53% of Americans believe moderate drinking is bad for your health (up from 28% in 2018). Understandably, alcohol brands are grasping at straws as sales fall off a cliff. Because despite throwing money at celeb campaigns and coming up with new ways to market their new “revolutionary” drinks, Gen Z is not interested. So what’s behind this culture-wide rejection? And will alcohol ever make a comeback? [Read more]

- Charlotte Ellis, Editor ♡

At this workshop, join Stanley Henry and the the Attention Seeker team for a 2-hour session to plan out your content strategy for the whole year.

You’ll learn:

✅ What’s actually working on social right now
✅ How to build a viral content strategy for your brand
✅ The exact approach we use to get millions of views for our clients (and build our own audience of 3.3 million)

PLUS we will have plenty of time for Q&A with you.

Wednesday, 28 Jan | 8:30-10:30am NZT | $49

Stop wasting time making content that doesn’t perform. This is your chance to walk into 2026 with a content plan you know will work 👇

I mean, was it ever really "there" aside from the accidental browser you open up when turning your dusty old PC on? Anyway, like me Yahoo is turning 30. And instead of pretending it’s a startup again, the brand is leaning into the quirky voice that once made it "unforgettable."

According to Marketing Brew, Yahoo’s CMO says the goal isn’t a total reboot. It’s translation: bringing forward the original “funny, wacky, self-aware” tone (yes, including its famous yodel and purple pop) for 2026 audiences. All while keeping the voice distinct in a sea of bland corporate speak. This move taps both nostalgia and differentiation at a moment when marketers everywhere are digging into the archives to stand out. And it may just work. Weirder things have happened.

At the 2026 Winter Olympics, skiing and snowboarding are emerging as serious commercial opportunities. And brands are funnelling sponsorship dollars and creative campaigns into these events specifically. Why? Because they deliver young, engaged, and globally distributed audiences that traditional winter sports historically didn’t reach. Because who tf is watching bob sledding?

Marketers see snowboarding’s cultural cache and skiing’s aspirational lifestyle as fertile ground for brand storytelling. For brands, there are opportunities from premium gear to tech and lifestyle partnerships. So they’re layering digital activations on top of broadcast exposure. It's no secret we’re in an era where eyeballs are fractured across screens. And snow sports are giving advertisers a rare chance to reach a diverse, passionate crowd.

New research suggests that AI chatbots are increasingly trained on social media content and creator output. This means the way brands and creators show up online could directly shape how AI tools answer queries about them. A recent eMarketer report notes that major social platforms are among the top sources AI models reference when generating responses. So brand visibility and narrative presence in those spaces are becoming part of how chatbots represent you.

This is huge. Because it means social strategy isn’t just about engagement anymore… it’s about informing the very training data that feeds AI responses. So if you want to appear authentically (and accurately) in tomorrow’s AI outputs, think about where and how your content gets indexed and cited today. Eeeeek!

-Sophie Randell, Writer

People committed to their health, their bank accounts, and not spending every weekend rotting away in bed hungover. And it got me thinking. Gen Z kind of started this whole movement.

Which means, somewhere in a marble-floored boardroom, alcohol's PR team is having a very bad day.

The numbers are in, and they're brutal: two-thirds of 18- to 34-year-olds now believe moderate drinking is unhealthy, up from 40% in 2015.

And no amount of celebrity vodka launches or Instagram-friendly cocktail content seems to be bringing them back.

This is alcohol's great reckoning. The substance that survived Prohibition, multiple public health campaigns, and countless After School Specials is finally facing its toughest opponent: a generation that simply doesn't give a sh*t.

Celebrity partnerships multiplied like product placements in a Marvel movie. Craft distilleries bloomed in every gentrified neighbourhood, touting their IPA to be the fruitiest, hoppiest experience yet.

"Wellness cocktails" with adaptogens appeared on menus. Low-ABV everything. Canned cocktails in millennial pink. Tequila brands with sustainability missions and minimalist bottles that look like they belong in a MoMA gift shop.

It always makes me think of that one SpongeBob episode, where everything's on fire and all the little Spongebobs are running around inside his head with clipboards screaming.

"This is fine," says alcohol, launching another celebrity tequila. "Everyone loves tequila!"

