Meghan Markle and Prince Harry seized their chance to launch their Californian lifestyle brand just as the Prince and Princess of Wales hit rock bottom due the Photoshop scandal, Britain’s leading PR and brand gurus claimed today.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex also ‘crashed’ the Princess Diana event in a brazen and ‘calculated’ attempt to ‘plunder’ the news agenda ‘in search of income’ from the lucrative ‘mummies market’, Mark Borkowski has said.
And the fact that Royal PRs were ‘blindsided’ by her action speaks volumes about the ‘chaos at the Palace’, the public relations veteran claimed.
Mr Borkowski told MailOnline today that the launch of American Riviera Orchard this week will have been months in the planning. The Diana Legacy Awards was a perfect platform to boost publicity around it – even if it meant eclipsing Prince William’s speech about his mother on the 25th anniversary of her legacy awards in London, he said.
And on the same night the couple announced Archewell’s winner of a $100,000 civil rights award in the US just as the Prince of Wales was still speaking and handing out awards to the winners at the Science Museum in London.
Brand and Culture Expert Nick Ede said the international storm over Kate Middleton’s Photoshop blunder and mea culpa will also have helped them because of the amount of royal press coverage this week.
He said the scandal of the Mother’s Day portrait this week was ‘welcome timing for Meghan and positive news for her and the brand’ at a time when Kate and William are being lampooned in the US on TV and in the left-wing press.
Mark Borkowski, whose celebrity clients have included Sir Cliff Richard, Van Morrison and Graham Norton, said that the Sussexes have taken a leaf out of Kanye West and Bianca Censori’s playbook by ‘causing chaos left, right and centre’.
Meghan and Harry, pictured together in a charity promo released last night, used a non subtle decision to launch a business idea on the day of the Diana Legacy Awards and as a storm raged around the Princess of Wales, it has been claimed
Experts believe the scandal over the Princess of Wales’ editing of this photo is ‘positive news ‘ for Meghan and her business launch
Experts believe that the Sussexes had been ‘smart’ to use the Diana Legacy Awards as a way to boost
The Prince and Princess of Wales, pictured together on Monday, have been ridiculed and criticised around the world over the editing scandal
He said Harry and Meghan’s urgent and over-riding need for money to support their expensive lifestyle coincided with a falling-off of support from super-rich friends in the United States where they have begun to generate ‘negativity’.
READ MORE: Harry and Meghan’s Freedom Day: How Duchess unveiled ‘Tig 2.0’ American Riviera Orchard site on four year anniversary of Megxit ‘freedom flight’
A smiling Harry on a private jet on what he called ‘Freedom Day’
Mr Borkowski said: ‘There would be a lot of planning for the launch of Meghan’s lifestyle and baby brand. Meghan and Harry are in the space now where they are looking at a strong commercial business to get them the money they need.
‘Of course they planned to launch it at this time. It was calculated. They understand about creating a noise on the internet. To launch anything you have got to get a huge surge of interest.
‘So timing it with the Diana Legacy Awards, why not? It’s akin to what Kanye West is doing right now, causing chaos left, right and centre.
‘I think the timing of the Photoshop thing is incident is coincidental, it was all about this week I suspect.
‘If they can succeed with this in the way they didn’t with Netflix and Spotify and get a range of products the public like, this could make a mark for them’.
Mr Borkowski has doubted there was very much communication between the PR teams for William and Harry before yesterday’s event.
‘I wouldn’t expect dialogue between the parties given the estrangement,’ he said. ‘Opportunist PR manoeuvres are something that a competitive business would consider in the commercial world.’
He said: ‘The timing was an attempt by Harry and Meghan to plunder the news agenda, and most of all it shows that what they’ve always got to do is generate income,’ he said.
‘There has always been speculation about Meghan returning to her strengths, dumping all the woolly ideological future thinking of their institute or legacy projects.
‘At the end of the day, they have a very expensive lifestyle, and when you look at the flights that they’re taking, many of them have come from donors,’ said Mr Borkowski.
He added that recent news of the couple’s apparent snubbing by Elton John who left them off the guest list for his Oscars Party this week, ‘reflects a certain unease in America, where they don’t like any kind of negativity.
‘It’s always got to be glossy and yummy, and marshmallow, Disneyworld – anything negative is frowned on where people just don’t want to pick up the virus.
‘I suspect there’s been less support from super-rich people who were there for them before, so if that is the case, she in particular aggressively go to her strengths, and their move closer to Hollywood sends a message that she’s available for work.
‘Looking at the poor results they’ve had with their Netflix and Spotify work, people don’t want to be associated with losers, but they haven’t really delivered on content, which was going to be their big play, with all that hype about them being the next Obamas.
‘So they’re returning to something that actually might just might deliver some cash, but they’ve got to engage with a younger audience who are genuinely curious and feel that Meghan has been treated badly. ‘
He said that Meghan’s team would be less bothered by any backlash from British media about yesterday’s conflict with Prince William’s emotional speech at the Diana charity event.
‘In terms of timing, by launching this on the same day as Diana’s charity event, it wasn’t subtle, but in this world of eyeballs and clickbait, that’s not so important. They say all publicity is good publicity apart from obituaries, and that’s still true.
‘Look at Kanye West and his girlfriend – it’s all about creating a buzz – the more controversial the better – and staying in the conversation.
‘So yes, there will be a lot of noise and attention from the main stream media about crashing Diana’s event, but it’s got everyone talking. For them it is all about social media, about kicking up dust. Arguably, it is working.’
He described Meghan’s new merchandising venture with a company called ‘Mama Knows Best’ registered in Delaware as ‘another attempt to find some dry ground.’
