Why Luxury Brands Fade (and How to Fix Yours)
You want your brand to feel alive. Magnetic. Impossible to ignore.
But instead, your marketing feels like Hamilton's move to Ferrari—hyped, high-investment, and heartbreakingly underwhelming when it counted most. Sorry Lewis 🤍
Your message falls flat. People scroll right past, assuming you’re just another pretty-but-passive placeholder. They file you under #inspo but there's zero hand-raising to join your world with cold hard cash.
The issue isn’t your marketing, no matter how hard you convince yourself. Cos I know you've just invested in another 30-day Reels challenge. I see you!
No, it's the voltage running through your brand. And that’s what we’re about to fix.
This is for high-end service providers, experts and coaches whose work is utterly exquisite but whose brand lacks teeth. If you’re secretly wondering why the world doesn’t see your genius—even though you know it's there—welcome.
Let’s electrify that brand so you become unignorable.
We need a brutally honest chat about your biz
Most people don’t realise their brand is forgettable until it’s already curled up in the corner, gathering digital dust.
They throw cash at ad agencies, build endless funnels, hire 17 VAs — and still, the inbox stays emptier than a Soho House at 9am. (Wow, I turned the sass up today!)
Here’s the thing: you can’t out-funnel weak positioning.
No algorithm, ad spend, or viral hook can save a brand that doesn’t actually say anything. Your message isn’t landing because the signal is scattered.
The world's most desirable brands? They don’t just look expensive — they leave an energetic imprint. They become a meme, a reference, an inside joke dropped into the group chat. They show up in other people’s moodboards. They get name-dropped in rooms you haven’t even entered yet.
That’s brand voltage. It’s what makes you impossible to copy even when someone tries. It’s what makes people say, “That’s so you” without needing to see your name in the byline.
So let’s have a ruthlessly honest chat about this:
- Do people quote you back to yourself? Do they repeat your phrases, your punchlines, your worldview? Are you being referenced in other folk's Substack?
- Would your brand be recognisable if we stripped away every visual element? Are you unmistakable?
- Can someone — anyone — explain what you do and why it matters in one delicious sentence?
If your answer is a nervous giggle, a vague shrug or a word salad of explaining, we’ve got work to do. Because right now? You’re wallpaper. Tasteful, tonal, inoffensive. And completely unremarkable.
But once this clicks? Everything changes. Your marketing becomes an amplifier, not a lifeline.
Your content gets shared. Your message sharpens. And your brand?
She walks into the room before you do.
Why Marketing Can’t Save a Bland Brand
Most people assume their marketing isn’t “working.” The real issue? They’re trying to serve caviar off paper plates.
You can’t out-funnel weak positioning.
Marketing isn’t a defibrillator. It can’t shock life into something that doesn’t have a pulse.
You can’t buy your way into desire with Facebook ads and “half-baked and spinning my wheels” launches. No matter how polished your website is—or how many ‘engagement hacks’ you’ve saved on Instagram—if your brand doesn’t move people, it won’t convert them either.
Luxury personal brands don’t scream. They're alive with certainty. There’s a silent confidence to a brand that knows what it’s doing, has claimed it's place and has truth to serve up—and it starts long before anyone sees the content.
So here’s the uncomfortable truth no one wants to say out loud:
Marketing only works when your brand does.
You need to decide whether you’re in the business of chasing attention... or commanding it.
Because when your brand has depth, focus, and an unmistakable point of view, even a single post becomes a lighthouse, guiding the right clients home to you. And when it doesn’t? You’ll need to shout louder than you were ever meant to.
The Brand Resurrection Blueprint
Every iconic brand that clawed its way back from irrelevance followed the same seductively predictable pattern.
It’s not a template. It’s undeniable truth. And once you see it, babes, you’ll never tolerate mediocre branding again.
Step one? Ruthless reduction.
They didn’t add. They subtracted.
Not to bland minimalism—but to something more savage, raw and potent. The non-negotiable brand DNA. The real essence that couldn’t be copied, bootlegged, or content-marketed away.
Because here’s the brutal truth: you don’t need more. You need clarity with bite.
Next, they stopped selling a product and started building a myth.
Not a tagline. A mythology. A bigger story people long to belong to—rebellion, elegance, discipline, freedom, obsession. It’s the difference between flogging a trench coat and offering an identity. That’s the game.
