You’ve heard of fashion mavens like Donatella Versace, Marc Jacobs, and Tom Ford. Might Nigel Xavier be next?

The designer was relatively unknown before he appeared on the second season of Netflix’s Next in Fashion, a competition series geared toward finding up-and-coming designers. Xavier’s upcycled denim looks won him the competition, not to mention $200,000 and thousands of Instagram followers. It also earned him another opportunity: The chance to create an exclusive collection with Rent the Runway.

The Xavier collaboration is one of the latest marketing moves by the subscription fashion service to assert itself in pop culture and build relevance after pandemic restrictions left many people without a need for designer clothing, leading tens of thousands of subscribers to cancel in March 2020.

Fast-forward to now, and a lot has changed: Earlier this month, the company reported having 141,205 active subscribers, its highest ever. In Q4, it brought in $75 million in revenue, up from $64 million the year prior.

The service, which went public in 2021, rolled out a remodeled subscription program last month, adding an extra item to subscribers’ monthly shipments. The change is being promoted through a campaign titled “Era of Extra,” which debuted last month.

“We wanted to start the year off with a bang, and we did by adding an extra item into every shipment for every single plan, so 25% more value for the same price,” Anushka Salinas, president and COO of Rent the Runway, told us. “We really are encouraging our subscribers to think about extra—trying something extra special that you might not have otherwise rented with this extra spot, trying a designer you wouldn’t have otherwise worn—and really sort of pushing the boundaries that you can only do with a subscription to fashion.”

Keep reading here.—JS

Building out the perfect media plan is as complicated as picking what to watch. But it can be done. The trick to achieving reach and scale for your brand and mastering the what-I’m-watching small talk? Stick to the hits.

Paramount delivers some of today’s most popular content—for everyone, everywhere. That’s right: We’re talkin’ about the most-watched programming, including big sports events, top comedies, iconic reality shows, enthralling dramas, and kid-friendly favorites.

Paramount is also home to Yellowstone, the most-watched show on TV; CBS, America’s most-watched network for 14 years straight; and Paramount+, the country’s fastest-growing streaming service.

Go big with Paramount.

It wasn’t long after Devika Mathrani joined NewYork-Presbyterian in July 2021 that she decided the health system’s old brand needed to go.

“I think it was the first week of August that I had a conversation with my incredible CEO, Dr. [Steven J.] Corwin,” Mathrani, NewYork-Presbyterian’s chief marketing and communications officer, recalled. “I said, I think I need to blow up the brand a bit.”

At the time of Mathrani’s arrival, NewYork-Presbyterian was using the tagline “Amazing Things are Happening Here,” brand messaging that had been in place for years following the 1998 merger between The New York Hospital and The Presbyterian Hospital that created the new institution. The tagline and accompanying black-and-white documentary-style ads, in which patients talk about their experience with the health system, had been praised, yes—but it was past time for a change, Mathrani said.

“The reality was that the campaign and the message had gotten quite dated,” Mathrani told Marketing Brew. “It was all about the white coats and the nurses being amazing, but it didn’t really bring the consumer into the story.”

Keep reading here.—KS

Roku is once again teaming up with a retailer.

The connected TV platform is striking a measurement pact with grocery delivery platform Instacart to measure the effectiveness streaming ads have on purchases, Roku announced today.

• The partnership will combine viewership data from Roku with consumer purchase information from Instacart to measure whether and to what degree viewers make purchases after seeing ads on Roku.
• The aim of the partnership is to help consumer packaged goods brands with their advertising goals on Roku, Kristina Shepard, Roku’s head of US brand sales, told Marketing Brew.

Ahead of a broad rollout, Roku and Instacart conducted pilot studies in 2022. In one pilot with a personal care brand, 60% of viewers who made Instacart purchases after seeing the brand’s campaign on Roku were new customers, Shepard said. “We were able to prove to the brand that combining Roku’s footprint with Instacart [meant] we’re able to really drive new consumers for them,” she told us.

Get in line: The partnership with Instacart, which comes just days before Roku is slated to present to advertisers at the annual NewFronts, is the latest in a series of pacts Roku has struck with retailers. The connected TV company has previously struck up arrangements with Kroger, DoorDash, and Walmart to tie advertising to purchases and, in the cases of Walmart and DoorDash, enable shoppable ads that allow viewers to check out directly from their TV screens.

Roku has also partnered with Microsoft to measure streaming advertising’s effects on internet searches and ad clicks, and earlier this year, it teamed up with Best Buy to sell new TVs and target ads using Best Buy customer purchase history.

“This is a really important addition to all of our other full-funnel partnerships,” Shepard told Marketing Brew.—KS

There are a lot of bad marketing tips out there. These aren’t those.

Tie the knot: Eyeball the latest wedding trends, courtesy of Pinterest and Zola.

Ducks in a row: Here are some tips for turning ideas into content that you’ll actually post.

Study time: Next time you’re doing market research, try turning to social media.

Brace for impact: Undertone’s High Impact advertising solutions are built to drive full-funnel results. From display and CTV to awareness and performance, see how Undertone’s cross-channel solutions can deliver for your brand.*

^{*This is sponsored advertising content.}

We are officially 2 weeks away from the marketing event of the year: The Brief. That means you have only 2 weeks to purchase tickets to unlock a powerhouse panel of marketing superstars.

We have oodles of marketing geniuses attending, including CEO Maria Dempsey and founder Lo Bosworth of Love Wellness, a health and fitness service catered to women.

Come to hear Maria and Lo discuss how Love Wellness has expanded its audience and mission and how they’ve built a close, collaborative relationship as founder and CEO. Get your tickets TODAY!

Catch up on a few Marketing Brew stories you might have missed.

• A marketing agency brought on two AI interns in January. They’re hired
• The big TV network shakeups happening before upfronts
• Opinion: Why the agency of record model needs to die