For artists like Ariana Grande or Lady Gaga, brand collabs tied to album releases are to be expected. That hasn’t been the case for indie band Bon Iver—until now.

For SABLE, fABLE, the latest album from Bon Iver that was released this month, frontman Justin Vernon hosted a basketball tournament, did interviews, and greenlit a slew of brand collabs with small businesses, including tinned-fish company Fishwife on a can of Bon Iver-branded smoked salmon—a product that has been called, among other things, “the weirdest brand collab ever.”

It’s an about-face from past promotions for Bon Iver’s albums, the first of which was released in 2008, which have historically been just about as subdued as the mysterious and private persona Vernon has embodied in his music.

“He was famously always very camera-shy,” Robby Morris, VP of creative marketing at Secretly Group, which oversees Bon Iver’s label, Jagjaguwar, said. “It was always a good artistic challenge for us because we had to figure out ways to work around him not wanting to do tons of press and him not wanting to put his face on things.”

With no tour on the horizon, Morris said SABLE, fABLE’s release was an opportunity for Vernon to be more involved and try something new—which, in this case, meant working with more than 25 different partners to help entertain fans and nonfans alike. And no, don’t consider it a cash grab. “We definitely did not enter any of these partnerships to make money, and we have not made any money,” Morris said. “We may have actually lost some money on some of this.”

What they may have lost in budget was, however, regained in community engagement and awareness via word-of-mouth marketing, which Morris said is continuing to climb. “We’re seeing the results of this total 180, going from the subdued to the very in-your-face,” he said. “So far, we think it’s working.”

Continue reading here.—KH

Some Chinese manufacturers on TikTok may have just started using Trump’s tariffs as an excuse to peddle $2 wholesale “Louis Vuitton” bags. But Jhara Valentini has been prepping her luxury clients on how to market during a trade war since last August.

Valentini is the founder and president of Valentini Media Group, an agency whose clients have included Louis Vuitton, the lifestyle brand Goop, and Watches of Switzerland, a seller of brands like Cartier, Rolex, and Patek. Luxury clients bring a wealth of unique consumer behavior data, and their consumers have more drawn-out customer journeys, she told us; high-end brands also often have more variable long-term goals, like engagement and awareness, rather than performance-based KPIs. That is key to how she plans to advise them on navigating the tariffs’ effects, which are levying extra costs on imports from countries central to the luxury sector’s manufacturing and inventory processes.

“Luxury is very atypical,” Valentini said. “I think luxury and heritage and that value perception is going to be the biggest narrative.”

We spoke with Valentini about how tariffs are already affecting luxury brands, and how she’s counseling her clients through a turbulent time.

Read more here.—JN

Maybe slow and steady does win the race? NBCU’s streaming service Peacock saw modest growth in Q1, jumping from 36 million to 41 million subscribers in the quarter, according to Comcast’s Q1 earnings call on Thursday.

As its subscriber base climbs, so is its revenue: the streamer grew revenue to $1.2 billion, a 16% YoY increase, and narrowed its losses from $639 million in the prior-year period to $215 million. With that said, executives said they are bracing for the impact of broader economic uncertainty.

“While we don’t see any noteworthy evidence of economic challenges for the year thus far, the odds have increased that challenges may be approaching,” Michael Cavanagh, Comcast’s president, told investors.

Sporting goods: While Peacock didn’t have an exclusive NFL wild-card game to boost viewership last quarter like it did in Q124, Cavanagh said that NBCU’s new media rights deal with the NBA, which will bring NBA games to Peacock beginning in the fall, will be a “launchpad” for further scaling the streamer’s growth.

It will also be a main focus of NBCUniversal’s upcoming upfronts presentation.

“Our content—all of it, but inclusive of the new content from NBA—is going to be a key anchor of what we do around the upfronts,” Cavanagh said.

Read more here.—JS

Executive moves across the industry.

• Coffee Meets Bagel, a dating app, parted ways with its CMO, Delbert Ty.
• Peloton CMO Lauren Weinberg has left the company as part of a larger restructuring.
• Lionsgate tapped Brad Haugen, previously CEO at Will Smith’s Westbrook Media, as its EVP, digital strategy and growth.