Her latest ‘drop’ of goods, bearing the faux-heraldic ‘ARO’ crest of her not-quite-launched brand American Riviera Orchard, comprised just two jars of raspberry jam and one stylish container of dog biscuits.
With timing which seems ill-considered, Meghan’s close friend Nacho Figueras, who plays polo with Prince Harry, posted an image of his ARO gifts on Instagram last weekend… just as Princess Kate was wowing cheering crowds at Trooping the Colour in her first public appearance since her brave announcement that she is fighting an unspecified cancer.
The jam, say sources close to the Duchess, will have been made from fruit grown in the gardens of the home in Montecito which she shares with Prince Harry and their children Archie and Lilibet.
It makes infinite commercial sense for Meghan’s first product to be a wine. She’s following a path well-trodden by other celebrities
Only two jars? Perhaps it wasn’t a great harvest.
But regardless of their raspberry crop, plans are well in progress for Meghan’s ‘lifestyle brand’, which will be inspired by the couple’s enviable life in their £10million mansion on the Californian coast.
Front and centre of the new brand will, of course, be Meghan herself. According to a source with intimate knowledge of the launch, it will sell Meghan as a beacon of inspiration, aspiration and attainability.
Her style will be sold as affordably elegant, while her image will be centred on her status as both a family-orientated and ‘regal’ figure – no laughing at the back, please.
Customers will be urged to embrace their innate elegance, and to ‘elevate the everyday’.
We can reveal, however, that the much-publicised jams will not be first out of the traps as a money spinner for Meghan Inc. Indeed, they seem to be something of a red herring.
Rather, a source tells us that the priority is instead the launch of a… rosé wine.
It makes infinite commercial sense for Meghan’s first product to be a wine. She’s following a path well-trodden, as many other celebrities have their own wine ranges, from Cameron Diaz to George Clooney, Kylie Minogue, Francis Ford Coppola and Brad Pitt. As a product, wines are far more aspirationally marketable – not to mention financially lucrative – than humble jam.
The jam, say sources close to the Duchess, will have been made from fruit grown in the gardens of the home in Montecito, California
A photo posted on Instagram by Nacho Figueras of the container of dog biscuits included in the latest goods offered by American Riviera Orchard
The brand’s logo is written in fine gold script above the word Montecito, where Meghan lives
Take, arguably, the most well-known celebrity wine, the Armand de Brignac Champagne, which was owned by rapper Jay-Z until he sold a 50 per cent stake to LVMH’s wines and spirits arm Moët Hennessy for a reported $300million. Bottles of the champagne – which is also known as Ace of Spades – can sell for around $800 a pop, thanks to a strictly limited production run which ensures its exclusivity.
Meanwhile, on a larger scale, Brad Pitt’s critically acclaimed Miraval rosé is flying off supermarket shelves at around £25 a bottle even without Angelina’s assistance, while Sting’s organic Tuscan red, made from grapes from his own vineyard, also sells well for around £30.
Even Idris Elba has his Porte Noir champagne, which is on the shelves at Harvey Nichols at £85 a bottle.
Another role model, certainly, could be Sarah Jessica Parker, whose New Zealand wine range ‘Invivo X SJP’ is big in the US. SJP is not only a shareholder, but has also been involved in the label design on the bottles and blending the vintages to her taste.
Ever the businesswoman, Meghan clearly has spotted a solid financial prospect in this, her latest potential cash cow.
Aside from the bottom line, rosé has long been Meghan’s favoured everyday tipple, far more so than the fancy Italian red Tignanello after which she named her previous lifestyle website The Tig.
Like a good Cali influencer, she loves a glass of the pink stuff, and is also a fan of every Instagrammer’s favourite drink, a ‘frosé’, which is made by freezing rose wine and blending it into a slushie with strawberries and some icing sugar, for extra sweetness.
Rosé has emotional connotations too – back in 2016, on their initial dates at London’s Soho House, she and Harry reportedly drank a number of glasses of it.
It wasn’t just any old pink plonk though: they would have been imbibing Lady A, the rosé made for Soho House executive Markus Anderson and which the private members’ club named after Anderson’s nickname.
Handsome, sophisticated Anderson is one of Meghan’s closest and longest-standing friends. Not only was he in the good seats at her wedding, he also was trusted to organise her small and super private hen party, at Soho Farmhouse.
His bottle of rosé features a picture of a Damien Hirst butterfly and is made by the giant Chateau de la Coste in France.
