Coco Chanel once said: “In order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different.”
The fashion icon’s words may have been about couture, but they couldn’t be more relevant to fmcg today.
In an overcrowded marketplace, products need more than marginal gains or functional benefits to cut through. Standing out on shelf – and in communications – is no longer a luxury or a creative bonus. It’s business-critical. Visibility drives consideration, and consideration leads to conversion.
Yet despite this urgency, most brands continue to sound exactly the same. Message hierarchies have become painfully predictable: ‘low fat’, ‘high protein’, ‘sustainably sourced’, ‘plastic free’, ‘live cultures’. These were once differentiators. Now, they’re category hygiene – baseline claims that fail to excite or engage. It’s marketing by numbers, and shoppers are tuning out, overwhelmed by a wall of worthy sameness.
There is another way: behave out of category.
If everyone else is playing it safe, do the opposite. Zig when they zag. Break free of default behaviour. Take your cues from unexpected places – fashion, tech, entertainment, automotive – and use those borrowed signals to shift how your brand appears, sounds and behaves. The result? Fresh distinction. Mental availability. And, crucially, cut-through.
This approach works across the entire brand ecosystem, from how you package your product to how you communicate its story.
Take the rise of ‘chaos packaging’, for example – a deliberate rejection of category norms designed to catch the consumer’s eye. Vacation suncream is packaged in a whipped cream can. Flo tampons arrive in a pastel ice cream tub. Engine Gin comes in what looks like a motor oil tin. And Liquid Death sells mountain water in a tallboy beer can.
These aren’t gimmicks – they’re strategic choices, borrowing visual and material cues from other industries to stand apart.
Breaking the rules
But this principle also powers great PR and marketing. Journalists, much like consumers, are bombarded daily with inbound brand messages. Most pitches are formulaic, forgettable and easy to ignore. But those that behave out of category? They stand a chance of being remembered, or better yet, written about.
Take Lucky Saint, the alcohol-free beer brand that bypassed the category’s usual wellness narrative. Instead of positioning itself around ‘no hangovers’ or ‘clean living’, it channelled religious iconography – commandments, saints, monastic cues – to build a brand world that feels cultish, elevated, and confident. It tells a story not about abstaining, but about belonging. You’re not missing out, you’re joining something bigger.
Or look at Oddbox, the fruit & veg delivery brand on a mission to fight food waste. Rather than echoing the same worthy sustainability narrative, Oddbox zagged. Around Valentine’s Day, it launched ‘Soilmates’ – a parody dating app for leftover vegetables. Customers uploaded their wilting produce, swiped on complementary ingredients, and were served up a recipe to match. A fun, tongue-in-cheek activation that generated headlines, buzz, and – crucially – distinction.
Then there’s Hoka, the performance running brand. Instead of spotlighting elite athletes or fuelling its marketing with fitness influencers, it opened a community-focused convenience shop to showcase its range. It was a warm, nostalgic nod to fmcg, using the language of local retail to tell a story about accessibility, ease, and community. Not just how fast you run, but who you run with.
The takeaway? Be brave. You’re not just competing with your immediate rivals. You’re competing for attention, both with consumers who have infinite choice, and with media gatekeepers who decide what makes the cut.
So act differently. Think differently. Behave differently.
Do what Chanel did. Break the rules. Step outside your lane. And become irreplaceable.
Paul McEntee is the founder of Here Be Dragons
No comments yet