The Wild New World of Brand Collabs

Brand partnerships have historically been about creating products and campaigns to trade exposure for brand equity (KAWS & Uniqlo), to cross-pollinate audiences (Taylor Swift & Post Malone’s “Fortnight”), or to delight a shared audience with like-minded brand values (LEGO & Nike). Like influencers who understand that growing a following requires teaming up with other influencers, brands realize that they must do the same to find new audiences and establish legitimate clout. As the space becomes crowded, a recent wave of attention-grabbing collaborations suggests that the more unexpected and over the top, the better. Take, for example, the E.l.f. Cosmetics & Chipotle makeup line or the Balenciaga & Erewhon fashion show.

In a somewhat cheeky manner – MSCHF, a Brooklyn Arts and Fashion collective that has made randomness its brand – has been dropping all kinds of bootleg limited-edition products lately, perhaps satirizing the very idea of the brand collab. One of their recent stunts was with Rihanna's Fenty Beauty: "Ketchup or Makeup?"Buyers got packets with either Fenty lip gloss or Heinz ketchup. No one knew what they were getting, but that was precisely the point—they weren’t selling a product; they were selling chaos… and people ate it up. In an age where attention-hacking is cultural and brand currency, successful collabs are less about utility and more about creating moments that spark conversations online and in real life. Ketchup or Makeup was a collab built on social experience, not exclusivity, with content opportunity in the vein of a TikTok challenge that invited every participant to share the absurdity of their unique makeup or ketchup reveal.

Even when brands seem mismatched, they can create magic together by pushing creative boundaries into the bizarre. These collaborations often go beyond just products, focusing on playfulness and sheer absurdity to get street cred. Unexpected pairings remind us that the most exciting opportunities come from stepping outside the ordinary, sometimes shifting brand loyalty in the process.