Meghan Markle's As Ever Rebrand Is a Masterclass in What Not to Do. If She'd Hired Me, Here's What I'd Have Said. | Brewtiful Living
☕ Brewtiful Living · Royals · May 15, 2026
Meghan Markle's As Ever Rebrand Is a Masterclass in What Not To Do.
IF SHE'D HIRED ME, HERE'S WHAT I'D HAVE SAID.
The sultry jam video. Five outfit changes. Netflix sending the inventory back. A T-shirt size guide uploaded and deleted the same day. We are going to go through all of it — with receipts, with warmth, and with the unsolicited PR consultation she very much needed.
Royals · BrandBy Sara AlbaMay 15, 202610 min read
// As Ever — Brand Status Report
FoundedApril 2025
Previous nameAmerican Riviera Orchard
Netflix statusExited March 2026
Show renewedNo. Cancelled.
Outfit changes (video)5
Jam soldOut in 1 hour ✓
T-shirt guideUploaded. Deleted.
Brand directionUnclear
FROM MEGHAN'S GARDEN TO YOUR TIMELINE · FIVE OUTFIT CHANGES · ONE JAR OF JAM · NETFLIX SENT THE INVENTORY BACK · "ALWAYS INTENDED" · SHE CALLED NETFLIX "HUGE" IN FEBRUARY · AN EVENING GOWN AT BREAKFAST · A T-SHIRT GUIDE THAT LASTED ONE AFTERNOON · FROM MEGHAN'S GARDEN TO YOUR TIMELINE ·
The Video.
MAY 11, 2026. LET'S GO THROUGH IT.
On May 11, 2026, Meghan Markle posted a promotional video for As Ever to both her personal Instagram and the brand's official account. The caption read: "Welcome to the world of As Ever. What began with fruit from Meghan's garden, simmered into preserves in her home kitchen, has inspired our curated collections to bring surprise and delight to your everyday."
The video opened with Meghan in the white evening gown she wore to the 2024 ESPYs — the ceremony at which Prince Harry was controversially given the Pat Tillman Award for Service. The same gown. At breakfast. In front of jam. She then appeared in a pale blue sweater set picking flowers from a garden into a wicker basket. Then on a kitchen counter in a black blouse, theatrically posing. Then in wide-leg jeans with her hair up. Then with her hair down, emerging from a pantry clutching a jar of fruit spread as if she'd found the meaning of life behind the preserves.
// The Outfit Log — As Ever Brand Video, May 11 20265 LOOKS · 1 PRODUCT
I
White evening gown (2024 ESPYs) · eating a strawberry for breakfast apparently
Not jam
II
Pale blue sweater set, crisp white pants · picking flowers into wicker basket very casually
Still not jam
III
Black blouse, jeans · perched on kitchen counter, posing theatrically at camera
Near jam
IV
Wide-leg jeans, crisp white blouse · hair pinned up · opening pantry
Approaching jam
V
Same but hair down now · emerging from pantry clutching fruit spread
Found the jam
The internet's response was swift and largely united on one question. "Is she trying to sell jam or herself?" Multiple commenters called it an acting reel. One X user noted: "Why is she feeling her chest and looking like she wants a nooner from H and selling Orange Marmalade??" We did not write that. Someone else wrote that. We are simply reporting it.
She also uploaded a T-shirt size guide to the As Ever website the same day. She deleted it the same day. Nobody is sure if that was a fashion pivot preview, a mistake, or a very short-lived business decision. We have questions. There are no answers.
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The Receipts
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How We Got Here.
THE FULL BRAND TIMELINE, SINCE WE'RE DOING THIS.
2014–2017
The Tig. Meghan's original lifestyle blog — personal essays, recipes, travel, culture. Warm, direct, genuinely her. The internet loved it. She was good at it. She closed it when she got engaged to Harry.
2020
The $100 million Netflix deal. Harry and Meghan sign with the streamer to produce an undisclosed number of series, documentaries, and children's content. The Harry & Meghan documentary becomes Netflix's most-watched documentary debut ever. Nothing after it matches it.
Early 2025
American Riviera Orchard → As Ever. The brand relaunches under a new name. Jam sells out in under an hour. "Our shelves may be empty but my heart is full," Meghan posts. A genuine moment. The internet is watching. The jam is real.