And finally? They had the audacity to ignore the market.
They stopped asking “What’s trending?” and started deciding “What aligns with our values?” That’s the shift that gets you out of the carousel of content and into the archives of culture. It creates culture.
And when it clicks?
People don’t just buy.
They buy in.
They choose your world. They evangelise it. They use your brand as a filter for their own decisions.
That… is what I call Brand Voltage.The magnetic charge that turns your soul mission and offers into movements.
Case Studies: How Cult Brands Reclaim Obsession with Brand Voltage
If you stack the world’s most iconic brand turnarounds side-by-side, you’ll spot a pattern. And unfortunately, it always starts with a fall from grace 😲
Heritage on the brink. Burberry.
Burberry was everywhere… and that was the problem. The once-regal check became recognisable—too recognisable—and it morphed into the chav uniform of the 2000s. Overexposed and ultimately, undesirable. The turnaround came when they began gatekeeping, built a price moat, elevated themselves with exclusivity.
Mundane becomes the myth. Erewhon.
A grocery store, rebranded as a shrine to $20 smoothies and sun-drenched aspiration. They didn’t sell health—they sold cultural relevance. With wellness on the rise, health became a flex. The most basic experience, reborn as the most current because they mirrored and elevated culture.
The prestige problem. Saint Laurent.
Beautiful. Historic. Irrelevant. Until Hedi Slimane kicked down the doors and gave it a pulse again. Suddenly, heritage was remixed into hedonism. Elegance now had edge. Reverence met rebellion—and culture took notice.
The masterstroke. Apple.
Not a brand. A belief system. Jobs didn’t relaunch a product. He delivered a manifesto. “Think Different” turned devices into identity. Product ownership into ideology.
Each brand broke and rebuilt itself—ruthlessly. What they all did?
- Stripped down to core essence
- Constructed mythology instead of marketing
- Reclaimed culture instead of chasing trends
- Injected brand voltage until the brand became a beacon
Inside The Business of Luxury Premium, I’ll show you exactly how they did it: what they eliminated, what they obsessed over, and the precise pivots that transformed them from overlooked to legendary.
Even more important? You’ll see what personal brands can steal—and how your own resurrection arc might just begin here.
How Personal Brands Can Follow the Same Arc
It’s easy to read these case studies and think, sure, but I’m not Burberry or Apple. The truth? The same voltage switch that flipped their trajectory applies directly to personal brands, especially high-end service businesses.
Here’s how you can run the arc yourself:
Burberry – From Overexposed to Icon
- Before: By the early 2000s, Burberry’s signature check was everywhere — from market stalls to football terraces. The heritage brand was overexposed, diluted, and drifting away from true luxury. It was embarrassing to be seen wearing their famous check.
- The Shift: Under Angela Ahrendts and Christopher Bailey, Burberry reclaimed its codes, invested in digital innovation, and rebuilt its trench coat as a cultural signal rather than a cliché. More recently, Daniel Lee has injected a new creative-commercial balance. Similar playbook, same energy.
- The Outcome: A once-mocked pattern became aspirational again. Burberry regained credibility as a British luxury powerhouse and its cultural authority snapped back into place. They ditched the discounts and doubled down on creating demand from desire.
- Lesson for Personal Brands: Overexposure isn’t the end — it’s a signal to ruthlessly refine your brand. You can reclaim your positioning by tightening your story, amplifying your true DNA, and showing restraint.
Refine, Don’t Add
Burberry didn’t reinvent itself by piling on more. It tightened the story, doubled down on brand codes, and cut the excess. For you, that means dropping the five different “offers” and sharpening one clear positioning line that people can repeat for you.
Simplicity is the most luxurious signal you can send.
Erewhon – Turning Groceries into Glamour
- Before: Erewhon was, at its core, just another health food store in Los Angeles after it moved there from Boston. Shelves of “good for you” produce and smoothies weren’t inherently exciting unless you where a health nut. They didn’t start their business to be the darlings of glam groceries.
- The Shift: By romancing everyday health basics with elevation and exclusivity — $20 smoothies named after influencers, curated collaborations, and ritual-like shopping experiences — Erewhon transformed grocery runs into status statements with health and wellness at the core. They started as a tiny shop and exploded when they doubled down on health being a cultural symbol.
