This Might Be Nothing

Nobody has ever complained about their XKJQZ drill betraying them, but plenty of people will talk your ear off about how Maytag just isn’t what it used to be. That’s because you can only be let down by someone you trusted to keep a promise.

Christopher Cecil and Allison Langford dig into what you’re actually paying for with a brand, what happens when a brand promise gets sold or squeezed, and why Holiday Inn Express gets a pass on everything, as long as you don’t get robbed.

Also featuring: Kirkland, Milwaukee vs. Ryobi, and a Nordstrom manager who saved a blazer from a cat named Penny.

Somewhere out there, a very confident person is about to hit publish on something that isn't good. Maybe a campaign, a rebrand, a website, a logo….all because the AI tools told them it was great. But the tools say that to everybody.

Making stuff has gotten easy, but knowing what's actually good is still hard. Christopher Cecil and Will Rothschild get into why AI worships the average, the scary thought that your AI assistant thinks all of your ideas are a masterpiece, and why every brand now lives or dies on whether one person in the building has taste.

TL;DR: Making it is easy now. But knowing if it's good has always been the game.

When Hurricane Helene hit the upstate in 2024, Duke Energy texted updates like a concerned ex. Spectrum went radio silent. Guess which one people brought meals to.

Join Christopher Cecil and Allison Langford as they dig into the gap between what a brand knows and what its customers actually hear, and why the brands that close it tend to come out ahead.

Also featuring: HIPAA forms nobody explains, Patagonia's "Don't Buy This Jacket" as weaponized honesty, why the United Airlines CEO is banned from Vegas, and a small linguistic mystery about why Europeans say "Spectrum are" instead of "Spectrum is."

TL;DR: If you don't tell customers what's going on, they'll make something up. And it'll most definitely be worse.

Admit it: we're all hypocrites. We live in the most consumer society ever assembled while actively despising the thing designed to help us consume. So what's actually going on?

Christopher Cecil and Will Rothschild spiral into what we lost when brands traded storytelling for click metrics, and it's highly unlikely an algorithm will ever write a "Be Like Mike" moment.

Also featuring: the Rolex playbook for staying calm while competitors panic, airport lounges as a metaphor for everything, and the quietly radical idea that nobody hates great advertising.

Brands are getting really good at reducing friction. Everything is faster and more effortless. But what if it’s getting a little too good?

In this episode, Christopher Cecil and Shelby Argo discuss what happens when brands accidentally optimize the life out of the experience. From Starbucks feeling like a vending machine to hotels that feel more like self-service kiosks, they unpack the rise of “frictionless” brands and why a little friction might actually be a good thing.

Also featuring: Disney magic, bad medical forms, Apple Pay amnesia, and the idea that slowing people down just a bit might be the most human move a brand can make.

A highly polished brand used to mean something. Now any brand can look flawless in just minutes...even the fake ones selling mystery vitamins from a storage unit. AI has officially handed everyone the same shiny aesthetic, which means the visual arms race is over...and nobody won.

Join Christopher Cecil and Morgan Albrecht as they go full spiral on the death of differentiation, why websites have all turned into gingerbread houses, and how brands keep contorting themselves to appease algorithms instead of actual humans.

Along the way: taste vs. templates, AI slop dressed as strategy, a quick séance for pre-Canva creativity, and a deeply disturbing prediction that Comic Sans might be on its way back.

In this episode, SLANT's Christopher Cecil and Allison Langford spiral (as usual) into a painfully real question: why does everything suck now? From lifeless Starbucks buildings to the tragic fall of a once-glorious salad, this episode unpacks the slow erosion of brand value, culture, and care. They break down three types of brand decay (passive, active, and internal rot), rail against enshittification, and make a desperate plea for brands to actually give a damn.

Also: Steve Jobs, broken windows, Craisins, Spirit Airlines, and a moment of silence for the Mosquito Magnet.

In this episode of This Might Be Nothing, SLANT’s Christopher Cecil and Will Rothschild mourn the slow, quiet death of "special." From childhood Nutella smuggling operations to Whataburger betrayal and Rolex gatekeeping, they unpack what happens when brands go from rare to everywhere and why ubiquity might be the fastest way to lose customer loyalty. Also featuring: a Mercedes eulogy, nostalgia-induced food bias, and a shoutout to the days when Coors beer was the hottest contraband east of the Mississippi.

TL;DR: You can be everywhere, or you can be special. Pick one.

Join SLANT creative director Christopher Cecil and Lead Strategist Will Rothschild as they spiral through emotional marketing, cold jargon, and the eternal war against Corporate Beige™. Along the way: a dig at Batteries Plus, romanticizing unicorns, comparing SaaS marketing to a hostage situation, and an unreasonably strong case for proper sunglasses storage.