Marketing Happy Hour - Turning Community and Experiences into Brand Loyalty | Courtney Weis of FP Movement

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

Get job openings + marketing updates direct to your inbox, every Thursday: Join the email listHow do you take a brand from a category extension to a powerhouse of its own? Courtney Weis, Managing Director of Brand Marketing at FP Movement, joins us to break down how the brand evolved from Free People’s activewear line into a standalone force with over 50 stores. She shares the key strategies behind building brand momentum, crafting authentic influencer partnerships, and leveraging experiential activations to deepen customer loyalty. Plus, we dive into what it takes to cut through the noise in today’s crowded market, test and refine marketing strategies, and turn in-person experiences into measurable brand impact. Key Takeaways:// Scaling with Intention – How FP Movement positioned itself as an independent brand while staying true to Free People’s DNA.// Beyond the Feed – FP Movement’s approach to influencer marketing that actually drives conversation and ROI.// IRL Impact in a Digital World – Why experiential marketing still matters, how FP Movement measures success, and the role of data in shaping future campaigns.Connect with Courtney: LinkedIn | InstagramLearn more about FP Movement: Website | Events Calendar | Run Day in Your CityThe Corner Nordstrom Pop-Up (through April 27, 2025)FP Movement Studios:AustinChicagoNew York____Say hi! DM me on Instagram and let us know what content you want to hear on the show - I can't wait to hear from you! Please also consider rating the show and leaving a review, as that helps us tremendously as we move forward in this Marketing Happy Hour journey and create more content for all of you. ⁠Join our FREE Open Jobs group on LinkedIn: ⁠Join now⁠Get the latest from MHH, straight to your inbox: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Join our email list!⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Follow MHH on Social: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠LinkedIn⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ |⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠TikTok⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ | ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Welcome to Marketing Happy Hour. I'm Cassie, consultant, podcaster, and your host. Every Thursday, you'll hear episodes packed with insights from brand leaders on an array of topics from crafting effective marketing strategies and hitting career goals to building leadership skills and launching your own business. Inspired by those unfiltered happy hour combos with peers, this show is all about practical, empowering chats to support your professional journey. So grab your favorite drink and let's get to the episode. I'm so excited to have Courtney with us today from literally one of my favorite athletic

athleisure brands ever, Free People Movement. Courtney, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to have you. Thank you so much, Cassie. I'm excited to be here on a, on a Monday, almost Monday afternoon for me. I know we were just chatting off record. You're in beautiful California, one of my favorite states ever. I'm so incredibly jealous. I was just out there. But I got to ask you, what's been in your glass lately? What have you been sipping on? I honestly have been really loving green tea. Hot green tea is just something a nice, it's actually in California. The weather has not been, not been that great lately. It's

been, I live in Santa Monica and work in Santa Monica and it's a little, it's been a little gloomy, a little chilly, but in terms of my real treat, I love a matcha latte. So that is not as easy to make at home. So whenever I'm at a coffee shop or getting one, I just love to, uh, pick that up. Yeah, no, I couldn't agree more. And you guys have some amazing coffee shops out there. I feel like we could talk about that all day too, and just your favorite shops and everything. But we'll do that, of course, off record. We have to chat more about that. But Courtney, I got to know, how did you land to where you are today? Just tell us your story a little bit, and then we'll dive into more of your strategies and insights that you've learned along the way too. I love

being asked that question because I think everybody should pause and ask themselves that question maybe once a quarter, because it is really rewarding when you look back at where you've been, where you've gotten to, even times when there have been quote unquote bumps along the way, it's all cumulative. That's the always advice I give to people that are in college or starting off. It doesn't really matter that much, whatever your first job is or second job is, you just have to make the most of everything and build on it. So with that being said, I majored in communications with this. I literally graduated college in 2008.

