FUCK! I can't keep doing this

“Fuck, Fuck, fuck….” “Can I do this?” “Don’t you fucking bottle it Pope?”

“Don’t you dare bottle it, Pope?”

“you’re gunna bottle it - you haven’t got it in you…!” “You’re gunna fuck this up” “Get some back bone”

These tremendously tumultuous thoughts ebbed and flowed and glowed through my mind for 3 loooooooonnggg assssss moooooonths.

Manz been a puddle of deranging, derailing and debilitating self-doubt. Voluptuous fear parked up, chugged out a melee of mind :: fudgy, thick, clotted cream doubt.

The Imposter Monster reared it’s fugly head.

“Why am I doing this?” “I don’t deserve to be here?” “Who picked me?” “Why me?”

Last week we hosted our Supper Club with Rory Sutherland and UberEats.

Events are FUCKING CRAZY.
Events are SERIOUS GRAFT.

But, Events are a Kingdom of Creativity - all my crazy ideas blossom and flower and bloom into bountiful technicolour.

In the run up to events, the spinning solar system of emotion scuttles through your innards - excitement - pain - happiness - fear - stress - elation - peace - satisfaction.

One minute, you’re buzzing-ya-tits-off

“this is gunna be SICK”.

The next, you’re asking yourself

“WHY ON EARTH AM I PUTTING MYSELF THROUGH THIS?”

I remedied my woes with Olivia Dean and cigarettes on repeat.

In a world of AI and Doom scrolling, the zephyrs are zagging online, people glued to their blowers, blowing their minds, bug-eyed, zonked-out.

HUNGRY is zagging against the online zigging zephyrs. Focusing deeply on in person events:: actual conversations:: actual connections:: actual hugs:: actual mates.

We have 4 unwavering values for HUNGRY Events.

• Generous Wisdom

• Electric Energy

• Deep Connection

• Unapologetic Fun

Here’s 3 things we did to smash-the-granny out of Supper Club. Hopefully, you can apply these lessons to any brand activation you roll out.

1. The God Is In The Details: Do Something Fun, On Brand and Remarkable.

“The God Is In The Details”

I love a Negroni.
They love me.

We friends, cuz.
Best o’ Buds, bruv.

I gleefully quaff HUNGRONI’s down-the-hatch - on el reg.

A convivial choo-choo train charges down my gob - arriving at the Station of Squiffy On Thames.

Negroni’s offload my baggage - soon - a yummy halcyon enters my marrow - that burning, ludicrously lurid, orange sunset liquid.

We wanted to create a HUNGRY version of a Negroni aka HUNGRONIS.

We created HUNGRONI’s in collaboration with my broski Ashley Palmer Watts, co-founder of The Devonshire and ex-Head Chef The Fat Duck and his amazing brand High Fidelity.

They’re SO BANGING.

ACTUAL crack.

Guests couldn’t stop talking about HUNGRONI’S.

The following day, I was flooded with messages everyone talking about HUNGRONIS

If you’re doing an event or brand activation, remember:

• The God Is In The Details

• Create something that is a genuine extension of YOU and YOUR brand

• Do Something Fun, On Brand and Remarkable.

2. Do The Opposite. Write a list of everything you fucking hate.

I fucking hate “networking”

When visioning the Supper Club.

I wrote a list (a perturbingly long list) of everything I HATE about traditional “networking” events.

”Networking” is so transactional.
”Networking” is so surface level.
”Networking” is so much superfluous small talk.

Networking is stale and frigid, sordid and frail.

Snake Oil Salespeople and Grifters peddling their wares.

Fawning gooey-platitudes and ghastly exhibitions of sycophantic nause.

“At School You Can’t Rewrite The Question But In Business You Can” - Rory Sutherland

So, on a piece of paper, we wrote 4 questions.

These 4 questions swooned - swirled - sprinted across my mind - often at 3.19am - awake in Sparkling Wild Alarm.

1. How can we galvanise GENUINE connection in a FUN way?

2. How can we do this DIFFERENT and BETTER?

3. How can we HUNGRIFY this to f*ck from a brand perspective?

4. How can we cut through surface level small talk and help people become actual mates?

Alas,

We BANNED Ice Breakers.
Ice Breakers are naff.
Ice Breakers are for gimps.

ENTER:: HUNGRY BEER BREAKERS

HUNGRY Beer mats containing the 3 biggest questions I ask guests on el poddy.

Questions purposefully designed to cut through surface level small talk, plunge deep into the depths of connection.

