ICYMI

Hi! Hello HSR <3 Happy Sunday!!!

While half the internet is in the desert this weekend, I escaped to the mountains with my husband for our final ski weekend of the year, which is honestly one of the places I feel the most grounded. There’s something about being in the mountains that always gets me back into the right headspace. Less noise, more clarity, and a reminder that if you want the life, the business, the body, the relationship, the vision, you have to do the work.

And that’s been a big theme for me lately. Do the work. Not just in one area, across the board. I got back to the gym this week and was lifting heavy (obviously in my Oner Active) but I’ve also been thinking about what it means to do the work mentally, creatively, emotionally, and professionally too. Showing up when it’s not glamorous. Staying consistent before anyone claps for you. Building the kind of life where you do not just want a seat at the table, you know how to own the room once you get there.

But speaking of the desert, it’s hard to ignore everything the Biebers, basically the king and queen of Coachella this weekend, have done to completely take over the festival and make it feel relevant again. This year feels like a level of cultural energy around Coachella we honestly haven’t seen in probably a decade. My entire TikTok is full of it. The billboards on the drive into Indio, the brand activations, the physical takeovers, the whole spectacle of it all. And then on top of that, Rhode drops spotwear right into the middle of the conversation and suddenly it feels like the entire internet is talking about Bieberchella. Databutmakeitfashion reported that searches for pink hoodies were up 47% on Google this morning after Justin’s set.

I personally was not sent the Rhode PR package for the Bieber collab, and I wish i was considering my hormonal acne is currently flaring up, and I have been relying on my current favorite Korean skincare patches from OOTD that can basically flatten a cystic pimple overnight. Please know this will not stop me from ordering the Rhode ones the second they go live tomorrow morning because I absolutely will be trying them.

And after the success of the 818 outpost, I might even end up ordering the Sprinter hydration packs too. For now, I’m still loyal to LMNT my current favorites that were founded right here in Bozeman, Montana. These exact ones I’ve repurchased 8x on Amazon. But the point is, this is exactly what makes Coachella such a fascinating marketing moment for consumer brands. It proves time and time again that physical media is not dead. If anything, it’s back and thriving. In a world where everyone is fighting for attention online, the brands willing to show up big in the real world are the ones cutting through. And that’s exactly why this week’s case study is about.

One of the Q&As I got this week was about my dream podcast guests, and I’m very happy to announce that over the next two weeks, I’m actually recording with a few of them, which I cannot wait to get into. Katie is flying into LA tonight, and I’m laughing because we are both literally on planes headed to LAX and have not seen each other in five weeks, which feels actually insane.

So let’s get into it!!!

This Week’s Mood Board

Stop Doing Pilates & Start Doing This Instead

Will you get shredded by removing your morning matcha?! The answer is no!!

Last week on Hot Smart Rich, I sat down with Senada Greca, to talk about why strength training is the missing link for fat loss, confidence, and real results. We got into the fitness myths keeping women stuck, why building muscle is the real glow-up, and why lifting weights isn’t something to fear, plus her experience training Kim Kardashian, creatine, cardio, and diet culture.

This episode is your reminder to stop shrinking, take up space, and build a body that feels as strong as it looks while we also cover mindset, discipline, nutrition, realistic timelines, and handling negative self-talk.

This is one of my favorite messages I got this week, “This episode is exactly what the world, and most importantly women, need right now. Thank you for such an amazing episode! - HSR Angel”. Honestly the impact I saw come out of this episode with the angels was truly amazing. I have been tagged in 100’s of stories on Instagram with you going and getting that strawberry matcha and enjoying life!!

So, if you haven’t seen it yet, now’s the time 👀

Consumer Gossip

all the brands, people, places, things we’re gossiping about this week

Women’s Health & Beauty

Media, Entertainment & Creator

Consumer, E-Commerce & Retail

Tech, Business & Investing

Kylie Jenner Quit Alcohol… And Launched This at Coachella Instead

Sprinter did not pivot. Kylie just finally put the brand in the right category. Here’s how I see it.

Sprinter was never really an alcohol story. It was a Kylie Jenner branding story stuck inside the alcohol business. And those are two very different things.

Alcohol looks sexy from the outside. A good can. A cool founder. Nice lighting. But the actual business is hard in all the least glamorous ways. Thin margins, messy distribution, retail dependence, and constant pressure to perform. You are not just selling a drink. You are fighting your way through an entire system that is controlled by distributors.

That is why Sprinter always felt a little off to me. Not because Kylie can’t sell a drink. She can sell anything. But because alcohol never felt like the clearest expression of what she actually sells best. Kylie’s real superpower has always been beauty, image, routine, aspiration, skin, getting ready, glow, maintenance. She sells the visual result and the world you get access to by being part of it.

So when Sprinter announced this week that it’s moved from vodka soda into hydration packets with collagen peptides, hyaluronic acid, and all this beauty-from-within language, I was like, this makes WAY more sense. The company announced k2o by Sprinter as a beauty-led hydration extension, sold in 20-count pouches for $39.99 across its own site, TikTok Shop, and soon Amazon. That is not just a new product, it is a fundamentally better business.

Hydration is a completely different game. It is lighter. Easier to ship. Easier to sell online. Easier to build into someone’s routine. Easier to reorder. Easier to turn into habit. Which means easier to turn into a real consumer business.

Alcohol never really belonged in Kylie’s world

Kylie’s biggest wins have always lived closest to beauty. That is where her credibility is strongest. So why would you want a product sitting at the center of that world that dries you out, works against your skin, and cuts directly against where beauty culture is going? Beauty from the inside out is not a niche idea anymore. It is the whole market.