So ancient now in the marketing world. And we've learned so much since then. But with that role, I really wanted to work in talent management. I've always been fascinated by brands and why consumers purchase one brand over another, brand loyalty, brand equity. And at the time in 2008, I was really intrigued by how people were becoming brands and personalities. I mean, this was even before what endorsement brands and social media looks like today. But the show Entourage actually was out, and I'm from Philadelphia, and I went to Penn State, and some girlfriends of mine lived in Los Angeles from Penn State, oddly enough. So I came out with them the summer after school,

and I actually got a job at United Talent Agency that was representing my agent. My boss worked for, he represented Dwayne Johnson and Ryan Reynolds. So I was always fascinated in how these people can market themselves as really global celebrities. And then later on, as the industry was changing, it kind of built. So I worked originally for a talent agent literally representing these celebrities for film roles film and tv but then as I learned more about the agency I went into the endorsements group and in the endorsements group then they represented celebrities as associated with with brands and being the face of the brand or being featured in a brand campaign or brand commercial

and once I learned that side of it I've always been passionate in consumer product marketing and fashion. And once I learned that side of it, everything kind of built. So I worked at a talent agency and then actually the talent agency represented Who What Wear, which is the online fashion magazine. So I pivoted from just like the straight up agency business, which is a little bit more transactional and in deal making it's evolved today as really the business has evolved with campaigns and commercials and brand commercials. And really Instagram was a big impetus to this. But at the time, Who What Wear was just much more dynamic being a media company. There was both branded content, the editorial content, affiliate marketing. So I went to Who What Wear and that's really opened up my role to where I am today because

Free People was actually an advertising and a marketing client of Who What Wear. So we would feature the brand quite often editorially and then link to them for an affiliate marketing perspective. And then we were converting sales to Free People. And I actually met the head of marketing brand representatives at the time and just was more intrigued after six years at Who Will Wear. We were really innovators in the space. I was working on so many different brand campaigns that I was like oh maybe this will be interesting working in-house at a brand and just really being

able to shape a brand identity and how that brand shows up in the market to consumers. So then I joined the Free People team in 2019. And at that time, FP Movement was just a category on Free People's website. So activewear, just one subset, just says cashmere or denim or their vacation collection. Free Us is a subset. And we really grew the FP Movement brand to a standalone brand. Today, it has over 50 stores, wholesale accounts, and a really large .com business. So that is a really rewarding story for me, how FP Movement has exploded. But yeah, everything was basically a stepping stone and just kind of had fun with my career along the way, even when there were certain setbacks.

If I didn't really buy with a company or culture of a company I was in, I always used it as a learning opportunity to really get out of it what I wanted to and what I could before moving on to the next company. Yeah. And thank you for mentioning that, because I feel like a lot of professionals, especially earlier on in their career, they take a step and they question what is this going to amount to or does this actually help me get to my goals? And I feel like no matter what type of diverse experience we're getting, there's something to take away from that. I mean, as you mentioned, just working on the talent side, I'm sure you were able to kind of peel the curtain back and learn what talent looks for in a brand partnership. And so to be able to take those learnings into the brand side and working with creators too, and then also agency versus in-house. I mean, there's so much that we can learn from all of them that help us just to become better marketers overall. So I would say don't discount your

experience, no matter what it is, because it all leads to something. So thank you for mentioning that. No, a thousand percent. I think it's one of the most, something, you know, that I've learned along the way from different leaders or just listening to different podcasts and the common denominator that a lot of really successful founders, CEOs, business leaders have in that they're a sponge. You can literally learn from anyone in any given scenario in any different day. So just kind of absorbing that knowledge and then applying it to what's your path, what's your skill set, um, is just really useful. It's been useful for me. Yeah, absolutely. I couldn't agree more. So you already mentioned how FP movement has just grown into this amazing extension of free people as a standalone brand.

And it's grown to so many stores throughout the years. I am just curious kind of in that transition and in that development, what have been some of those key strategic decisions that have helped you position it as an independent brand, but also maintain the DNA of free people itself too. Yeah. So there was really a tremendous, you know, just wasn't myself for the marketing team. There's really a tremendous brand back in our home office in Philadelphia. I'm in Los Angeles in a satellite office. So it's really been just a strategic vision from our CEO, from the board, from leadership. And something we've able to do is really distill those goals in a yearly basis. We took what we were seeing in the marketplace in 2020, had the right marketing campaign, and then have really grown on that.