- The Outcome: Erewhon became shorthand for a lifestyle: healthy, aspirational, clean, cultish. Suddenly, what was once mundane (buying healthy food) became a symbol of identity and belonging.
- Lesson for Personal Brands: Even “boring” industries can be elevated. It’s not what you sell but how you frame it. Service businesses, from accounting to coaching, can turn the ordinary into desire if they infuse taste, story, and ritual.
Elevate the Everyday
Erewhon glamorised groceries. You can do the same with your “ordinary” service. Maybe bookkeeping becomes financial security for freelancers on the edge of burnout, or fitness coaching becomes a rite of passage into a strong and healthy mid-life.
Don’t underestimate how framing, ritual, and language can turn the mundane into magnetism.
There are no such things as boring businesses, only boring stories about businesses.
Saint Laurent – From Revered to Resonant
- Before: Yves Saint Laurent was respected, admired, and steeped in heritage. But the brand risked becoming a relic — prestigious but stagnant, more museum than a movement.
- The Shift: In 2012, Hedi Slimane dropped “Yves” from the name, sharpened the brand codes, and injected a rock’n’roll aesthetic. It was bold, controversial, and ruthlessly modern.
- The Outcome: Sales surged, the brand reconnected with culture, and Saint Laurent became the label of the moment. Relevance replaced reverence. Desire turned into obsession.
- Lesson for Personal Brands: Reputation isn’t enough. You can’t coast on what you’ve done. You must make people want you now—not admire you for the past. Relevance beats nostalgia every time.
Chase Resonance, Not Reverence
Saint Laurent didn’t rest on its legacy — it risked backlash to stay culturally alive. To use the same strategy, the key is to refresh your voice, visuals, and point of view to resonate with today’s cultural moment rather than relying solely on past achievements or expertise. If you talk/write like you’re teaching at Oxford, shift your tone of voice to one that is authentic, confident, and sometimes edgy or provocative.
Apple – From Near Collapse to Cultural Religion
- Before: In the mid-1990s, Apple was struggling. Fragmented products, poor sales, and a fading brand story had left it on the brink of irrelevance.
- The Shift: Steve Jobs returned in 1997, axed the excess, and rebuilt Apple around one myth: “Think Different.” He put obsessive design and storytelling at the centre, turning computers into cultural objects of desire.
- The Outcome: Apple transcended tech. It became a religion of taste, aspiration, and identity. People don’t just buy Apple products — they buy into Apple.
- Lesson for Personal Brands: Clarity creates obsession. Strip away distractions, build around a central myth, and present your work not as tools but as symbols. When your brand embodies an idea bigger than the product, you become unignorable.
Build a Myth, Not a Menu of Offerings
Apple’s turnaround hinged on one central myth: Think Different. Every product echoed it. For you, the myth could be “luxury is about restraint” or “success is quiet confidence.” When your work points back to an idea bigger than itself, you stop selling services and start selling belonging.
Run this your brand through this process and you stop worrying about being overexposed, overlooked, or outdated. Instead, your brand becomes a magnet that draws people in because it feels alive.
Over to You…
So here’s the moment to be honest with yourself: are you quietly magnetic, or totally ignorable?
If you recognised pieces of your own brand in Burberry’s overexposure/over compensating/overworking, Erewhon’s ordinary into extraordinary, Saint Laurent’s leaning on past wins, or Apple’s product > brand, that’s not a bad sign. It’s a spark of energy. Every one of those brands was once stuck exactly where you are now.
The difference is, they chose to refine instead of doing the same old thing. They didn’t wait for the market to tell them what to do — they returned back to their brand DNA, built a myth, and dared to show up in ways that made them unignorable again.
And that’s the opportunity sitting right in front of you.
Forget pouring more money into marketing. Forget chasing the latest platform, trend, or IG hack.
If your brand voltage isn’t strong, the campaigns won’t land anyway.
But when you shift the current — when your story, POV, and presence hum with your undeniable energy — everything else amplifies effortlessly.
This is the part where most service providers hesitate. They fear stripping back, fear standing out, fear taking a position. But what feels risky is often the safest move of all: making yourself unforgettable.
Because here’s the real test: when someone leaves a room after meeting you or scrolling past your work — do they carry your name with them? If not, it’s time to change that.