1. What’s one truth you believe most people disagree with you on?

2. What’s the last thing you radically changed your mind on?

3. What’s the biggest problem in your business right now?

As guests arrived, we took their jackets, volleyed a warm welcome, loaded them up with HUNGRONIS and dished out HUNGRY Beer Breakers.

HUNGRY BEER BREAKERS acted as a conversational compass:: Soul-stirring questions for soul-nourishing chinwags.

They went down an ABSOLUTE STORM.

If you want to break category codes.

• Rewrite the question

• Write a list of dumb questions.

• The smart answer, always lies in the dumb question.

3. Reverse Bench Marking & The Peak End Rule

We applied two Behavioural Science rules to make the Supper Club a SMASH HIT.

1. The Peak End Rule by Daniel Khaneman

The peak-end rule is a psychological heuristic stating that people judge an experience based largely on how they felt at its peak (most intense point) and its end, rather than the total sum or average of the entire experience

It’s why Oasis play Wonder Wall last.

2. Reverse Benchmarking by Will Guidara and Rory Sutherland

This is Rory’s spin on Will Guidara’s book “Unreasonable Hospitality.”

Benchmarking is comparing yourself against your competitors at what they’re GOOD at.

Reverse Benchmarking is the opposite, find something your competitor is pony at. Find the chinks in the armour. Exploit that weakness.

In Unreasonable Hospitality

Will, dined at all the best restaurants in the world (his competitors) to find where they were weak.

Will realised all restaurants focus heavily on wine, yet, completely neglect beer.

Will invoked “Reverse Benchmarking” - focus on what you’re competitor is bad at. At his restaurant, Union Square Cafe, in New York, Will implemented a Beer Sommelier.

We thought VERY DEEPLY and VERY HARD about 3 questions

1. How do we turn an common afterthought into the main event? (Reverse Bench Marking)

2. How do we create residual emotion (i.e. how will guests still think about the supper club in 3 weeks time?)(Peak End Rule)

3. How do we keep guests learning and thinking about the event AFTER the event? (Peak End Rule)

After mulling on these, immediately, Goodie Bags swooned into polished clarity.

At most events Goodie bags are absolutely pony.

Most goodie bags posses the personality of a Pure Gym in Epsom.
Most goodie bags are feeble, flimsy, gaudy and garish billboards for brands.
Most goodie bags are thrown away in the bin.

“Let’s make The Best Mutha Fucking Goodie Bag on Planet Earth”

I got on the blower and WhatsApp voice noted all my pals “WhatsAppening Mate - please may we get some gear for our goodie bags?”

To solve question 1 and 2: we created, IMHO, The Greatest Goodie Bag On Planet Earth.

Witness The Fitness below, bro.

To solve question 3: 

“How do we keep guests learning and thinking about the event AFTER the event?”

Before the Supper Club, I asked Rory what his favourite marketing book of all time was. It’s “Obvious Adams” FYI.

During Rory and I’s talk, I planted a question.

“Your favourite marketing book of all time is Obvious Adams….what are the principles or lessons the audience can use to improve their restaurant experience?”

To create a moment of surprise and delight and emotional residue when guests got home and ferociously unwrapped their goodie bag with feverish-toddler-on-Crimbo-Day-zeal.

“Obvious Adam’s” was waiting for them in their goodie bag - we signed it “STAY HUNGRY X”

Every time guests read the book, they’ll develop a conscious and sub-conscious connection to the Supper Club.

• think about emotional residue

• Thinking about about what happens after an event when people get home is so underrated.

Popey xxx

p.s. - we’ve tonnes of SICK events coming up this year.

Supper clubs, Banging Breekie Clubs, Roundtable chinwags with industry titans… even wanna do HUNGRY Plod & Pints Run Club.

If you wanna put your brand in the room with the UK’s biggest FMCG and Hospitality Operators.

HMU xxx

Still Hungry? Course you are…

Please feel free to gorge on the most downloaded podcast episodes of all time (these are CERTY: BANGERS)

1. Rory Sutherland: Why Challenger Brands Must Never Follow Logic to Truly Disrupt Categories 

2. Waitrose CEO: How Challenger Food & Drink Brands Can Win and Build Profitable Partnerships with Waitrose - James Baile

3. Spencer Matthews: How Spencer Matthews Built Unshakeable Resilience and Raised + £10m to Launch Clean Co. in Sainsbury's, Tesco and the U.S.A. 

4. How Grenade Exited to Mondelez for £200 Million and Lessons in Unapologetic Authenticity- Juliett Baratt

5. Tyrells Tycoon: How William Chase built and sold Tyrells for £50 million and sold Chase Distillery to DIAGEO 

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