The state of Delaware is a popular choice with corporations because it doesn’t impose income tax on business which don’t do business in the state, nor on shareholders who live elsewhere. It also offers directors anonymity as they don’t have to disclose their names to the state.
Added Mr Borkowski: ‘They’ve tried the legacy work the campaigning work, she’s tried podcasting.
‘So she’s now heading for a kind of Oprah Winfrey character, but part of the reason that they’ve failed so far is that they never seemed to have much of a plan.
‘The amount of scrutiny on this will be intense – imagine if it turns out that something from their product range is produced by exploited workers, for example.
‘There’s a thing in the trade called ‘idea porn’ where everyone around the table gets really excited by an idea and it’s only afterwards you take a proper look and begin to regret it.
‘There’s never been any defined strategy. They should have been sitting down and actually having a hard look at where they were going, not just in six months or a year but in five years.
‘I think they were driven by hubris, that whatever they did would be a massive success.
‘If this launch doesn’t work, bad news seems to just follow them and ultimately, they will be running out of people who are going to back them’.
Meghan Markle is filmed working in a kitchen in a social media friendly video launching her new food and homeware business American Riviera Orchard
Prince William, Prince of Wales, arrives at The Diana Legacy Awards at the Science Museum where he was greeted by Tessy Oho
At 9pm the Sussexes appeared in a video where they announced Archewell’s winner of a $100,000 civil rights award in the US
William attended the event for the Diana Legacy Awards at the Science Museum in London, while his brother made an appearance virtually from Montecito several hours later, after his older brother had left
Questions have been raised about whether the Duke and Duchess of Sussex timed the announcement to scupper Prince William’s speech to the 25th Diana Legacy Awards at the Science Museum in London yesterday evening.
In a glitzy Instagram video for the new venture released at 5.15pm yesterday, the Duchess of Sussex can be seen busying herself in a rustic-looking kitchen.
Just 45 minutes later, at 6pm, Prince William arrived at the Diana Legacy Awards where he hailed his mother’s legacy in an emotional speech given at 7pm.
The PR bombardment from California continued when at 9pm the Sussexes appeared in a video where they announced Archewell’s winner of a $100,000 civil rights award in the US just as the Prince of Wales was still speaking and handing out awards to the winners.
Harry then addressed Diana Legacy Award winners at around 11.15pm, via video link from Montecito, until around midnight. But the video of Harry congratulating the 20 young people was released by his team at Archewell at around 5am this morning, just in time for the morning headlines in the UK.
American Riviera Orchard itself was unveiled to the world on March 14 – a seismic day for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. Yesterday was the fourth anniversary of what Prince Harry called their ‘freedom flight’, where he filmed himself celebrating officially emigrating to the US as Megxit was confirmed.
In extraordinary footage on March 14 2020, a jubilant Harry filmed himself on board the luxury liner – putting his fingers his lips and smiling as he said: ‘We are on the freedom flight. We are leaving Canada and we are headed to Los Angeles. Shh!’
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Archie, then 10 months old, and Harry’s mother in law Doria Ragland were given Tyler Perry’s private jet to take them to California from Vancouver Island, where they had been living since quitting as frontline royals.
Mr Perry, who is also Archie’s godfather, also offered the couple the use of his home in California before they bought $14.7million dollar mansion in Montecito.
The launch of American Riviera Orchard emerged late yesterday afternoon – just as William was about to take to the stage to hail his mother’s legacy in an emotional speech.
Trademark documents hastily filed in the US show she plans to flog tableware, cookbooks, napkin rings, jellies, jams and marmalades. American Riviera Orchard is owned by Meghan’s new company Mama Knows Best, which suggests more businesses are on the way.
Critics have questioned whether Harry’s rift with William is now so all consuming that he would be allow his wife’s lifestyle brand launch to overshadow an event in his mother’s memory with a business launch selling jams, marmalades and kitchenware.
Others have pondered whether Harry was fully aware given his love for his mother and the magnitude of last night’s event.
Royal biographer and commentator Phil Dampier told MailOnline today: ‘Nothing happens by accident with Harry and Meghan.
‘Harry probably felt he wasn’t getting the exposure he deserved as William was actually at the event and he wasn’t. As for American Riviera Orchard I’ve always thought Meghan would end up doing some sort of Gwyneth Paltrow style lifestyle range and this has clearly been planned for many months.
‘If it means she concentrates on making money and not on attacking the royal family I’m all for it’.
The Sussexes’ have been accused of Prince William’s speech at an awards ceremony in honour of his mother Princess Diana when Meghan revealed she is launching a cooking and lifestyle brand.
An insider told the Mail: ‘The brand is meant to coincide with the launch of a new cookery show for Netflix. Meghan will be making, and selling products such as jams. At some point there will be a book and a blog.’
The brand, American Riviera Orchard, will focus on home, garden, food and lifestyle wares.
On its Instagram account, it posted a series of nine cryptic images, which revealed its gold logo, featuring a swirly emblem. Beneath that is written ‘Montecito’, the Californian town where Prince Harry, 39, and Meghan, 42, moved to after stepping down as working royals.
Meghan’s regal looking logo and branding
The new brand is set to be an extension of her former lifestyle blog The Tig, an insider told America’s Page Six, adding: ‘She’s been working on this for over a year and it’s all the things that are close to her heart.’
The Instagram video opens with washed-out footage of a woman’s hands arranging white and pink flowers. It then fades to reveal Meghan in a kitchen, whisking something in a bowl.
It continues with an image of a woman, thought to be Meghan, wearing a long, dark dress in an Italian-style, outdoor corridor. The scenes, which have a glamorous, retro feel, are set against the strains of American jazz singer Nancy Wilson’s 1960 hit I Wish You Love.