribe to the Marketing Brew email newsletter. (Really! I’ve been getting it for years, and I love the round-up of great work from which I can learn and take inspiration.) But I’d also suggest following other brands’ social accounts. Any brand in any industry can be a source of insight. I think too much marketing talk can get insular after a while, so I find it helpful to learn from my peers as they talk directly to consumers versus talking about marketing for marketing’s sake.