Maya Seshadri, who writes the newsletter Run of Show, admits something I have felt too: after enough Fashion Week dinners, they start to blur. The candles, the menu, the gift bag, the step-and-repeat. Any logo could hang on the wall.
Events are asked to do too much
Seshadri’s diagnosis is that brands use events as everything at once: a source of noise, a megaphone for messaging, a container for sales targets. An event that tries to do all of it ends up saying nothing.
It is also a misunderstanding of how people decide. Brands count seats, gift bags and downloads, and lead with features and benefits. Guests decide with feeling. They trust people more than products, and they remember what a brand believes far longer than what it said.
An event shows what a brand believes
A brand event is evidence. Every choice in the room, the venue, the food, the guests, the light, tells people what the company values and how seriously it takes its own story. Seshadri points to brands that build a clear world and invite people into it, and calls good events “temporary worlds”.
A full room is not the goal. A room that feels like the brand is.
Where it goes wrong: mismatched decisions
The quickest way to lose an event is a detail that contradicts the brand. Seshadri’s examples are sharp: an adventure travel brand hosting on a luxury cruise ship, a non-toxic cleaning brand filling a dinner with heavily scented candles. Guests notice, even when they cannot say why.
Where it works: consistent decisions
Authenticity is not a message. It is a series of choices that prove it. For The Female Company’s sale launch, the brand’s colour became the evening: an all-red, fully edible menu, red on every table, guests in red. Fifty-plus guests and twenty-plus sponsors did not need a speech to understand what the brand stands for.
For Sol de Janeiro I planned a launch dinner with around 40 creators and editors in Berlin, and a Formula 1 weekend in Madrid where the setting carried the scent’s story. Neither needed a bigger budget. They needed clearer decisions.
Three questions before any event
- What does the brand believe? One sentence. If you cannot write it, the event will not show it.
- Which details prove it? Venue, menu, guest list, gift, music, light. Each one either supports the belief or dilutes it.
- What should guests feel on Monday? Not what they should post. What they should remember.
Every event says something, whether you plan it or not. The work is making sure it says the right thing. That is how I approach brand events in DACH, from an intimate launch dinner to a community event.
Source: Maya Seshadri, “We’ve lost the plot on brand events”, Run of Show, February 2026.