Feb 2025
With Love, Meghan launches on Netflix. Meghan calls Netflix "not just" her show partner but her "partner in my business" and describes that as "huge."Note the date. Note the word. Remember it.
Aug 2025
Season 2 of With Love, Meghan. Does not crack Netflix's weekly Top 10. By late 2025, falls to 1,217th in the platform's most-watched rankings. Not a typo. One thousand, two hundred and seventeenth.
March 6, 2026
Netflix exits As Ever. Returns leftover inventory to Meghan. Both parties release statements. Netflix: "always intended." Meghan: "meaningful and rapid growth, ready to stand on its own."She called them "huge" in February 2025. They called it "always intended" in March 2026. We are simply noting the gap.
May 11, 2026
The rebrand video. Five outfit changes. An evening gown. A jar of marmalade. A brief T-shirt guide. A lot of window-gazing. You're here now. You've seen it.
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What Went Wrong
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The Problem Isn't the Jam.
THE JAM SOLD OUT IN AN HOUR. THE JAM IS FINE.
Here is what people keep getting wrong about the As Ever conversation: the jam is actually good. The honey sold out. The product itself is not the problem. Meghan Markle has a genuine gift for the lifestyle category — she always has. The Tig was proof. The early As Ever launch was proof. When she's genuine, people buy. The problem is the performance layered on top of the genuineness until you can't see the genuineness anymore.
The video is not the problem either, exactly. The problem is what the video is trying to do. It's trying to establish Meghan as someone who comes from this — from the graceful morning routine, from the tasteful linen, from the garden that looks like it was styled for a shoot because it was. It's trying to create the impression of old money ease, of a woman who has always moved through the world in sweater sets, picking flowers into wicker baskets as a natural extension of her Tuesday morning.
"The woman who wore torn-up jeans and was barefoot to meet a future monarch is now dressing up as a Stepford wife, fully evolving to her new money try-hard aesthetic."
— X (formerly Twitter) · May 11, 2026 · We did not write this. Someone else did. It is extremely accurate.
Meghan Markle — As Ever rebrand, May 2026 · Photo: Page Six / NewsPress
That's the specific tension. Not that she's aspirational — she always was. But that the aspiration has become so carefully constructed it's stopped feeling like her. The Tig-era Meghan wrote about the food she actually ate and the wines she actually loved and the places she actually went. As Ever Meghan gazes longingly at a jar of marmalade in five different outfits. Both are lifestyle content. Only one of them feels like a person.
Also: where are the kids? Where is Harry? The warmth of the early As Ever era was in the "this came from my actual life" framing. A brand called As Ever that shows no evidence of an "ever" — no real home, no real family, no real Tuesday — is just a woman in nice clothes standing near some jam. Which is a harder sell than it looks.
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The Unsolicited PR Plan
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If She'd Hired Me.
HERE'S WHAT I'D HAVE SAID. FREE. GRATIS. TAKE IT.
Meghan Markle does not need a rebrand. She needs to stop rebranding. She has rebranded approximately four times since 2020 — Duchess, Netflix star, American Riviera Orchard, As Ever — and each rebrand has moved her further from the thing that made her compelling in the first place. The person. Here is the PR plan nobody asked for but she very much needs:
The Unsolicited As Ever PR Plan — Sara Alba, Brewtiful LivingRate: £0. Take it or leave it.
1
BRING BACK THE TIG ENERGY — NOT THE TIG
Not the blog. The register. The Tig worked because Meghan wrote like a person who had opinions and made choices and occasionally got things wrong. As Ever posts like a brand that has been pre-approved by six stakeholders and a legal team. The product is you. Be you. Not the curated version. The actual version.
2
BRING THE KIDS AND HARRY INTO IT — ONCE
The brand is called As Ever. It is marketed as coming from her actual home, her actual garden, her actual life. Show the actual life. One genuine morning with Archie and Lili making jam would outsell every sultry marmalade gaze in the catalogue. People don't buy aspiration from someone who seems to be performing aspiration. They buy warmth from someone who seems to actually have it.
3
STOP PERFORMING OLD MONEY. YOU DIDN'T GROW UP WITH OLD MONEY.
Meghan Markle grew up in Los Angeles, went to Northwestern, worked as a calligrapher to pay the bills, and spent years auditioning for parts. That story is more interesting and more relatable than anything the wicker basket and the sweater set are saying. The "I came from this" aesthetic doesn't land because she didn't come from this. The "I built this" story would. Goop works for Gwyneth because Gwyneth actually grew up in that world. Meghan's version of that aesthetic reads as aspirational cosplay, and the internet has a very good eye for cosplay.
