Meghan Markle has found major success with her lifestyle brand, As Ever, selling jams, jellies, baking mixes, and teas. As of early July, the Duchess of Sussex officially expanded into the alcohol industry, dropping a rosé on the first of the month. Many fans were shocked to hear that the fruity beverage sold out within one hour of the first drop—so shocked that some don’t even believe it, and experts are questioning her credibility. Keep reading for more information.
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Is She *Really* Selling Out?
The Napa Valley Rosé went live at 8am PT / 11am ET on wine.asever.com and sold for $30 a bottle. For the first drop, bottles were only sold in sets of three bottles, half cases, and full cases. But it seems that Meghan had plenty of customers lined up, as her entire stock was gone in an hour.
While from some angles, this looks like a major success for Meghan’s brand, others are raising questions about how legit the whole operation is. Meghan hasn’t released any official sales figures so it’s not possible to verify the size of each drop—was she selling out of 100 cases of wine or out of 1,000 cases of wine?—there’s a big difference.
Experts Raise Their Eyebrows
Eric Schiffer, the chair of Reputation Management Consultants, gave his thoughts on the topic. He explained that the mother-of-two needs to stop these sell out runs in order to build a more authentic relationship with her customer base. "These product sales are creating catastrophic credibility issues because it all looks like it's manufactured to sell out."
"So, it's like these kids on a corner who open a lemonade stand and they have one glass of lemonade, OK you were successful but no one believes it," he continued. "She's doubling down on scarcity theater. They already have credibility issues so why set things up to look fake. Roll the dice. Be a real entrepreneur."


