The 20 year story of LSKD, Avvika city inspired energy drinks, and Peloton unveils strength training app...
Here’s what we got this week in the business world of health, fitness, & wellness:
🗞️ The Story - The 20 year story of LSKD.
📈 The Strategy - Avvika energy drinks using regionality.
🛍️ The Product - Peloton unveils strength training app.
The 20 year story of sportswear brand LSKD, that all started from a high school nickname.
So let’s rewind to when Jason Daniel, the founder of LSKD, was just a kid.
He was super into BMX and motocross, and was pretty fearless with it.
People were always saying things like “You’re riding loose today kid”.
And those phrases turned into his high school nickname of “Loose Kid”.
Which would then later become the name of his sportswear brand.
So the business really began in 2002 when he was 16, and it was called Loose Kid Industries.
Just selling t-shirts and other garments locally.
8 years later in 2010 he decided to quit his job and go all in on it, and shortened the name to LKI.
He took a big bet on himself because the brand wasn’t doing much and he still wasn’t paying himself.
But the breakthrough really happened in 2018, when he changed the name yet again, to what you know it today, LSKD.
LSKD then completely focused in on functional sportswear.
And made a strategic decision to ditch wholesale and just sell directly online.
Along with a huge push in influencer marketing and I’m sure you’ve seen the brand on your social feed before.
So 20 years of grit and numerous challenges & pivots along the way, all contributed to what is now a $50M sportswear brand.
The quick lesson here:
There are A LOT of lessons we can pull from this, but I want to highlight one specifically.
The first version of your business will not be the last.
Your launch does not have to be perfect.
Just launch the thing, post the reel, share the prototype.
The business will change and get better over time.
But the sooner you put it out in the world, the sooner you can learn and make the business a success.
Avvika just launched these caffeine free alternative energy drinks.
Instead of caffeine, the drink is formulated with D-Ribose, L-Theanine, rosa roxburghii, panax notoginseng, bacopa monnieri, ashwagandha, and soluble corn fiber.
Honestly, I don’t know what half those ingredients are.
And that’s okay because that’s not what I love about the product.
Here’s what I love about this:
The flavors of the drinks are named after cities.
They only have two flavors right now - Los Angeles and Tokyo.
But I’d expect future flavors to follow this same pattern.
This strategy taps into regionality.
Which basically involves tailoring your marketing and/or product to a specific geographical area.
It’s a strategy that is often overlooked and forgotten about by brands.
But usually works so well because people LOVE repping the city where they live or are from.
Creating a desire in the consumer to buy the product simply because it feels personal to them and expresses their roots.
Learn from this, and think about ways you can incorporate regionality in your product or just in specific marketing campaigns.
Peloton unveils a strength training app called Strength+.
Though it’s not released to the public yet and just in beta right now.
But it will feature full workout programs created by their trainers, as well as workouts generated by machine learning.
My quick thoughts:
First off, this new app is not revolutionary.
There are endless options of strength training apps.
But that’s okay because I still like the move by Peloton.
Mainly because it is yet another example that they hyper focused on growing their business and open to doing it in new ways.
Peloton continues to branch out with new offerings and collaborations.
Such as their partnership with TikTok at the beginning of the year, their partnership with FitBit in August, and now this new app unveiling.
All of these moves seem to be pushing the company in the right direction.
Shown by their recent investor update, which notes YoY revenue growth for the first time since 2022.
Previously they seemed closed off to the idea of working with others or venturing off the path of their prized bike that brought them to notoriety.
And this new open, collaborative, and growth minded direction they are headed makes me feel very optimistic about their future.
