Friendly Beast
An investor and brand operating partner for wild consumer brands.
THE BET
We can build a different animal.
Investor and operating partner for wild consumer brands between $5m and $100m revenue. We marry brand and business on the inside — powered by capital, consulting, creative, and AI.
THE SHIFT
Big brands will be made by small companies.
Taste is a low-cost strategy
Creativity is underrated — it drives value, culture and differentiation.
AI will make it cheaper to build brands
Less headcount, more output, means better operating margins, reinvested back into growth, fewer rounds and less dilution.
New operator models will change org charts
Owners and founders won’t need to stare down the FTE path, as new models enable the protein of added capabilities without the calories of fixed commitments.
THE SHIFT
Society is changing
01
Sport and culture are becoming one market.
02
Brands are becoming entertainment and live experience companies.
03
The biggest category secret in consumer goods is women.
04
Public investors want access to private companies.
05
Consumers expecting luxury-level brand experiences in literally anything they buy now.
THE SHIFT
White space
Culture is good for business, but most verticals don’t really have cultural brands.
The consumer of today demands an elevated experience in everything they consume, from an Hermès scarf to a tube of toothpaste. So we bring the cultural codes from fashion, luxury, streetwear, and the arts into the large consumer verticals — recasting consumer goods companies as lifestyle brands.
Food & beverage · Hospitality · Wellness · FMCG · Beauty · Consumer electronics
Apparel & footwear
Nike Supreme Arc’teryx The North Face Loewe Salomon Patagonia Maison Margiela Comme des Garçons Stüssy Noah Rapha
Entertainment
HBO MSCHF A24 The Line Adult Swim
Retail
Dover Street Market Kith MoMA Store Globus Bodega Merci
Technology
Beats Discord Nothing WeTransfer
Food & beverage
Oatly Liquid Death Blue Bottle Coffee Café Kitsuné Ghia
CPG
Glossier Aēsop CeraVe
Publishing
Phaidon Rizzoli Assouline
Wellness
Goop Equinox Headspace Pangaia
The thinner the column, the bigger the white space — the green verticals are wide open.
The market is full of brands with wild potential that nobody knows how to build.
They are under-managed and under-capitalised. The work is too complex to run alongside everything else, and the teams inside are overwhelmed.
WHAT WE ARE GOING TO DO
So we are betting on the wild ones.
It’s not enough to be different — you have to be wild. Native, instinctive, coherent, natural, competitive. The next decade of category-defining consumer brands will be built this way. We take a seat no consultancy can replicate and no agency can execute, and we help them stay wild.
WHAT THIS CALLS FOR
A different animal is needed.
Creative agencies spark brands but can’t run businesses. Consultancies write plans but won’t bet on them. Investors write checks but stay outside. Friendly Beast is different. We invest, operate, and create together. That is how we help owners make their brands bigger and wilder while keeping their companies smaller.
— We invest in consumer brands with wild potential
— Marrying brand and business to build breakthroughs
— We go native, operating alongside founders and teams
— And connect rare talent to the mission
These companies don’t need classic management, complex org charts, or bloated headcount. They need a friendly beast.
Owners and founders ask us how we see ourselves in their projects.
We are the missing piece in your operation.
THE SCREEN
What we look for
01
Obsessive product
Real craft. Actual function. Genuine care. The kind of product that wouldn't exist if someone hadn't insisted. We back brands made by people possessed by the process of making something really great.
02
A point of view
Owners and founders with an angle on the category, the customer, and a clear idea on what they're doing differently. We insist on a depth of philosophy and we back conviction. We don't take on imitation labels.
03
Category-defining opportunity
Companies in large but unloved, overlooked, underserved, or even dirty/unsexy categories. We avoid crowded spaces and we don't take on turnarounds, rescues, or distressed assets.
04
Brand centric
Those willing to use the brand as the strategic idea for what the company can become next. We don't work with companies that treat brand as a logo or a marketing function.
05
Long term commitment
Really good things take time. We embed operationally for a twelve month minimum in our portfolio companies and have a 7-10 year investment horizon. Companies looking for a quick pump, a high end deck, a one-off sprint, or help they can't fund - this is not for them.
THE METHOD
Rewild™
We remove what holds brands captive and build around what matters.
01
Get in trouble
Find the pivot point behind the noise
02
Define Next
Brand as the strategic idea for what to become next
03
Fall In Love
Align the team around a future worth executing
04
Create Leverage
Capital, capability, and capacity for the move.
05
Get Moving
Go.
A brand-led value creation company.
CAPABILITIES
A brand—led value creation company.
01
Model
A top team of experienced operators at the core of portfolios, plus a network that fills specific capability needs.
Shared services-as-a-service.
02
Core team
Valued at €1.5m a year — for a fraction of the cost. Modular, assembled around the portfolio.
Chris Booth
Brand management operations, strategy, team build
Formerly Db (acq. LVMH), black crows; Operating Partner Brain Dead. Former corporate lawyer and professional athlete.
Reese Sun
Brand management, strategy, team build
Formerly Alo Yoga, The North Face, REI Ventures, Deloitte. Harvard MBA.
Damian Bradfield
Brand management, strategy, team build. Principally advisory
Cofounder of WeTransfer and WePresent. Chairman of The Supporting Act.
Arnaud Faeh
Brand management, strategy, team build
Brand management, strategy, and team build across the portfolio.
Rafael Orozco
AI operations — planning, supply chain, reporting
Formerly Airbus, Apple, Unilever, Db. Masters in applied mathematics.
James Dunford
AI operations — sales, marketing, customer service
Formerly black crows, Japan Tobacco.
Amund Grimstad
AI operations — applications and workflows
Anthropic-certified. BSc Economics and Business Administration, CBS.
03
Network
Fractional experts we source from without the overhead — plus dozens of independent contractors.
Brand design
ANTI
Kurppa Hosk
Hwasoo Shin
Product design
Bluish Studio
Vincent Laine Studio
Native
Anthony Boronowski
Marketing comms
Radical North
Noir Wrks
Jour Blanc
Bao
Growth
The Formula
Kovra
Refindable
Sales
Tier-1 agencies
Distribution companies
Finance
Grand Journee
Perl
Sky Lab
CAPABILITIES
Core team work
“We embed, orchestrate, and create together.”
01
BRAND PLATFORM
Context, positioning, platform — brand-led corporate strategy
02
COMMERCIAL PLATFORM
Business modelling and budgeting, management rhythm, go-to-market, marketing mix and S&OP
03
AI & OPERATIONS
Data warehouse, systems, automation, AI application layer, logistics
04
ORG DESIGN
Key talent recruitment, org setup, performance
THE MODEL
Two ways in
01
Venture
We invest in emergent consumer companies with category-defining potential.
We operate inside on a light retainer for a minimum of 12 months.
We invest in one to two companies per year.
02
Operating Partner
We help mature companies from $5m-$100m in revenue re-engage with what makes them wild and dangerous.
We do retainer-based work embedding with leadership on brand-led value creation strategies from insight to deployment.