We've been really strategic about both item-focused marketing as well as brand marketing. So creating, I have to give it to the design team, creating these individual pieces that are really viral, really cult worthy, and also that are so useful in terms of a utility perspective at the end of the day for this consumer that leaves an active but is craving a fashionable active lifestyle. So I think really the product development has been key, but from a marketing perspective, I really strongly advocated when I came in in 2019 as a baseline, we were working with ambassadors and influencers, but we didn't have dedicated ones to FP movement. And I really advocated for this at the end of our 2019 year, going into 2020. And I think that whenever someone feels passionate about something, especially a marketer expresses to your boss, plant the seed, trees don't grow overnight. So I planted the seed.

I really want a dedicated ambassador program for FP movement. And that was green lit at the beginning of our fiscal year, which is in February. So February, 2020, I had the budget and I selected, I think six ambassadors that year and they had product gifted. We were signed, they had contractual social obligations. And what happened there is they really became a major part of our content creation game in 2020 when other brands were scrambling to get that across the ground. Because of course, most assets needed to be self-shot in 2020 with the lack of availability to models and a larger cash just with social distancing

rules. So we had this great ambassador group that was able, that we trusted in their content, their vision. We were able to get them product. They were able to shoot. So they weren't just a part of our experiential or social marketing, but they actually became part of our campaign marketing. And then we had really strategic item focused marketing. I worked with the buyers and cross-functional partners, and I can't stress that enough. And my personal success, but also the brand success, like really be on the same page as some of your other cross-functional leaders. And we marketed the Way Home Short. I'm sure you guys all know the short, but it has a thicker, thicker waistband, um, flirtier kind of nice swish, swishy sounding, sounding fabric. And the way home short really

took off for us from a marketing perspective in 2020. So it was this combination of the ambassadors, the product, and then we actually opened our first store in 2020 and we decided just to be really bullish on this momentum and we opened in LA Century City Mall, the Westfield Mall which is perfectly positioned in the center of the city and then with the same momentum we also advocated for community this year. We had socially distanced run clubs which was an outdoor activity when we were able based on local regulations when we were able, based on local regulations, when we were able to gather, we did so outside. And this programming has remained consistent to this day. We've never missed a run day, which is on the first Saturday of the month. It started off in one market, Los Angeles, and scaled to two markets in 2020. And now we activate a run day in 23

markets. So no matter where you are in the country when you're traveling always look at it for our events um it's in our app literally has our own section at the bottom of our app events or you can easily navigate it to it on our website or through social channels but it's been so rewarding to hear people say like oh i moved to a new city and i met friends through run day and it's run, it's walk, whatever, whatever you make it. And we also have other activities too. So I would say that combination for us of, of community ambassadors and just product marketing really helped us and like running with the momentum of that with every department really helped us

catapult, um, our brand within 2020. And then we continue that momentum, like slowly chipping away at new communities and additional campaigns and learning from successes and building year to year. You mentioned starting to build the Influencer Creator Program back in 2020. Just now being in 2025, as we're recording this, what have been some of the biggest shifts

that you've seen in the influencer landscape? I know, I mean, just the way that social platforms are being built and communities are being fostered is has changed so much over the years, but I'm curious for you all specifically at FP movement, how has that strategy adapted just as times have changed the last few years? Sure. So it's actually, I think, potentially even more interesting and layered for us than a traditional fashion brand. Being an activewear brand, it opens us up the ability to work with athletes, so professional athletes. Something that's really unique about the FP Movement brand is we really celebrate all forms of movement, and we've decided to really go in deep with our product strategy based on activities. So we have products for skiing, hiking, running, mat-based classes, racket sports such as tennis, and run is our last pillar.

So seasonally, we kind of focus on these different activities based on what you can do during that time of course there's there's evergreen ones such as studio and run but surf and maybe racket or more surf ski and racket or maybe more specific to the season so with this strategy we've then built it in athlete strategy and professional athletes and tennis we work with Salone Stevens we work with Sophia Kennan and Danielle Collins who actually wear our product in the professional tour and that's televised. So that's been a really fun for us in athlete conversation. And then we also have an instructor portion of our influencer marketing strategy and instructors are teaching math place classes again in over 20 markets at this point. So that has added a layer

there and been a big unlock. and then of course we have traditional influencers which we've actually now broken up into content creators and then affiliate influencers so affiliate influencers are specifically contracted to link honestly primarily in stories with a monetizable affiliate link where we can track their performance. And they're really going after item focused, like the bucket they're in is the item focused marketing and their KPI is sales and traffic back to our site. And then for content creators, maybe they're not even contractually obligated to post every piece of content on their channels, but they're required to give us X amount of images around surfing offitting or certain campaigns.

