Introducing The New Consumer (on Substack)

Why I’m here — an experiment.

Hi, I’m Dan Frommer, and this is The New Consumer… on Substack.

For almost six years, I’ve been publishing The New Consumer — a publication about how and why people spend their time and money — as a member-supported newsletter and website. It’s been great!

When I launched in 2019, I specifically chose not to use Substack as my publishing system: I wanted complete control over my site’s visual appearance and user experience, including specific layouts and fonts. I’m still very happy with that decision.

In that time, however, Substack has grown and evolved into a large, interesting platform for writing, reading, and discussion.

Substack now does a lot of things that I wouldn’t build into my own site (and wouldn’t want to), including Notes, Chat, live video, and certain features for revenue and audience growth. It has crossed into the everyday lexicon, at least among my target readers. And it has figured out some network effects, which are rare in the media business.

So, as an experiment, I’m now publishing this Substack Edition of The New Consumer, in parallel with the original.

You’re welcome to subscribe and become a member here or there — whichever you’d like. And if you’ve never heard of The New Consumer or me, here’s some info, or six years of work. (Recent topics: David Protein bars, what Ozempic users are buying a year later, a big profile on Row 7, and why YouTube is the future of TV.)

Here, in addition to publishing, I’ll test some of the community features, including comments (mostly for members) and Notes. I may experiment with other post formats. And I’ll keep track of — and share with you — whether Substack’s growth engine is meaningful enough to justify the extra effort, and the less-Frommer-y user experience.

Why bother? As I often say when I’m talking about consumer brands, distribution wins championships.

There are great reasons to have direct-to-consumer businesses, including the best user experience, more granular data, and the truest ownership over the customer relationship. I’ll always aim to make my site the nicest, best way to experience The New Consumer, and treat it as my primary home on the internet.

There are also great reasons to have wholesale businesses, where there’s another party involved in distribution, marketing, sales, and experience design. Nike recently learned this the hard way, leaning too heavily into DTC at the expense of its third-party retail business.

That’s how I think of this Substack Edition: Substack has built an interesting store and community, with real distribution power.

It’s already a top referrer to my site, thanks to great writers here like

Emily Sundberg

,

Rachel Karten

, and

Casey Lewis

, who have all linked to my work. I’m also a big fan of

Lenny Rachitsky

,

Kristen Hawley

,

Drew Austin

,

Snaxshot

,

The Angel

,

The Transcript

,

Alison Roman

,

Sprezza

,

Ground Condition

, and

Why is this interesting?

, among the very many Substack-powered newsletters I subscribe to.

So I’m curious to see how The New Consumer will do here. Just as I publish a version of my work on platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram, I’ll publish a version on Substack. The portability of tools like Stripe, our secure payments platform, make this impressively easy.

Membership costs the same here — $200 per year, or $20 per month — and includes access to my ongoing newsletter, the Substack Edition archives, and my ~quarterly member Office Hours. There’s also a $500 per year Founding Member level, if you find my work especially valuable. (I should note that I also do consulting projects and advisory work, and speak at private and public events, if you really like what I do. Let’s chat.)

I also send occasional free emails, including my popular Consumer Trends research highlights, so don’t hesitate to sign up as a free subscriber. If you’re interested in sponsoring The New Consumer, and unlocking more of my work for free subs, please get in touch.

And if you’re already a paid member of The New Consumer (thank you!) and want to use Substack as your main reader, or want to use the community features here, email me and we can figure it out — dan@newconsumer.com.

Here goes! Thanks, as always, for your time and support. I’ll see you in the comments.