Might they be making Meghan’s rosé? Well, nobody at that company confirmed or denied it this week, and a spokesman for the Duchess did not return requests for comment on anything to do with American Riviera Orchard.
To complement the reported wine launch, it’s expected that other products in the initial tranche of releases will be drinking and serving ware, bar essentials and other products, related to hosting and entertaining. We can expect items in classic, but expensive, style.
Happily for Meghan, the launch of her lifestyle brand – which she has been planning for at least 18 months – has also now positively electrified her relationship with the streaming giant Netflix, which had been in the doldrums after the initial success of their Harry & Meghan documentary in 2022.
By the time of Harry’s documentary, Heart Of Invictus, in August 2023, sources were calling the couple’s ‘$100 million deal’ with Netflix a ‘dead duck’ because of the lack of output and apparent lack of ideas from the couple.
Undeterred, however, the Sussexes then got Netflix to buy the rights to a romantic novel, Meet Me At The Lake, for them in August last year. There is, however, as yet no sign of a script or anything going into production.
Other possible ideas for filming were said to be at an ‘early, early stage’ according to executive Bela Bajaria, who has the task of making the association work.
Harry managed a couple of days of filming of a polo documentary earlier this year. It’s hard to see that proving a blockbuster.
The expectation was that the deal would be gently allowed to run out and not be renewed. Netflix would have been happy with that as a reasonable return on the $50million or so that they would have paid out.
But that was before Meghan’s lifestyle brand wheeze.
Sources say that Netflix weren’t involved initially in Meghan’s plans to launch American Riviera Orchard, but certainly are now – having been asked by the Duchess to get involved in the production of a cookery show.
The prospect of this has delighted the streaming service. Put simply, Netflix has now turbo-charged Meghan’s plans, which she announced in an artfully filmed video for social media in April, and are going full-on into the American Riviera Orchard business, taking over all executive roles, delivering deals with wholesalers, designers, growers and retailers.
Meghan’s lawyer has now applied to trademark the American Riviera Orchard brand in the US for various goods, including cutlery, recipe books, tablecloths, napkins, jams, edible oils, vegetable-based spreads and dairy-based spreads. All applications are still pending.
It’s seems Meghan’s future commercial path is clear. With Netflix now understood to be on board, both sides appear to be thinking, forget telly: a lifestyle brand could be where the real money lies. The fact is that Netflix already merchandise hundreds of lines – everything from Bridgerton china sold in Primark, to Bridgerton tea sets, sold at Liberty of London.
There is a Love Is Blind-branded wine after the reality dating show, and Stranger Things lines including pizzas and ice cream.
Netflix says that it is Generation Alpha’s favourite brand (meaning those aged 14 and under) and beyond question its clout is immense. Executives point out that Netflix was the biggest streamer in 49 out of 52 weeks in 2023.
And there is little doubt that Meghan would use a TV cookery show to be the shop window for her brand.
The rewards could be huge: just look at the riches enjoyed by Gwyneth Paltrow thanks to Goop, or Reese Witherspoon’s TV production company Hello Sunshine.
Sources confirm that Meghan started filming in April in a Montecito mansion that is not her own.
That’s not without precedent. Some chefs, like Jamie Oliver and in years gone by Delia Smith, film at home. But others, like Nigella Lawson during the Charles Saatchi years, don’t appreciate the intrusion or the disruption, and also may not want to satisfy the nosiest viewers with glimpses into their kitchen drawers. Lawson famously pretended to host dinner parties with actors in her ‘kitchen’ and ‘garden’ which were actually created at a TV studio in West London.
What are we to expect from the show? Netflix won’t comment at all, but it seems it will follow the so-called ‘chop and chat’ format, with the Duchess hosting her friends and conducting bright and breezy interviews while they make food together.
You can expect some of Meghan’s eternally supportive pals to show up, perhaps tennis player Serena Williams or actress Abigail Spencer. No word on whether close friend and feminist Gloria Steinem will decide to navigate the ideological complexity of plugging a career which starts in the kitchen. It will certainly be fascinating if she does.
The Duchess has put off recording interviews for a new series of her Archetypes podcast on the Lemonada platform until next year in order for there to be no clash, which could be a clue on timings.
In due course, we should be able to buy American Riviera Orchard bedding pillows, soaps, home decor, fragrances, cookbooks and cookie mixes. Eventually, if demand is sufficient, it seems there will be some kind of a physical shop, as her trademark application also appears to extend to a space where items could be sold.
Will the world be buying what she is selling? Of course. Who would bet against the determined Duchess – and the mighty Netflix?
