Hey, it’s Alex.

First email of the year, and while I’ve been quiet on the public writing front, in the studio, it’s been the opposite.

Every aspect of the business has been firing, so I’m going to share why, and how this can benefit your brand this year.

In today’s edition, I’m going to cover:

Let’s go.

Last year, was difficult for many businesses - while both our businesses grew - it felt harder than it should have been - this year, has been the complete opposite, and what’s funny, is I knew it would be looking ahead.

I’ve personally found the best way to power through - is eating my own dog food - aka doing what I share with friends and other business owners - just as Morpheus tells Neo - "There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path" - 2026 is all about walking the path.

For me - that is writing, recording, building, planning, executing, and saying no to bullsh*t, opposed to putting up with it.

As a result - this year will see the publishing of 2 books, a YouTube channel, and 3 or 4 releases of “assets” that I believe will position Studio Almond into a global league of “How the hell did they do that?”

Last year, I started bringing together a range of frameworks and strategies I had developed since starting Studio Almond over 10 years ago.

Over Christmas I managed to formalise these into my book outline, and have been writing away - these are forming my first printed book: The Aesthetics of Profit* - to be released later this year.

*(Working subtitle: “How to position your brand inside a category of one” - the subtitle is still in the works - this is harder than writing the book).

Let’s take a concept from this and see how it plays out:

You have probably seen me say before: ads do not solve a conversion problem - they solve a traffic problem.

Putting 10 ads in the face of ideal customer a day - regardless of how premium your product is more likely to put them off buying, than make them part with their cash.

So with this in mind - there are 3 concepts that as a brand you need to bare in mind if you want to be able to scale profitability online without relying on just paid ads.

This is a framework I have developed with around 120+ actions to take which guide brands to compound their organic revenue to a level where they don’t need to rely on ads.

The 5C’s are:

Revenue level based actions:

Depending where you are in your online revenue x profit formula, the actions you need to make between $0-2m online, $2m-10m online and $10-25m are all very different.

If you focus on priorities for the $2m-10m bucket, but you are at $10k a month - you’ll be out of business next month, while done at the right time, you’ll 5x your profit.

Baseline, Campaign & Chunk revenue

Most brands are surviving on chunk revenue - where they live or die by calendar events (e.g. Black Friday). The revenue from these periods sustains them, but there is little if any profit because they are just waiting for the next event.

If lucky, some brands will have managed to create a higher level of revenue with more regular campaigns - these, when added to the revenue with the chunks creates a bit more profit in the business.

But what most brands have no idea how to do - is get there baseline revenue to a point where the chunk and campaign revenue doesn’t matter.

If a brand can get their baseline revenue to a cover every cost in the business, and give them 30% profit each month, and THEN add in ads, and THEN add in campaigns and chunk revenue, then you’ll be watching your sales come in on your private yacht - but most have no idea where to start - even worse - the people / agencies you are paying right now don’t know how - but they’ll still take your money.

The challenge here, is that it requires a holistic view and logical thinking - and as Hermione Granger reminds us - even the greatest wizards don’t have an ounce of logic.

Flip to using the 5C framework with a list of the 120+ focus points we have developed, then you are scaling profits.

This checklist allows you to combine retention marketing, brand, strategy, design and positioning to multiple the 5Cs.

Most studios or agency focus on 1 aspect - whether it be retention, SEO or ads, but they don’t understand how to combine with brand and positioning - so storytelling, communicate, and organic compounding growth eludes them.

Check the end of the newsletter on where to start.

If you’ve worked with me before, you’ll know that I like to do videos.

The same motivation to write, fills me to share my experiences, stories, and lessons to help other avoid pitfalls or challenges that can be avoided - but the last thing you want to do is listen to me drone on, so I’ve had help from some friends.

I’ll shortly be starting to post a weekly masterclass on brand, strategy, positioning, tone of voice, art direction, storytelling, sprinkled with my own stories and lessons, all featuring my friends from Succession, Breaking Bad, Suits, Parks & Rec, The Office, and a few other favourites.

Delivered with my blunt bewilderment and transparency mission - I’m excited to start sharing these videos with you.

With all of this in mind, I'm lucky to be in a position where Studio Almond is fully booked and we have a waitlist in place across projects and retainers.

You might think - well - why don't you hire more people?

Because the future of a services business isn't more headcount. It's scaling the expertise that makes the work valuable in the first place.

Most brands are stuck in the same loop: redesign the site, spend more on ads, hope for the best. That cycle doesn't build a category-leading brand. It builds dependency.

So we've built something different. M-nus (pronounced “Minus”) is a strategy platform that connects your Shopify data, Google Analytics, Microsoft Clarity, Meta, and Klaviyo into one engine - built on frameworks we've developed across working with 200+ premium stores worldwide. It gives you a prioritised growth playbook: specific advice, explicit actions, and the steps to grow profit, brand, and positioning as the premium solution for your ideal customer.

Combine that with access to our studio's designers, strategists, and developers - plus tailored accountability, ongoing guides, and walkthroughs - and you have something that doesn't exist anywhere else in this space.

M-nus forms a key part of the ecosystem we are building - combined with our studio, retention product Roadmap, we are able to compound insight and expertise, and scale it to brands looking to move themselves into a category of one - standing alone, as the clear choice for their ideal customers.

Launching late May to an initial group of only 10 brands, we already have over 50 on the waitlist, and will notify the waitlist first of availability.

Reply to this email with "waitlist" and you'll get first access before we open to the full of over 1600+ brands.

See you next week.

Thanks for reading!

See you next week.

Alex Murton
Shopify for Lifestyle Brands
Co-Founder @ Studio Almond & Almond Labs.