Hello hungry minds,
This week’s tasting menu of ideas is served hot and spicy:
This FTSE 100 leader asked a dangerous little “What if?” and rewrote their playbook. Extreme questions aren’t risky, they’re the only way to 10X your future.
Robots on the high street, space breaks on the horizon, AI in your ear. It’s official: the future is here. And it didn’t even bother to knock.
Whether you want to make music with rocks or intricate animals from food, there’s a wealth of inspiration when you go down the Insta rabbit hole.
From taboo topics to chaotic stunts, these campaigns show how bold ideas spark conversation and pull audiences in.
Have you seen these fake snacks yet? They’re a delicious reminder that imagination will never go out of style.
Tuck in and taste what’s next…” 🍴✨
Angelique
‘What if…’ Is The Only Question That Matters
You know the scene. Boardroom. Laptops aglow. Everyone dutifully filling in their SWOTs like they’re doing corporate Mad Libs. Competitor benchmarks, tick. Market trends, tick. Consensus nodding, tick.
It’s safe. It’s tidy. It’s also the corporate equivalent of decaf—technically fine, but nobody’s buzzed.
Then the CEO asks: “Will this 10X our future—or just keep the lights on?” Cue: silence so awkward you can hear the fluorescent buzz. Because deep down, everyone knows: safe strategy = safe results = no champagne.
So how do you break the rut?
You ask a question so extreme, it rewrites the whole playbook.
📖 TRUE STORY: Laura’s Dangerous Little “What if?”
Meet my client, (let’s call her Laura), head of insights at a blue chip giant. Her R&D team was pumping out perfectly respectable innovations. They made sense on paper, tested well, blah, blah, blah.
But something felt off. They were all incremental baby steps. Nothing truly breakthrough. So she came to me for help. I took her through my take on what was going on with the consumers they wanted to win.
Half way through she blurted it out: “What if we don’t know what our future consumers really want and need to start over with a blank slate?”
That single “What if?” blew the doors off.
We ditched the boardroom and took her team to LA for some fresh inspiration—a full-on insights safari packed with juice bars, biohackers, goat yoga, and barrio bodegas.
One week later, her team wasn’t talking incremental growth. They’d pivoted into whole new categories, chasing insights they could literally taste, smell, and touch.
Today, her company is leading markets they once thought impossible.
One extreme question did what a thousand tidy SWOTs never could.
🧪 Why Extreme Works
Safe questions keep your brain on autopilot. Extreme questions? They hijack your imagination like a 3am rave.
A 2020 Harvard Business Review study found companies clinging to tradition averaged 5% growth. But the ones asking disruptive, uncomfortable questions leapt 25%. That’s the ROI of daring to look ridiculous before you look brilliant.
Extreme questions force your brain out of its beige cubicle and into a playground where new ideas live. The thing is your brain wants safety. But your heart longs for exhilaration. Playing it safe might keep you afloat, but it will never get you on the winner’s podium.
One extreme “What if?” can turn the world’s most forgettable meeting into the spark that rewrites your future. Here are a few of my favourites:
What if every decision we took had to be made in 60 seconds? What would we do differently?
What if a Silicon Valley startup, who knows nothing about our industry, is doing something right now that could make us obsolete?
What if we had to 10X revenue without a single new customer?
What if our biggest weakness became our greatest flex?
What if we launched a competitor to ourselves—and had to beat us?
What if we were banned from selling our product tomorrow? How else would we deliver value?
What if we had to grow without spending a penny on marketing?
What if we could never launch anything new, only reinvent what we already have?
What if we had to become profitable overnight? No excuses. No delays. What’s the first thing we would do immediately?
What if we could never hire another full-timer? How would we scale?
Try using one question in every team meeting, and give everyone 15 minutes of judgment-free brainstorming. Once a quarter test at least one of these ideas small-scale and watch your results go from beige to brilliant.
Want more?
This is the bit where most people nod politely and scroll on. But if you’d rather be the one rewriting the playbook, hit reply and I’ll share the approach that made Laura’s team rethink everything.
Wait, What?!: Sci-fi Tech Hitting the Real World
Glasses that summon ChatGPT with a tap now exist. No screens, no fuss, just everyday specs with a mic and speaker. Great in theory, until your mate suddenly becomes a pub quiz master.
A hotel in orbit is set to open in 2027, complete with a bar, a cinema, a spa, and artificial gravity. Taking luxury to new heights, this is a playground for the ultra-rich. Champagne at 20,000mph, anybody? 🤢
Beijing now has a mall just for robots, selling everything from robo-dogs to cooking bots. The real story? Robots are becoming everyday consumer goods. At this rate, owning a robot will feel as normal as buying a new toaster.