And then we use that content on our end for paid and organic social. We just had found that when you go in with a blanket ask to more on the influencer end, not the athlete end, but when you go in with a blanket ask of, okay, post three times in feed and create one reel and post X amount of stories. And we need usage for paid and organic social. It's actually not that most efficient with the brand dollars because talent may not be great converters, but they might convert really well on our platform because their imagery

is so strong, but their audience isn't seasoned to shop. And at the same time, some affiliate creators may not have that exact aesthetic for our brand and our brand channels, but on their channels, they absolutely kill it. And then they, they garner a certain audience based on their style for their channels. And that really works for them. So just because our budgets, I mean, I don't think any brands budgets are growing as quickly as creators are demanding dollars to be growing. And not that, not that every creator doesn't kind of deserve the rates that they're asking.

We just had to be more strategic on our brand end to be able to fit in from a budgetary perspective, all the buckets of creators that we need to fuel our, our business. I love that. And I love just this perception of looking at content just a little bit differently in the collaborations that you're taking. And I also just love this newer, you know, thing and strategy. I feel like over the last few years of that UGC, quote unquote, user generated content that brands are using from creators and infusing that into their partnerships. I want to go back to, for a second, to these community IRL experiences that you all have developed with your customers over the years. How do you feel those in-person experiences help to,

you know, thinking about ROI, for example, brands are always talking about, okay, that sounds awesome. A community-based event is fun, but how does this kind of lead back to the greater purpose? And so just overall speaking to community in general, why is it important to focus on as a brand? And then also as an extension, how have these in-person experiences kind of helped to grow the brand or meet some of those goals that you're setting in place for FP Movement? Yes, it's a great question. And it's actually something that we are constantly revisiting and pondering and re-looking at with our experiential team because that's just it. In-person events are expensive, especially when we do them in a way with a lot of detail, right? So custom merchandise, custom cups, custom napkins, they're all kind of artisan-based

goods at this point that are expensive. So what we're really looking at is, A, community is so important for us, for people to see the product in real life and also just be around like-minded people that enjoy movement and use movement as an outlet. That's why it's, I love working on an activewear brand, FP Movement, because you have this extra added element of moving your body and health and fitness. And that is really able to ground our experiential strategies. So we look at our core activities that are in season for us. So when we're selling hike product, and that is really evergreen for us hike, especially in the fall, spring and summer. But when we're looking at hike, developing experiences on that, we just launched a tennis clinic, community tennis, and that will span spring and summer and go into fall

a little bit. So we're ensuring that it's not just a community meetup to meet up. But again, I'm really lucky as a marketer that it fits within our overall product strategy. And then something that we're constantly, I challenge myself and I challenge the team is the recapping and not just recap to recap, but to really want to understand and know this data. So anyone that comes to any, an event for safety purposes, they have to sign a waiver, also a waiver that they are able to be in social media marketing because we capture all of our events and we use it for content. So that's also two buckets that it's covered. It's not just community and cultivating customers, but

we also use them for content generation purposes. So when they sign this waiver, we acquire their email. So new customer acquisition, and then it's not only acquiring the email, but we're able to then track the users and say, we have a fantastic analytics team and, and really understand, are these people net new to events? First of all, have they never come to an event before, which is great for us to reach new audiences. But are they a new customer to the brand? When's the last time they purchased something? Are they purchasing in-store after the event? That's also a really unique position and so grateful for the partnership with the stores team. But because we expanded stores at a rapid rate over the past four years,

that's where we anchor a lot of our events. So for run day, it starts and ends at the store. We just launched a walk day in certain markets. When we have a quad or an area at an outdoor shopping center, we always try to utilize that space for map-based classes. So understanding are the customers shopping or the event attendees rather, are they customers? Are they shopping after class? What products are they interested in? Are they interested in whatever the lead, hike lead or run lead or tennis lead and what they're wearing? Just try to bring them into our customer life cycle a little bit more. So everything is ROI driven. If our events weren't producing any new customers, then I think it would be a little hard to justify