Ask any bartender about their younger customers and you'll hear the complaints: they don't tip well, they close tabs after every drink, they nurse two beers all night.

From the industry's perspective, these are problem drinkers. But in the original sense of the phrase: they're not drinking enough to be profitable.

But here's what's actually happening: Gen Z showed up, looked at the bill (financial and physical), and said "no thanks." They're ordering non-alcoholic beer, making a mocktail last three hours, or just—revolutionary concept—not drinking at all.

Which is weird, by the way?

There's this bizarre insistence that you need alcohol to have fun, to make friends, to be interesting. As if the entire foundation of human connection rests on fermented grain. Spoiler alert, it does not.

Meanwhile, Gen Z is literally still at the bar. They're just drinking non-alcoholic beer.

Think about that for a second. Non-alcoholic beer tastes bitter, costs almost as much as regular beer, and delivers exactly zero buzz. By traditional logic, it's pointless. And yet they're choosing it anyway, because they want to socialise, just without the hangover, the anxiety, the brain fog, the empty calories, and the generational trauma.

It's the same energy as ordering decaf coffee at 10 PM because you want to hang out with friends at the internet café, not because you need a caffeine hit. The ritual without the damage. The vibe without the consequences.

The list goes on. And on. And on and on and on.

When you're living through multiple existential crises before your prefrontal cortex fully develops, maybe adding a depressant to the mix seems less appealing.

This generation watched their parents self-medicate stress with wine o'clock culture. They grew up with "mommy needs her juice" memes and normalised bingedrinking. They saw the Instagram-perfect brunch mimosas alongside the very real mental health struggles and dysfunction. They're choosing differently.

The non-alcoholic beverage market is exploding. Functional sodas, complex mocktails, alcohol-free spirits that actually taste sophisticated. These aren't sad substitutes; they're deliberate choices. Gen Z is showing that you can have the ritual, the social lubricant, the fancy drink in your hand, without the poison.

This isn't about being boring or missing out. It's about being selective. It's about asking "what is this actually doing for me?" and not accepting "because that's what we've always done" as an answer.

Here's what I hope for: maybe we're watching the beginning of the end of alcohol's stranglehold on social life. Maybe Gen Z is finally kicking the destructive habits and generational traumas that come gift-wrapped with every boozy bottle.

Alcohol's PR team can keep running around with their clipboards, launching celebrity brands and wellness-washed marketing campaigns.

You can't influencer-partner your way into a generation that's decided they deserve better.

The building's on fire, and Gen Z has already left. They're at the bar next door, drinking something that won't make them sick, having genuine conversations, and, imagine this, actually remembering them the next day.

Sorry, alcohol. Your rebrand isn't working. And maybe that's exactly as it should be.

Because if my generation were the last ones to sneak out and end up black drunk out on the grass in a park somewhere – I’m definitely not mad about it. 

-Sophie Randell, Writer

It's a vibe effectively captured by TikToker and musician Kell Martin, who in early January rapped and beatboxed a highly infectious tune:

"Yo! I got like hella money, I got like hella money, I got like 5 bucks, what? Lincoln!"

While Martin's original video has seemingly disappeared, its sound still exists and has become phenomenally popular within a few short weeks. But it makes sense, right? Remember what generation dominates TikTok - to be Gen Z is to be near-broke. So when our parents send more money than we asked for or we admit to overspending on Littlest Pet Shop toys, our universal reaction to a rap about having $5 is almost always "hell yeah".

Take this sound and either film yourself lip-syncing to it, or put the camera on something exemplifying your wealth (or lack thereof). Then, add OST describing a time you felt you were rolling in it (however much of "it" you have).  

If you're putting yourself in frame, you can really sell your excitement by dancing and beaming like you just got the greatest news of your life - and who's to say having $5 shouldn't count?!

A few ideas to get you started:

-Devin Pike, Copywriter

😂Yap’s funniest home videos Monkey eating fruit bowl
❤How wholesome The reality of having a puppy
🎧Soooo tingly Satisfying wax cracking
🍝What you should make for dinner tonight High protein street corn chicken bowl

We get it. Creating content that does numbers is harder than it looks. But doing those big numbers is the fastest way to grow your brand. So if you’re tired of throwing sh*t at the wall and seeing what sticks, you’re in luck. Because making our clients go viral is kinda what we do every single day.