Open tabs: Americans are sleeping on Chinese brands, behind the ShopMy veil, peak protein & more.

Plus: major CPG brand launches a co-branded product with a dating app. (!?)

Do any other nerds giddily await the release of a new Consumer Trends report from Dan Frommer and Coefficient Capital? The 2026 Mid-Year Consumer Trends Report dropped just before 4th of July weekend, ICYMI while eating hot dogs and lighting sparklers.

A few of the learnings to gnaw on:

• If you thought we were at peak protein… we are nowhere near it.

• There’s a new “archetype” of consumer: The Optimizer! They’re wellness, AI, and GLP-1 obsessed.

• Willingness to pay for those expensive optimizations— AI, GLP-1s, and alllllll the added protein— is climbing.

You can read a lot more in the full report, linked below!

Introducing the Consumer Trends 2026 Mid-Year Report

• A major CPG brand and a dating app partnering? This might be a first! Breeze and Kraft Heinz collaborated on a new “Marry Me Pasta Sauce,” inspired by the viral recipe.

• From brand builder Sara Neves Paixao: Americans are sleeping on Chinese brands, and they’re coming our way. (Plus: a few to get smart on fast!)

• Bath & Body Works and Hilary Duff dropped their new “fruit forward” body care line. Speaking of, here’s a very interesting take on why Bath & Body Works may not be so successful in all their new Ulta doors, from Asha Talwar Coco.

• How fun would it be to work on the brand campaign OluKai launched with Hawaiian lifeguards? In addition to shining a spotlight on real Hawaiian lifeguards in their video series, they also provide shoes to all (!) of the lifeguards in the Hawaiian islands.

• Brand founder Dani Milo’s guide to influencer and affiliate platform ShopMy, and whether or not it’s “worth it” for a brand. (Need more ShopMy takes? Look no further than friend of the pod Ali Kriegsman, who joined us on Commerce is Chaos not so long ago!)

• The LoveShackFancy x Target collab dropped last weekend and apparently Target stores throughout the US were festooned with LoveShackFancy’s signature bows. (Had to take the opportunity to use the word “festooned.”) The partnership expanded to include branded items from Wet Brush, Case-Mate, Wild, and Yoobi. Can’t remember the last time a partnership between a brand and retailer like this expanded to include other brands under its umbrella, can you?

Happy July European vacation season to all who celebrate! And if you’re planning a more, should we say, American style vacation, allow us to put you on to the most incredible contraption: this laptop shade is light as a feather, folds flat, and is relatively eco-friendly.

Judah Bergman is the Founder and President of Jool Baby, a fully bootstrapped baby gear and child-safety brand he started in 2015 with a single magnetic cabinet lock he designed because no product on the market met his standard.

Since then, he’s grown Jool Baby into an eight-figure Amazon business with distribution across Target, Walmart, Babylist, and TikTok Shop — without a single outside investor or acquisition. (!)

He’s also spent over a decade running a free, vetted seller community now 450+ members strong, with working groups covering Amazon, Walmart, TikTok, warehousing, and tariffs.

Whether you’re building on Amazon, navigating the move into physical retail, or trying to compete on a playing field shaped by tariff volatility, Judah’s frameworks offer a candid, operator-first look at what it actually takes to scale a bootstrapped consumer brand in today’s market.