the expense because like I said, we do do things in a very detail oriented way. But it's really challenging. Like I think early on when I was building the team, I had one of my, at the time she considered herself an event planner and I was like, no, you're really an experiential marketer. It is a marketing channel and really challenging. Okay. Every element, what is the Instagrammable element to this? What's the customer experience from all of the senses, from a scent to what you're visually looking at, to what are you hearing at the event? What are you tasting at the event? How is that all part of the experience? And then the data pipe is the other big unlock. Like you have to connect with the analytics team. You have to get, get the data and we have to evaluate was this event. It's not

only worth the money, but something that we've been talking a lot about lately is, is the time and the head count that is put on each different experience. So we figured out this sweet spot, this formula that does, um, does work for us and we've had to pivot and change different elements along the way. Yeah. And I think just overall, you know, I, I would hope that most marketers out there do not need any more reasons why community is important, but even extending on that, the IRL experiences are so huge because just thinking about the memories that I'm sure a lot of the attendees are making, and there's that connection to the brand of thinking back of when someone met their now best friend or they, you know, had a PR in

their run or something. And so they can tie that back to the brand. And I think that's so huge, that memory driven connectivity to FP movement. And I'm sure that has helped, you know, strengthen people's love for the brand overall. So I think that's such a huge element. Yes, and brand loyalty and then going to different events. And we try to build upon that too. For example, with our run days, we now are expanding those when there's marathons in major markets.

So we just opened in Boston this past year, which we're so thrilled to be in that market. We have such a cute store on a high street there. So when there's Boston Marathon, which is this large event in the city, and Miami Marathon, we're actually the title sponsor of the Miami Marathon. We have this thing called a ShakeOut Run day or two before the marathon for family and friends that are running the marathon or anyone that wants to be involved in it in the community perspective. It's kind of a souped upup, extra-special run day, if you will.

And that's even bringing further people in. So there's always different. But when we have a collaboration with a footwear brand, like last year we had a collaboration with On and with Hoka, so there's extra-special experiences sometimes based on what we're doing. So we kind of use the community as a foundation and then build upon that based on campaign-, what's going on with the brand. Yeah. And I'm just curious with all of this, whether it's brand partnerships, uh, community driven events, um, influencer programs,

whatever you're building out, what, what encouragement do you have just to marketers looking to try new ideas and test different solutions and just looking to make it make sense for the brand and also having, you know, let's say it doesn't work out. You try it, you test it and you realize, okay, maybe this isn't a fit moving forward. Just that encouragement to keep going and to not let those trial and errors, you know, get you down as well. Quote unquote failure isn't really a negative word.

It's when you, when you understand where you need to pivot and where you're no longer be focusing your time. So we always like to say, if you're going to fail, that's fail fast. I mean, go through with it. Don't, don't fail before, before the event, unless you just realize it's, it doesn't, doesn't make any sense or whatever marketing channel. It doesn't have to be just an event, but definitely go through with it. Do your market research.

Try it. And if it doesn't work, that's totally okay. You know where to not focus your time and dollars, which is almost sometimes more valuable than knowing where to focus your time and dollars. So I think clarity is really important and it's okay. It's okay. That's part of the role. Everything's in evolution and a learning experience. So I think if you view it from that lens, it shouldn't be

discouraging, right? Definitely just try it and learn and evaluate and analyze and move on. And kind of on that, you know, there's so many brands vying for attention nowadays. I feel like consumers are just absolutely inundated with messages every single day through social and everything. So how are you and your team at FP Movement just creating campaigns and content in general that cut through the noise and just truly feel differentiated and unique to who you all are as a brand? I think it's already so unique that we celebrate all these different forms of movement and activity. And we really sit at this intersection of function and fashion. Like that is our core principle with our design team to make sure the product is coming in

unique colors, unique style, unique fit, but is functional that we're not compromising either the fashion or function with, with anything. So with those as our core brand DNA, core brand mission in mind, we then work across seasonal quarterly campaigns with that activity in mind, what type of movement makes sense for that season. And then we've really been trying to cast unique athletes, either our ambassadors or kind of one-off ambassadors in our latest campaign, Stand Not Never Still. We cast Riley Arnold, which was a new cast for us. She's on the Dancing with the Stars tour. So that was really exciting. We cast a soccer player, we cast a runner, we cast a tennis player and a dancer and a boxer.