That was always the contradiction. A vodka soda brand under Kylie Jenner was interesting because of who launched it but honestly never really made sense. A skin hydration product under Kylie Jenner is interesting because it actually fits her narrative. The language in the press release says exactly that. Kylie says beauty has always been at the center of everything she does and that k2o fits whether you are getting ready for a night out or resetting the next day. That sentence gives the whole strategy away because this is not really a “hydration” play, it is a beauty routine in the beverage world and that is a much smarter place to be.

She did not start over. She just swapped the engine.

What is smart here is that she did not kill Sprinter. She changed what Sprinter means because Kylie of all people will understand how business works. It is expensive to shutter something, and even more expensive to create a brand from scratch.

Officially, k2o is an extension of the brand. Fine. But if we are being honest, this feels much bigger than an extension. It feels like the company realized the original category was the wrong one and moved the brand into a better one without having to publicly announce it wasn’t working. That is very different from starting over.

You keep the name. You keep the awareness. You keep the audience. You keep the digital footprint. But underneath it, you put in a completely different business model.

Old Sprinter was the life of the party. New Sprinter is the thing you take after. The brand went from nightlife to recovery. From social drinking to skin maintenance. From occasional use to routine use. And that shift matters because routine products build better businesses than occasion products do.

The really interesting part is how this fits next to 818

And here is what no one is saying….but of course I did my homework.

The same K5 Global named in the k2o announcement is also cited in the release as the firm behind 818 Tequila and Khloud Foods. K2O is incubated by Night and they’re backed by K5. And once you see that, this whole thing starts to look a lot less random. Because if 818 already owns one drinking occasion, why would you want Sprinter trying to compete in basically the same universe?

That is messy portfolio strategy. A complementary product is much smarter than a cannibalizing one. Get drunk with 818, recover with Sprinter. One owns the night. One owns the morning after.

That is a much cleaner system I think that is part of why this move is more strategic than people realize. Sprinter is not just more aligned with Kylie now. It is more aligned with the broader Kardashian-Jenner consumer universe. Instead of fighting for the same moment, these brands can work together inside the same lifestyle loop. That is how you build a portfolio, not just a product.

The real product is not hydration. It is habit.

Most people are going to get distracted by the ingredients. Electrolytes. Hyaluronic acid. Collagen peptides. Lower sodium than Liquid I.V. Fine. That is not the most important part. The most important part is that hydration can become something you do all the time and that is where the money is.

Alcohol is occasional and especially for Gen-Z who is barely drinking at all. Hydration is habitual. That one distinction changes everything. A habit product gives you repeat purchase. It gives you routine. It gives you a much better shot at subscription behavior, stronger retention, and higher lifetime value. It does not need a birthday, a girls trip, dinner plans, or a festival to make sense. It can attach itself to a Tuesday.

And once a product makes sense on a Tuesday, the business gets a lot more interesting. The launch line says, “After the party, it’s time to hydrate beautifully.” That is not just cute copy. That is the bridge. They are taking whatever social energy the alcohol brand had and converting it into a next-day ritual. That is the unlock.

Coachella was not just a launch. It was the point.

Launching this during Coachella was smart. Because Coachella is not really a festival anymore. It is a content machine. According to the Los Angeles Times, it draws more than 125,000 people a day across two weekends and has become one of the biggest content-making weekends of the year, with brands using it as a massive marketing stage through parties, activations, and influencer-heavy experiences. One executive in the piece said it best: “It’s Coachella, then it’s everything else.”

If you are going to relaunch a brand identity as Kylie Jenner, you do it on the biggest possible stage. You do it where the need state is obvious and the content that creators and attendees are creating is built in.

It is hot. People are dehydrated. People are drinking. People are taking photos all day. People care what they look like. People are posting everything in real time. In that environment, a beauty-forward hydration product explains itself which is why this was such a smart move.

The same Los Angeles Times piece quotes one agency founder calling Coachella a “content wonderland” that gives brands a huge bank of content. That matters too. Because this launch needed assets. Proof. People holding it, using it, packing it, recovering with it, posting it. The brand needed new visual language fast. Coachella gives you that in a weekend.

This is also why I keep thinking about Khloud

This move makes the bigger Kardashian-Jenner portfolio thesis feel more obvious to me.

If Skims is the giant, some of the next biggest winners in this ecosystem may come from food, beverage, and consumables. Not just because those categories are hot, but because the right ones create repeat behavior. And repeat behavior is where these celebrity machines get very powerful.

That is why Khloud is interesting. That is why Sprinter is interesting. Not because every launch will work, but because you can see the architecture starting to form. Products tied to routine. Products tied to identity. Products that live in the everyday, not just in the occasional celebrity flash and that is a much bigger opportunity than people realize.

And it is also why Sprinter moving out of alcohol matters beyond Sprinter. It suggests an understanding of where the real money is.

HSR Takeaway

Kylie Jenner did not just launch a hydration product. She corrected the business model.

Sprinter makes more sense as recovery than as alcohol. It makes more sense next to 818 that way too. And it makes much more sense in Kylie’s beauty universe, where skin, glow, and beauty from the inside out are already the language.

Coachella was the perfect place to do it because it gave her the biggest global stage to teach people how to see the brand differently.

That is the real lesson here. A strong brand name is not enough if it is trapped in the wrong category. But if you already have attention, distribution, and a name people know, you do not always need a new brand.

Sometimes you just need a better business underneath it.