Do Summer, Not Your Hair

Overview

Led Crown Affair’s Summer Campaign, centered on air-dry rituals and effortless styling. This campaign marked a strategic pivot to lead with emotion-first messaging, balancing aspirational storytelling with clear product hooks.

Result

Crown Affair's buzziest brand campaign to date:

$4.3M EMV
6.8% IG engagement rate (+2.7 pts MoM)
Press coverage in People Brands & Things and Because of Marketing

BRAND: Crown Affair

INDUSTRY: Haircare, Clean Beauty, Prestige Beauty, Luxury

PROJECT: Brand Campaign

ROLE: Lead (Director of Brand & Integrated Marketing)

TIMELINE: June-July 2025

with quick hair rituals that clear your calendar.

the challenge

Driving awareness without newness.

Summer presented an opportunity to put Crown Affair at the center of the seasonal “summer hair” conversation — but without the launch of a new product, which typically fuels buzz and awareness. The challenge was to cut through the summer noise and create urgency for Crown Affair in a way that felt fresh, culturally relevant, and true to the brand’s ethos of rituals — positioning Crown Affair as the go-to for quick, effortless routines that free up time for making memories, not styling your hair in the bathroom.

strategic approach

Lead with emotion, anchor in rituals.

Instead of defaulting to claims-driven messaging, we leaned into an emotion-first strategy with a bold, cheeky campaign line — "Do Summer, Not Your Hair." This set the tone for a season-long platform designed to make Crown Affair synonymous with effortless summer rituals. Robust messaging frameworks connected the emotional promise (“more time making memories”) with functional proof points across air drying, quick refreshes, and post-beach treatments. The approach gave consumers both the why and the how — making Crown Affair feel essential, not optional, during the busiest season of the year.

See messaging frameworks below:

creative execution

360 execution

We brought the campaign line to life through bold, cheeky visuals that anchored in the promise of “Less time styling, more time living.” I concepted and led the development of a modular creative system that paired lifestyle cues with product rituals, resulting in our strongest hero assets of the season:

Less time styling, more time wandering
Less time styling, more time going places
Less time styling, more time bronzing
Less time styling, more time spritzing
Less time styling, more time unwinding

This visual identity connected the emotional “why” with the functional “how,” ensuring Crown Affair felt both aspirational and achievable across every touchpoint.

the results

Successfully directed "Do Summer, Not Your Hair" as Crown Affair’s most resonant and buzzy brand campaigns — orchestrating cross-functional collaboration across Creative, Retail, Digital, and Brand to deliver cohesive execution.

Drove 163M organic reach and $4.3M EMV, establishing new benchmarks for campaign performance.
Built a repeatable, scalable messaging playbook (emotional hook → product ritual → result) that informed future 360 campaign structures.
Elevated cultural relevance with creative that centered on lifestyle moments — “less time styling, more time ___” — now a recognizable shorthand for the brand.

The campaign extended across all channels to maximize reach and relevance:

Organic Social: Robust calendar with 50+ content pieces, tying emotional hooks to rituals.
Influencer: ShopMy affiliate campaigns and UGC content laddering into rituals and campaign themes.
Activations:
- Elevated influencer/editor event at Flamingo Estate
- Customer event in partnership with Sunny Days
- Air drying masterclass at Sephora
- Interactive Summer Hair Quiz for ritual matching
Merch & Collabs: Comb Keychain and Jacob van Loon beach towel to drive cultural buzz and organic reach.
Paid Media: 12+ thumb-stopping branded and Influencer assets translating hooks into performance creative.