In most markets, no matter what category, differentiation is difficult to come by, and distinctiveness is a dying art. Categories are congested. Competition is intense. Copycatting is rife. Growth is an uphill battle.

In response, we are increasingly seeing disruptors break through to become mainstream. And this, in turn, means established brands need to reclaim their "sexy" – that spark of distinctiveness that many of the challengers possess. That’s the thing that will stop the customer scrolling, that makes a brand memorable and sticky, and this ultimately will drive growth.

Everyone has had to become a little bit cooler. Brands are raising their game. And bigger brands are craving the discreet appeal that smaller brands have. As challenger brands become increasingly competitive, well-established brands need to tap into their mindset to break through in 2026.

Becoming a distinctive brand means having an unordinary idea at the heart and behaving in unordinary ways. And distinctive brands are well-designed. They function well, making life seamless and easy. Fundamentally, they are interesting, engaging and good to be with.

Who Gives a Crap has made a commodity interesting. Not only that, it has fundamentally changed the way we buy toilet paper – until recently, it was D2C only. It had a big unordinary idea – to overcome the problem of dirty water (which is accountable for 50% of hospital beds in sub-Saharan Africa) by providing toilets for the 40% of the world’s population that don’t have them. And it executed that unordinary idea in an unordinary way – with somewhat irreverent humour never before seen in the category (weird, because toilets and what happens in them is funny!). Their individually wrapped rolls make for great unboxing content – they have even been given as presents. And they took a very human and transparent approach to the inevitable challenges they faced as a fledgling business doing things differently.

While newer, challenger brands like Who Gives a Crap are thriving in this space (they are now the UK’s third biggest loo roll brand), big brands too can definitely find their ‘sexy’. Over the last year or so, Marks & Spencer has gone from being the Aunt you’re fond of but don’t particularly want to hang out with, to the cool cousin you look forward to seeing at family get-togethers. It has overhauled the brand with a single-minded determination, ensuring everything from its products to its experiences delivers on being ‘Stylish and Relevant’, delivering quality and value to its growing customer base without forgetting its heritage.

And so brands need to find an unordinary, unexpected idea. that will cut through and create distinctiveness. These are not just creative whims; they are strategic tools. They reject the expected, break category conventions, challenge norms, and leave the generic behind.

These ideas should be able to motivate your people as well, making them your champions. They are the most critical ambassadors for a business, so they must understand the brand idea and project it. The ‘sexy’ brands, big and small, have understood that customers will never love a brand unless their people love it – they engage their staff and make them absolute brand advocates. Who Gives a Crap has taken its team on Impact trips to see what their work does in the field, and M&S has made engaging colleagues a key pillar of their strategy, encouraging individual stores to have their own social media accounts, and allowing individuals to promote their favourite products.

So how can brands find their ‘sexy’? How does a brand tap into a challenger mindset?

1.  Get radically people-centric: Move beyond data points and reconnect with the human. Challengers don't have huge research budgets; they have empathy and intuition. It’s about understanding the culture of the target consumer and the human truths that motivate them. This is true even in B2B – while the dynamics of buying aircraft are different to buying coffee, the purchasing team making the decisions are still people.

2.  Define your 'enemy’: Challengers define themselves against something – the boring convention, the frustrating customer experience, the lazy status quo. Big brands can identify their own "enemy". It serves to galvanise the team and clarify the brand's purpose and mission.

3.  Find your unordinary idea: Identify the idea that will make you distinctive, memorable and sticky and use that as the platform to drive how your brand communicates and behaves, as a rallying cry for your people and as the driver behind business decisions.

4.  Embrace agile execution: Challengers move fast because they have to. Big brands can replicate this speed by creating small, empowered senior teams dedicated to a project. It's about cutting through bureaucracy and making smart decisions quickly.

5. Sacrifice: It’s not just about what you stand for, it’s what you reject. What are you prepared to do without? You have to be reductionist – single-minded – telegraphing one thing. And you have to reject things that other, conventional brands think are important. These are things that research tells us are important. They are attributes that your competitors would like to own. That’s why it takes real sacrifice.

Liquid Death, an edgy and bold brand, rejects the typical cues that others in the category tend to use. It has sacrificed thirst-quenching, freshness, purity and visual source cues to design a viral brand and create a cult following.

To bring all of this to life, ‘sexy’ brands recognise the power of immersive experiences. They connect the Unordinary Idea to tangible, modern execution. In 2026, ‘sexy’ brands won't just be seen; they'll be felt. Once a brand has that single idea at the core, this can be expressed across every sense – from a unique sonic identity and signature motion design to retail spaces and experiential activations. This is the path for a brand to be a living, breathing, meaningful part of its audience's world. And that in turn is a path to growth.