Brands Briefing: What brands should know before jumping into Substack

Although some brands have previously partnered with independent Substack writers or sponsored posts, launching a branded newsletter is a newer strategy more companies are actively exploring. Marketing experts say the trend will likely continue as brands search for ways to reach audiences organically outside of Instagram and TikTok.

Interest in branded Substack newsletters has surged in recent months. Erika Veurink, a writer who pens the Long Live newsletter on Substack, said she saw a spike in inquiries from brands around February, when luxury resale marketplace The RealReal launched their Substack. “I had so many intro calls,” she said. “It felt like every CMO was saying, ‘We should have a Substack.’” 

What brands are saying

Rare Beauty, which published its first Substack post on April 1, was inspired, in part, by the brand’s own engagement with the platform. As regular readers, the team was drawn to the variety of approaches brands were taking.

“It’s inspiring to look at how other brands are doing it and what their unique points of view are,” said MacKenzie Kassab, who authors Rare Beauty’s newsletter and serves as brand’s director of creative strategy. “I don’t think anyone’s doing exactly the same thing.” So far, Rare Beauty’s newsletter has focused on product development, such as how the brand’s new blush came to be, as well as interviews with team members.

Saie, which launched its branded Substack a year ago, was an early adopter. The brand has used its Substack to showcase behind-the-scenes stories, makeup tutorials tied to hit TV shows like “The White Lotus” and dispatches from fashion events. Founder and CEO Laney Crowell described the effort as a return to longform storytelling that’s hard to pull off on fast-moving platforms like Instagram or TikTok​.

“We’re not going to be doing heavy marketing in our Substack,” Crowell said. “It’s really a place where, whether you’re a Saie consumer or not, you’re going to enjoy the content.” 

Substack newsletters are rarely designed to drive immediate sales. Instead, brands that spoke to Modern Retail said they view them as community-building tools to deepen brand loyalty while developing a more distinct brand personality.

That said, the return on investment can still be significant. Saie, for example, reported a 20% month-over-month growth in newsletter subscribers this year. “That was exciting for us,” Crowell said, crediting the boost to consistent publishing and cross-promotion on other channels​.

Substack has increasingly added discoverability elements to its platform, including a TikTok-style feed that rolled out earlier this year. Crowell said that has helped introduce users to the brand. “Our Substack readers feel very new to the brand,” Crowell said. “We definitely get followers to our Substack from our existing channels, but Substack also pushes things out to the feed.”

For Loftie, the sleep wellness brand, Substack was appealing because “it wasn’t so saturated like a lot of other social platforms,” said Lindsay Tyrpien, Loftie’s former chief creative officer and currently the co-founder of The Lyle Gallery in New York, who helped launched the brand’s Substack in February. Loftie’s Little Book of Sleep newsletter features contributions from staff across departments — from personal essays to roundups of sleep-related art and culture. “Nothing in there is going to be promotional. If Loftie put out a magazine, this is what it would look like,” Tyrpien said. 

Substack isn’t plug-and-play

While a branded Substack may sound like a low-cost way to bypass social media algorithms or combat rising ad costs, it’s “not a set-it-and-forget-it” strategy, Veurink said.

“You need someone in-house who can not only execute on writing but also think through your chat strategy, how you’re engaging with other Substack newsletters and what success looks like,” she said.

Rachel Karten, a social-media consultant and the author of the Link In Bio newsletter, who has tracked the trend closely, said that the effort required often surprises brands. “Substack is such a time-intensive type of platform,” she said. To be successful on Substack, brands will “need to be consistent” and “put effort into it.”

From a legal perspective, brands should be mindful that Substack isn’t exempt from existing advertising and intellectual property laws. Robert Freund, a lawyer who focuses on e-commerce and advertising law, said that even though Substack is relatively new territory for brands, companies shouldn’t assume it’s a legal gray area. “It would be a mistake to think that the laws around advertising are significantly different just because we’re on Substack,” he said. “Truth-in-advertising rules still apply, as do rights clearance issues.”

Even Substack urges brands to be intentional. Christina Loff, Substack’s head of lifestyle writer partnerships, previously told Link In Bio’s Karten that while the platform welcomes branded accounts, success “comes from bringing a strong original perspective — not just using the platform as another promotional tool.”

Separately, a Substack spokesperson told Modern Retail in an email statement that, “as more brands and organizations publish on Substack,” the platform’s “dedicated Standards & Enforcement team that reviews content to ensure it aligns with our guidelines … helps ensure the platform remains focused on editorial integrity” rather than strictly promotional content.

For brands that are launching Substacks now, “You can get credit just for being early,” according to Grace Clarke, a marketing consultant and the founder of GraceAI. “If you’re willing to experiment, and have a plan for maintaining it, Substack can be a really efficient way to connect with your community.”

Clarke advises clients to choose one of three strategic models: a founder-led voice; an editorial “front of book” model, like a magazine; or a creative writing experiment. “The mistake is trying to do all three,” she said.

“Clients are asking me, ‘How fun can we be?’” Clarke said. “And that’s the right question to be asking.” –Allison Smith

Three questions with Full Glass Wine

No industry is spared from the effects of new tariffs, but the wine industry, in particular, is preparing for sudden shifts. Even U.S.-made wines may be affected, thanks to an international supply chain for packaging as well as certain imports like oak barrels from France. To help understand this landscape, we spoke with Louis Amoroso, president of the direct-to-consumer wine company Full Glass Wine, which operates brands like Winc and Splash.

How will tariffs on European imports affect your business?
“Currently, about 60% of what we do is domestic and 40% international. We’re buying wine internationally from across the world and all the major wine-producing countries.  And on the domestic side, it’s just sort of supply and demand. There’s gonna be more demand for California wine, which is gonna most likely increase wine prices.”

What’s your strategy to mitigate the price increases?
“Most of the conversations about how to deal with the tariffs are about how we have the least impact on the consumers as possible. We’re really focused on providing value to our customers, and so we will be reallocating purchases into different areas, like buying more California products.”

Will you pass along price increases to shoppers?
“We will endeavor to keep prices as constant as possible on the international product, and we have a fair amount of inventory. So we’ll try and keep it as constant as possible until we have to pass on price increases.” –Melissa Daniels

Quote of the week

“We look for brands that have a strong voice and ethos. What does it stand for? Does it have the fashion? Does it have the quality? Does it have the value? We also think about: If the brand wasn’t in business tomorrow, would anybody miss it? … We’re not interested in buying brands that are trendy. They’re great, and many times, those [companies] are businesses, but we’re really focused on building a brand.”

–Jonathan Greller, the co-founder and president of Consortium Brand Partners, a private-equity firm whose portfolio includes Draper James, Jonathan Adler and Outdoor Voices, on what he looks for in brands –Julia Waldow

What we’re reading

• Shein sent an email to customers telling them it would raise prices starting April 25 due to tariffs.
• On an earnings call, Rent the Runway CEO Jennifer Hyman said a revamped approach to customer service has been key to retaining customers; the team proactively calls about half of new customers in the early days after they join, explaining more how the service works.
• Supplement startup Grüns has raised fresh cash at a valuation of up to $500 million, the Information reported.

What we’ve covered

• Amazon sent a survey to sellers last week asking for information on how tariffs were expected to impact their businesses.
• Resale platforms like OfferUp and Kidsy say they’ve seen an uptick in shopping in recent weeks that seems to be tied to people looking for items with stable pricing, in light of tariffs.
• Small business owners have been on a media blitz the past week, trying to sound the alarm on the existential danger tariffs pose to small businesses.