We had five different athletes. Had some newness, like boxing is somewhat of a new activity for us and dance, but always evergreen. It's something that we've always focused, but maybe not a core activity. So always wanting to try new things. And then we have a phenomenal creative team that basically takes the marketing vision and they work to make it beautiful and compelling. And then something we've really done to extend the life of our campaigns are

really look at all those channels. So work with our social team. There's TikTok, there are reels. Of course, there's traditional Instagram and stories. Work with our paid team between YouTube, other digital channels, connected TV, out of home, and really ensure in the brief of a campaign that we're getting all the assets that can fuel all this unique marketing channel. So that's the advice I would give to a marketer. You can't just create one asset and then almost like fit it into a box and say, this works for TikTok, this works for here.

It definitely makes campaigns more expensive, but upfront in the brief, that's usually done by marketing or a combination of marketing and creative. You really need to consider all those channels and all the ways that you'll want to disseminate the campaign going into it. So the art director, photographer, videographer, they have this clear shot list. And you almost, because campaigns are very expensive, you know what you need, what assets you can expect going out of it. And then you can almost plan the marketing. So you can earmark connected TV dollars or out-of-home dollars, whatever channel it is based on the intention, intended outlet for that campaign. And then we've really been

trying to extend our messaging. So it's not just a month, it's a quarter for Stand Not Never Still. We've actually launched Stand Not Never Still, the spirit of that campaign with that tagline last year, and then built upon it this year. And even beyond this creative, we are continuing with the ethos of Stand Not Never Still throughout the year. Oh, I love that. And I'm just curious too, why do you think it's been important for you all to extend that? Is it just giving your team more learnings or what's kind of the thought process behind extending that period a little bit? It's really just having creative consistency in the marketplace. And we have one campaign and we have so many assets against that.

Really having the time for those assets to live on their own and reach all the customers. There was a study done. It takes something like a customer like six or seven times in a buying life cycle to see something before they actually add to their cart and then hit purchase. So sometimes certain team members internally will challenge us, isn't there asset fatigue? And we've seen it so much. And I'm like, maybe because we've seen it so much is actually a good thing. And it's not the same exact cut of the same ad. So really wanting to make sure that's why we intentionally pick the products and the campaign to be a little bit more evergreen and not necessarily trend-based, but to really have a memorable campaign that the consumers are like, oh, wow, yes, I've seen that. That's FP movement.

Like, I don't think it's the worst thing in the world to be like, oh, I've seen this so many times. People might be like, OK, now I'll buy the set or now I'll buy the skirt, whatever it might be. Yeah. No, not at all. I think that's great. And I love that repositioning of just how long you're testing different campaigns.

I'm curious, too. You've mentioned a few things coming up with the Boston Marathon and some collaborations that you're doing with partners and creators. Anything else coming up for you all, just with the brand in general, or even just focuses on the marketing front that you're thinking about going into the rest of 2025? Yes, our brand is developing. We're really thinking about where is our product being sold? So we have really strong wholesale partnerships. Right now we're in Nordstrom's The Corner, which is a really fantastic space in the corner of 57th and Broadway,

kind of mid-uptown New York City. We have a standalone store, 583 Broadway. It's actually on the same street, but they're very far away from each other. We're on Broadway and Houston, so it was really exciting for us to learn a little bit more about this Uptown Midtown customer with Nordstrom. So it's a complete standalone space. It's an entire, I mean, you can see it in any direction you are when you're on the corner of 57th and Broadway. So it's an entire shop, kind of separate than the Nordstrom shop. We are in Nordstrom as well, but it's a separate kind of standalone store. And we also have a studio there where we're activating classes four days a week, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. And we have a speaker

series there as well. So that's unique to that space. So that is just exciting for us. That's been a big project. We're also in Dick's Sporting Goods. So really looking at areas where maybe we didn't have a standalone FP movement store. Obviously, we're always open 24-7 online, which is the exciting thing about our society in 2025 and beyond. We're opening, I think, most Dick's locations at this point. We're in all Nordstrom locations. And then we also just launched in about 10 REI locations. So thinking about expanding that wholesale footprint as well as our.com and then our store footprint. So kind of however you want to access and shop the brand, you're able to learn, interact