4
ONE OUTFIT. ONE PRODUCT. ONE MINUTE.
The next video: Meghan, one outfit, one jar of jam, one minute. No wardrobe changes. No evening gown. No window gazing. Just her actually making something and talking about why she likes it. The jam sold out in an hour when she posted about it simply. The product doesn't need the production value. It needs the person.
5
PICK A LANE AND STAY IN IT
Jam. Honey. Tea. That's a lane. A T-shirt size guide is a different lane. Fashion is a third lane. You cannot sell old-money elegance, artisanal preserves, and a T-shirt measurement guide simultaneously. The brand currently has the positioning of someone who is still deciding what they want to be when they grow up. Pick the thing you're actually good at. She is good at making people feel like a lifestyle is within reach. She is not yet good at making people believe she has always lived it. Use the former. Stop trying to fake the latter.
6
STOP TREATING EVERY SETBACK AS A PIVOT
American Riviera Orchard → As Ever → rebrand → rebrand. Netflix exits → "always intended." Show cancelled → "ready to stand on its own." The constant reframing of setbacks as victories is the thing that has made people stop believing the victories. The jam selling out in an hour was a genuine win. Own it fully. Be honest about the rest. Audiences respect honesty about difficulty considerably more than they respect performative confidence about everything being exactly as planned.
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The Tig
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// What We Actually Miss
The Tig Meghan Was The Best Meghan.
The Tig ran from 2014 to 2017. Meghan named it after Tignanello, a wine she fell in love with. She wrote about food she actually ate, places she actually went, things she actually believed. She wrote a post about the aloneness of eating pasta by herself in a Toronto apartment that people shared for years because it was just — real. Specific. Hers.
She closed it in 2017, before the engagement, because it was no longer compatible with the life she was entering. Which was the right call for the right reasons. But somewhere in the decade since, the Tig-era instinct — the personal, direct, warm, unfiltered version of Meghan Markle — got buried under the brand strategy.
The woman who wrote about wine and pasta and loneliness in Toronto is the same woman who could sell jam with a photo from her actual kitchen on an actual Tuesday morning and make people feel like they were invited in. That version of her doesn't need an evening gown. She doesn't need five outfits. She needs a jar and a caption and a moment that's actually hers.
We are rooting for her to find her way back to that. We have also written a six-point PR plan above in case that helps. She can have it free. We've said before that Meghan Markle is genuinely compelling when she stops trying to be. That remains true. It will remain true as long as the jam is good — and apparently the jam is very good. Start there.
As Ever — What People Are Searching
As Ever is Meghan Markle's lifestyle brand selling jam, honey, tea, wine, and flower sprinkles. It launched in April 2025 alongside her Netflix series With Love, Meghan, rebranding from its original name American Riviera Orchard. Netflix withdrew as an equity investor in March 2026, returning leftover inventory to Meghan. As of May 2026 she is running the brand independently.
On May 11, 2026, Meghan posted a promotional video featuring five outfit changes — including the white evening gown she wore to the 2024 ESPYs — while gazing at jars of jam, picking flowers, and posing on kitchen counters. The video was widely mocked online for appearing more like an acting reel than a product advertisement. "Is she trying to sell jam or herself?" became the defining response.
Netflix withdrew as an equity investor in As Ever on March 6, 2026, returning leftover inventory to Meghan. With Love, Meghan had fallen to 1,217th in Netflix's most-watched rankings and was not renewed. Both parties claimed the split was "always intended" — notable given Meghan had called Netflix her "partner in my business" and described that as "huge" just weeks before.
The Tig was Meghan Markle's lifestyle blog, active from 2014 to 2017 and named after the wine Tignanello. It featured personal essays, travel recommendations, recipes, and cultural commentary. It was widely praised for being warm, authentic, and genuinely personal — a direct contrast to her current As Ever brand positioning. She closed it in 2017 before marrying Prince Harry.
The products themselves have sold well — jam sold out in under an hour at launch, and honey was consistently oversold. The brand's challenges are positioning and direction rather than product quality. Netflix's exit, the cancelled show, the rebrand video backlash, and a deleted T-shirt guide uploaded the same day as the video suggest an identity still being worked out.