MIT’s new printer turns banana peels and coffee grounds into cups and bowls using AI and bioplastics. Beyond recycling, it hints at a future where waste isn’t waste at all, it’s raw material. Yesterday’s banana skin could be tomorrow’s coffee mug. Just don’t get them mixed up.
This “toaster” brings a dead phone back to life before you’ve even blinked, 100% charge in two seconds flat. Battery anxiety? Gone. It’s like CPR for your mobile.
The Cata-Lyst:
4 Mind-Expanding Finds We’re Tuning Into
I went down an Insta rabbit hole this week and it all started with some cute poodles made out of cauliflower, obviously. Here’s some of the cool stuff I found along the way, starting with you know what...
The Animal Kingdom in Food
Food artist @sibatable plays with their food, and I’m obsessed. From poodles to penguins, their insanely detailed (and adorable) creations turn every dish into next-level edible art. It’s the type of content and creativity I am very much here for.
©Yanko Design Official
Rock Music
Thanks to Yanko Design for the find, and the pun in the headline. This is called, ‘Sonorising Stones’ where ancient materials are turned in to mesmerising audio-visual installations. These natural elements, curated by @fd_verrecchia with artistic prints by @emilie.hirayama, harness stone’s unique vibrational properties to both produce and trigger sound experiences. Primitive matter, with a future energy that could be the soundtrack to your day.
©zeoh.3d
Porcelain Patchwork
The 3D artist zeoh.3d loves to play with reality, creating 3D-printed pieces that give crumbling everyday sculptures, walls, and buildings an unexpected update. Each one nods to the original structure and its location, but reimagines it with beautiful design and a touch of humour. It’s interactive design that makes you want to interact with your surroundings, and I’d love to see more of this on my walks around London.
©bondtruluv
Digital Street Art
This one stopped me in my tracks. Artist @bondtruluv uses VR to translate his work onto real‑world walls, but it was his post that really hit. He challenges the idea that tools define art, saying, “Narrowing down a piece of art to the tool it’s made with is way too simple.” A one‑minute read that’s well worth your time.
5 Great Marketing Moves
This week, we spotlight brands tackling stigma head-on. These campaigns show the power of creativity to break the silence, spark empathy, and drive cultural change.
Hair Loss, Reframed
Uncommon tackled the stigma of male hair loss with a witty short film and bold posters, turning a taboo subject into a moment of humour and empathy. The campaign shifts silence into solidarity by bringing the conversation into the open.
Breast Milk on the Menu
Frida and OddFellows launched a limited-edition breast milk–inspired ice cream, sparking curiosity and debate during National Breastfeeding Awareness Month. The playful yet provocative flavour choice challenged cultural taboos and quickly became a conversation starter.
Self-Exams Made Simple
Vardí Used Cars launched a striking campaign urging men to check themselves for testicular cancer. By using bold, disruptive visuals, the work turned a taboo subject into a direct reminder that a simple self-exam can save lives.
These two brands show the most powerful campaigns aren’t just seen, they’re lived. By drawing people in, they turn audiences into active participants.
Chaos-Proof Outdoor Gear
Columbia ditches glossy landscapes for survival slapstick—testing jackets against vultures, snowploughs and croc-infested waters. The brand flips outdoor advertising into spectacle, to prove its kit thrives in the chaos, not the calm.
Tourism That Speaks Your Language
Tourism Australia’s $130M “Come and Say G’day” sequel tapped local icons like Robert Irwin and Nigella Lawson to target potential visitors from different countries. By tailoring their invitation for each audience, the campaign makes a global pitch feel like a personal welcome.
’Snackfish’: The Latest Watch Word
Sources: adam.the.creator, dreamfoodUK, uksnackattack
Welcome to the age of Snackfish. Where the wildest snacks aren’t on shelves, they’re on our socials. From Pringles Big Mac Sauce to Walkers Glitter crisps, these Franken-snacks spark arguments, memes, and cravings for things that never existed.
Snackfishing is the perfect cultural cocktail: part clickbait, part chaos, and part collective daydream. We know the Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes cereal milk probably isn’t real… but what if it was? That “What if?” is the thrill.
It just goes to show that we’re always hungry (literally) for surprise, humour, and boundary-pushing indulgence. In a way, Snackfish is the new street art: temporary, provocative, and engineered to make you stop scrolling.
The takeaway? Sometimes the most powerful brand moments are the ones that never actually happened. (Yet.)
That’s it for this week’s tasting menu 🍽️✨.
Until next week, may your ideas stay spicy 🌶️
…and your days rosé 🍷.