Brands of the Week: KFC's Comeback, Pokémon Hits $150B, and the Truth About Loofahs
On Brand with Donny DeutschShow Notes
What do Mamdani's NYC sweep, a $16.5 million Pikachu card, and your dirty hotel shower dispenser have in common? They're all brands on the move — and Donny Deutsch breaks down who's up and who's down this week.
On this episode of On Brand with Donny Deutsch, Donny dives into the cultural and business stories shaping the zeitgeist:
🔺 Brand Up: KFC's bold "Kentucky Fried Comeback" rebrand as fried chicken sandwiches heat up the fast-food wars 🔺 Brand Up: The HPV vaccine's stunning real-world results — zero cervical cancer deaths in young women in a major UK study 🔺 Brand Up: Adult braces are trending — not for looks, but for heart health and longevity 🔺 Brand Up: Pokémon turns 30 as the most valuable media franchise in history, worth $150 billion 🔻 Brand Down: Loofahs — why dermatologists say your favorite shower accessory is a bacteria magnet 🔻 Brand Down: Hotel shower dispensers — the surprising study on just how contaminated they really are 🔻 Brand Down: New York Democratic politics, as far-left, anti-Israel candidates win big primary races 🔻 Brand Down: Ripping up your boarding pass — the privacy risk hiding in that little barcode
Plus: Mike Myers confirms Austin Powers 4 is happening, adult sleepaway camps are booming, Heinz launches three new dipping sauces, streaming costs are quietly draining your bank account, and a tribute to legendary TV director James Burrows (Cheers, Friends, Will & Grace).
It's pop culture, politics, health, and marketing — all through Donny's signature brand lens.
🎙️ Don't miss Thursday's big interview with former Mueller prosecutor Andrew Weissmann.
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This week Donny Deutsch and Lou Pellegrino run through who's up and who's down in American culture. They start with a CDC report finding that most U.S. adults are running on empty, then compare notes on five o'clock naps and why sleep has become a $100 billion industry. From there it's senior TikTok creators talking openly about sex and intimacy, the University of Chicago banning AI and laptops from its core courses, and the dictionary's newest additions, including "parasocial," "cuffing season," and "Sunday scaries."
Anthony Scaramucci joins Donny Deutsch to break down his new book, All the Wrong Moves: How Three Catastrophic Decisions Led to the Rise of Trump, a sharp and surprisingly self-critical look at how America got here. The SkyBridge founder and co-host of The Rest Is Politics: US walks through the three turning points he believes set the stage for MAGA: letting China into the WTO without checking its rise, the post-9/11 wars funded by tax cuts that blew up the deficit, and a 2008 bailout that rescued the banks but left Main Street behind. As Scaramucci puts it, Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party "had a baby, and they named it baby MAGA."