What We See. How We Think.
Research reports, original thinking, and writing on qualitative insight, brand strategy, and the future of research.
Young People & Money
New research on how a generation navigates a system they feel is stacked against them. What they buy, how they save, and what they actually want from brands.
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Who Are Cocktail Ultra-Enthusiasts?
A deep dive into the rituals, motivations, and cultural codes of the people driving premiumization in the cocktail category.
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The Cost Of Not Choosing
Strategy involves making trade-offs between two positive alternatives. Without explicit choices, companies risk disappointing everyone.
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When Research Says 'Go' But The Real World Says 'No'
How research can give you a green light that the real world will never honour — and what to do about it.
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On Research & Reputation
Thought leadership isn't enough. Your research has to work bottom up — earning attention through resonance with lived experience, rather than by asserting expertise.
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Young People & The Financialization of Everyday Life
What are young people trying to accomplish socially through their financial choices? A deeper look behind the 'financial nihilism' label.
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The Mythology Of Segmentation
Segmentations are more useful as mythology than as truth — and treating them as gospel closes doors that could lead to the insights that help brands differentiate.
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The Weird, Wonderful World of Professional Santas
Our holiday report — and a reminder of why this work matters.
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Show & Tell: The Case Against 'Actionable Insights'
Sometimes we undermine our ability to get to insight when we force it. Not every deliverable needs to be a clean, linear parade of findings.
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The Express Train to Slopville
AI-powered research tools can make research faster, but only people can make it matter. Here's how to avoid contributing to research slop.
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Selling Certainty
Speed and confidence aren't the same as insight. The promise of certainty has a mixed track record, at best.
Read →Young People & Money
Young people don't buy the optimism, and their lives feel increasingly heavy. New research on how a generation navigates a system they feel is stacked against them.
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Peripheral Vision: How The Edges Pay Off Double
Companies so focused on the middle, and optimising for today, that they were embarrassingly unprepared for tomorrow. That feels like the exact moment so many brands are in right now.
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For Deeper Insight, Think Like a Casting Director
We should think more like casting directors, and less like researchers. Here's what that means in practice.
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Scattered, Smothered, And Covered…
The Cracker Barrel logo controversy doesn't merit serious attention. The underlying strategic question it raises very much does.
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What's Actually Going On With Young People?
The way the Financial Times framed their 'Troubling Decline in Conscientiousness' story says far more about how we moralise data than it does about young people and what's going on in their lives.
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Are You Prepared For The Loud Minority?
Messaging tests well in a traditional research setting. Then the 1% pounce. Here's how to design research that accounts for the way narratives actually travel.
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Cultural Relevancy Hides In Plain Sight
Traditional research firms talk a big game about cultural relevancy. Then they fall back on the same tired vendors and panels full of professional respondents. Here's how we actually find the right people.
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Representation ≠ Relevance
The job of research isn't to reflect the world. It's to understand how to move it.
Read →Who Are Cocktail Ultra-Enthusiasts?
The first research drop from Faster Horses — and a case for why the people most obsessively engaged with a category are the ones worth talking to.
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One Simple Thing to Level Up Your Innovation Efforts
Many front-end innovation efforts fail to deliver meaningful results. Teams end up recycling the same familiar trends. Cross-impact analysis changes that.
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Don't Leave Your Best Ideas on The Backburner
Generating concepts is straightforward. Allocating resources to develop them is hard. Here's a case for external concept management.
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