📂 How kale rose to popularity (yes, really)

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If vegetables had a celebrity A-list, kale would be at the top.

It’s everywhere — in salads, smoothies, and even Beyoncé music videos. It’s the default superfood, something people buy not just for health — but for status.

But not long ago, kale wasn’t a wellness icon. It was actually often overlooked as just a salad bar decoration. So how did it go from forgotten leafy green to must-have superfood?

The PR genius behind kale’s rise

Amanda Natividad @amandanat TIL kale (yes, the vegetable) had its own publicist, Oberon Sinclair. Sinclair also popularized... acai berries. 🤯 More in this interview from 2015. https://www.papermag.com/kale-famous-oberon-sinclair--1427654647.html?rebelltitem=2 style="no-color: #1B95E0">#rebelltitem2 5:14 PM • Jul 18, 2021 0 Retweets 16 Likes Read 3 replies

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In the early 2010s, a New York PR exec named Oberon Sinclair saw an opportunity to make kale famous. What started as a playful guerrilla marketing experiment quickly took off — a ripple effect that turned kale into the ultimate “it” vegetable.

She believed kale deserved better, but instead of pushing facts and nutrition labels, she took a different approach:

1. She made it seem bigger than it was. Sinclair created the “American Kale Association” (which didn’t actually exist) to make it feel like a nationwide movement with credibility.
2. She put kale in the right places. Instead of pushing ads, she got it on high-end restaurant menus, making it aspirational before it hit the mainstream.
3. She let influencers do the work. Celebrities like Gwyneth Paltrow, chefs, and health gurus started talking about how they love to use kale — and soon, everyone had to try it.

By 2012, kale was unstoppable. U.S. kale production skyrocketed 60% in just five years.

It wasn’t the vitamins that made it famous — it was positioning.

What do kale and SaaS have in common?

Kale isn’t the only thing that needed a marketing makeover. SaaS has a lot more in common with it than you’d think:

🥬 People need education

Kale needed recipes. SaaS needs clear use cases. You can’t just drop a product into the world and expect people to understand its value.

🥬 It’s not always flashy

Vegetables aren’t exciting. Neither is software — until you portray it as something desirable.

🥬 Influence drives demand

Kale didn’t win over everyone first. It won over the right people. The best SaaS companies do the same — start with industry leaders, and the rest follows.

The takeaway: create demand, don’t chase it

The best SaaS companies don’t just sell tools — they shape narratives. The real magic happens when an overlooked product becomes something undeniable.

Kale’s rise wasn’t about health benefits alone — it was about placement.

People saw it on celebrity plates, in high-end restaurant dishes, and suddenly, it wasn’t just another leafy green — it was the leafy green.

So what’s your SaaS version of that?

Where can you place your product so it becomes the solution people start to associate with success?

What’s the thing your customers should care about but don’t yet?

Hit reply — I’d love to hear your thoughts.

—Corey