with the product. So that's really exciting for us as an upcoming focus. And then we're coming into tennis season, which was one of my personal favorite, also professional favorite. So the team is actually launching an experiential series at the Charleston Open this week, which is the WTA 500 tournament in just the cutest city of Charleston. So we have a shop and shop and the merchandising tent there. We also actually have a clinic on the actual tournament grounds this Friday evening. So that's exciting for us. And then we'll be popping up at the tent there we also actually have a clinic on the actual tournament grounds this this friday evening

so that's exciting for us and then we'll be popping up at the the french open doing a little something there on the ground as well as at wimbledon and us open so really celebrating tennis season throughout the year we also have a partnership with the national park foundation for many years running now so we'll be going to Moab with a group where we'll be doing a social shoot, also having an escape. We'll host X amount of craters there. And then that content will go on live in late June, just before 4th of July for all those adventures out there. So that's something I'm looking forward to. And then just in general, we have some new sets, new travel, new casual ideas out in the business that we are working on a unique product marketing spin on, continuing to expand Runday. Marina Del Rey is opening in Los Angeles, which is really exciting.

And LA is so vast and big, as you know, from visiting. So Abbot Kinney store, you may have a little bit more of like a destination high street, or maybe a little bit more of a tourist customer is actually quite a different neighborhood to Marina del Rey, even though they're only a few miles apart. Really excited to go into that a little bit more of a residential neighborhood. And yeah, busy, busy. Oh, that's so fun. And it's so inspiring just as a marketer to see the different ways that you're connecting with consumers

and popping up at events and things. I think there's a lot to learn from that. I'm in New York often too. So I'm definitely gonna pay attention to that speaker and class schedule. So that sounds awesome. But super stoked for you all. Just congrats on all of the success

and things that you all have been working on. And I just have to know as we close out, you know, what are the best places to stay connected with the brand? I know you kind of mentioned online and things, but where can we find out about those events and happenings? And then also just how can we stay in touch with you personally as well? Sure. So, I mean, always our website. If you have our app, I love, love, love it. It's

actually the free people and FP movement app in ones. You can type FP movement or free people into the app store and you'll find it really functional works really well. There's a tab experience, so you can click on FP movement or free people and everything's still in one cart. So there is an icon at the bottom, events and classes, and you can easily sign up for any. Run day is complimentary to all of our customers. You can easily sign up for run day. And again, don't be intimidated. I'm not a big runner either. It's a run, run, walk day, but you'll find everything there. And then on social, like our social team is awesome. They will answer your DMs, really connected there. Of course, stories come and go within 24 hours,

but our highlight reel, we tend to keep updated with different events and classes there or shoot as a DM and we'll try to get back to you. And then I would say for me personally, yes, I'm on LinkedIn and I'm also on Instagram. I'm CW2586. I'm on LinkedIn as Courtney Wartman-Weiss. So shoot me a message, drop a line. I'll always try to get back to you guys, but we love expanding our community, seeing our community everywhere. And like I said, I love the brand. Everyone on the team loves a brand and that's just something really, really unique to this organization. So we're always growing, expanding both team, but also different partners and trying to be in as many markets as we can from an in real life perspective. So we'd love to meet everyone. Amazing. Well, thank you so much for just passing

along your insights and telling your story today and just the story of the growth of FP movement. It's like I said, as a consumer of the brand, it's been so fun to see it grow and develop over the years. And so again, just kudos to your team. Amazing, amazing stuff you guys are working on and can't wait to see what's next for y'all. Thank you so much. And I'm so excited to keep in touch with, with you and see you either Florida, New York, LA, wherever, wherever you might be, but I appreciate you, uh, telling the story with us. Absolutely. Yeah. Looking forward to it. I, and I would love to see the showroom. So I'll definitely let you know when I'm in your area for sure. Oh, please do. We are here.

Awesome. Thanks Courtney. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for tuning into this week's episode. If you enjoyed this conversation, I would love your feedback. And if you're ready to take things to the next level, sign up for my weekly newsletter in the show notes. You'll get weekly career and marketing insights straight to your inbox. And if you have an idea for a future Marketing Happy Hour episode, shoot me an email. Hello at marketinghappyhr.com. Thank you again, and I'll see you next Thursday.