At POSSIBLE 2025, a striking truth surfaced: luxury brands are no longer competing with each other they’re competing with everything. Memes. Podcasts. TikTok mini-dramas. Netflix. YouTube rabbit holes. In short: culture. And in a culture of infinite scroll, entertainment is the new attention filter.

That’s the premise brand leaders from Hugo Boss, Moët Hennessy, and Small World unpacked in this sharp session on how legacy luxury players are embracing risk, transmedia storytelling, and new talent models to stay relevant to a generation raised on immediacy, irony, and emotional access.

From Aspiration to Entertainment

Legacy luxury marketing was built on exclusivity and polish. But the new standard is relevance and relevance moves at the speed of culture. Dan Salkey opened by declaring that luxury brands are no longer just competing with each other; they’re up against MrBeast, Netflix, and TikTok micro-trends.

Carlos Zepeda (Moët Hennessy) shared how campaigns are evolving from stills and slogans into episodic content designed to entertain, not just elevate. The Glenmorangie x Harrison Ford collaboration, for instance, leaned into grumpy humor and cinematic storytelling with full behind-the-scenes content embraced as part of the brand narrative. Not only did it resonate on social, but it expanded audience reach beyond traditional whisky drinkers.

Authenticity Is a Tone. Not Just a Value

Nadia Kokni emphasized that authenticity doesn’t just mean real values it means real tone. Humor, behind-the-scenes content, and cultural self-awareness are now more effective than overproduced polish. She shared how Hugo Boss shifted casting and format dramatically in recent seasons replacing the expected runway with more unexpected personalities, including Pamela Anderson and DJ Khaled. The result? Massive engagement and a redefined brand perception.

Luxury, the panel agreed, isn’t losing exclusivity by being relatable it’s gaining access by being emotionally available. That might mean humor. That might mean imperfection. But what matters is that the audience believes it’s real.

The Future of Influence Is Niche and Native

While A-listers still matter, the conversation made clear: creators with cultural currency not just follower counts are the new creative directors. Salkey noted how niche fandoms, unexpected character partnerships, and rough-edged TikTok creators are outperforming traditional talent in many luxury campaigns.

For brands, that means relinquishing a degree of control and designing collaboration models that allow creators and fans to participate in shaping the brand narrative.

Offline Is the New Differentiator

In a digital-everywhere world, what stands out now is tactility and real-world magic. Zepeda spoke about Moët Hennessy’s recent activations that invited consumers into experiential spaces: underground tastings, culinary collaborations, humor-driven moments. These IRL experiences were designed not just to delight participants, but to create content moments that audiences want to share extending the reach far beyond the event itself.

The takeaway: the real world is a content engine but only if the experience is worth capturing.

Balancing Exclusivity with Access

The panel addressed one of luxury’s great tensions: how to remain aspirational while being discoverable. Kokni was clear not every brand needs to be financially accessible. But all brands need to be culturally accessible: present where the audience is, fluent in the formats that matter, and flexible in tone.

It’s not about lowering the bar. It’s about showing up in unexpected places without losing your identity. Red Bull and Hermès were cited as examples of brands that have mastered this balance through consistent, experiential ecosystems.

What It Takes to Move at the Speed of Culture

The session closed with a call for internal change. To create culturally relevant content, luxury brands need:

1. Freedom: teams empowered to move fast, break process, and trust instinct.

2. Courage: leadership willing to take brand risks in public view.

3. Gen Z fluency: not just targeting young audiences, but hiring them, learning from them, and collaborating with them inside the organization.

4. Internal studios: lean, nimble teams that can capture content in real time.

When trust, talent, and tools align, brands can create and respond in ways that feel natural, not manufactured.

Independently Created. Not affiliated with POSSIBLE.

ClickZ is a ClickZ Media publication in the Events division