Things to Know 10/31
The NYC Marathon Festival, Time's Innovation Awards, Athlete Contract Season, Mount to Coast, Noah Droddy, Emotional Ads, Gary V, and Apple.
The New York City Marathon is the weekend. I’ve shot around it 4 different times and it’s honestly my favorite of the major marathons. I’ve got plans with the fam this weekend so I won’t be able to make it. A big thanks to several of you that extended me an invite to your events. Next time for sure.
I was planning to curate some top activations around the race but my friends at
did a great job so I’m going to share their post.Someone (who?) curated the full INSANE schedule of peripheral events and it’s absolutely wild. A big thank you to the NYCM for not cracking down on “guerrilla marketing” because all of this extracurricular activity makes this race THE center of road running IMO. It’s an absolute celebration of running and I’m here for it. Seriously, actual festival schedules don’t look like this. It captures so much of the cultural zeitgeist in road running. Can we just formalize this as an actual festival? How cool would that be?
Let me know what you see this week that stands out. I’d love to hear about it.
Bandit won a Time Magazine “Best Inventions of 2024” for their 6 Pocket Nova Crop. Time gave out 200 of these awards in various categories. Also making the list were On’s Lightspray, Hyperice’s new wireless Normatec Boots, Omius Cooling Headband, and Garmin’s Heart Rate Monitor with a sports bra fit.
Cool to see products from small brands being noticed and recognized.
The year is winding down and that means it’s contract season for athletes. I hear from friends that the market for female athletes is on fire. Super cool. I’ve got a good post in the works on this. Stay tuned.
I was texting with someone else in the industry about how we are seeing a crazy amount of targeted ads from Mount to Coast. If you’re not familiar they are a Chinese brand with a nitrogen infused supercritical foam (meaning it’s soft, light AND responsive). They have 3 shoe models and the brand is targeted toward road ultra running - a niche within a niche but perhaps a smart strategy because they can own it all by themselves. I first discovered them at TRE last year. Fun fact, Renegade was the first US shop to carry Mount to Coast.
Tracksuit dropped a report on the effect of emotion in advertising. Plenty of great data and examples on how emotion drives differentiation, relatability and newness. Emotional campaigns decrease price elasticity and decrease price per click. The five key positive emotions to lean into are surprise, empathy, excitement, happiness and curiosity. You have to drop a name and email but you can access the report here.
I read Gary Vee’s new book Day Trading Attention. It’s an interesting read on social media related marketing strategies. Lots of info in there.
Be niche. Be unique.
The legend Noah Droddy hung it up this week. An absolute personality of the track and road world here in the US. We will never forget the phenomenon that was his 2016 Olympic Trials as the “mustachioed, beer-drinking hero". I made a fun film for Salomon about his story and we had a lot of fun. Congrats Noah!
Inspiration from OG Apple. Empathy. Focus. Impute. (great word)
Last but not least - VOTE!!!!!
✌️ Happy Halloween!
-M
Thanks for the shout! I put together the schedule alongside another mod at r/runningfashion. An impossible number of events to attend, but exciting to see! Hopefully Boston gets a bit more this year.