Welcome to the Crystal Baller, our annual roundup of emerging cultural, marketing and product trends that will shape the outdoor, active and wellness industries.
Now, I’m not a professional trend forecaster. But between trade shows, travels and the daily conversations I have with leaders in our industry, I get a peek into the near -future almost every day. And I take notes. A lot of them.
For 2025 I’ve got NINE trends for marketers to watch, and I’ve added a “Brief to your brand” for each, so you know how to apply it to your product and marketing plans in the year ahead.
Here goes:
1. The change-what-you-can spirit
Changing the world? Many folks feel like positive global change is on pause for at least the next four years. This might be a prolonged season of setbacks for the planet, DEI, and general bodily safety. Rather than walking away in defeat, we’ll see folks focusing on making an impact within their immediate sphere. Rather than marching with protest signs, we’ll do community cleanups, serve in inner-city kitchens, donate to local charities, plant gardens in food deserts, model kindness and inclusivity, and elevate diverse voices in our own businesses and communities. Rather than wallowing in injustice or getting enraged at the news cycle, we’ll get active close to home.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: Get clear on your customer persona, what matters to them and where it overlaps with your own values. Then create values-aligned opportunities to have an impact in your key markets.
2. Brand voice becomes indispensable
Just a few years ago many businesses and organizations treated their Brand Voice as a needless afterthought. We’ve seen a huge shift this year: brands now understand that whether they’re engaging with their customers online or IRL, how they talk and what they say matter just as much as (if not more than) how they show up visually.
Along with some of our peers in the brand world, we’ve shifted to talking about “Verbal Identity,” because your voice isn’t separate from your ID—it is the singular thing that defines who you are for your fans. There’s no easier way to create brand consistency than to articulate and document your verbal identity. We’re seeing big and small companies enlist our help to create robust guidelines, with supporting straplines, “this/not this” vocabulary lists, and ownable “linguistic abstractions.” They’re using it to brief in ambassadors and influencers, the media and every one of their internal teams.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: If it’s locked in your head (or your founder’s), then your brand voice doesn’t exist. This is the year to document your verbal identity, onboard your team to it and ensure everyone objectively knows it when they see it.
3. Endurance is for anyone
I think and talk about running constantly, but in 2025 everyone you know will be too. Endurance sports—ultra marathons in particular—are seeing a major upswing. A friend who owns a large race series in the Southwest recently told me that it’s a slog to fill 10-20k races, but every 100-miler sells out in days. Endurance sport is no longer just the purview of your fittest friends. Ultras are now on bucket lists of recent retirees, stay-at-home moms, finance bros and multigenerational families looking to cross a finish line together. This is one of the few sports that really isn’t about winning but how hard you try.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: When you think about sponsorship dollars, don’t assume ultras are too ultra-niche for you. You may hit a surprisingly broad audience. Likewise, think about adapting your product line for endurance—wider toe boxes, footcare (think: novel ways to tend to or hide our black and missing toenails), products that adapt for extremes of heat or cold, and fuel options that maximize output but won’t put out our bellies.
4. Macros go mainstream
My parents called it the Atkins diet, Gen X calls it Keto, and in 2025 we call it “tracking macros”—and it’s all you’ll hear about from your health-nut friends in 2025. Anyone trying to get “lean” or “swole” has been doing this for a while, this will be the year tracking macros goes mainstream.
If you’re new to macros, it’s ostensibly the practice of tracking and optimizing your balance of macronutrients: proteins, carbohydrates and fats. But let’s be honest, it’s code for the practice of cutting carbs and replacing them with protein and fat (the goal: to eat a number of grams of protein equal to the number of pounds you weigh).
But also, in other trend news: If you notice your fit friends suddenly getting extra cut, it could be macros, or they could be quietly microdosing Ozempic.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: We’ll be looking for protein-heavy menus at community events, and looking to influencers who are touting that macro lifestyle. Overall we’ll be looking for more fast and “clean” protein options. And as soon as you get into macros, you’ll be getting into supplements. Think about great starter supplements. Look to BelliWelli’s new unflavoured 4-in-1 fiber, electrolytes, probiotic and collagen mix or Organika’s Enhanced Collagen Protein to see brands that are leading the way
5. Return to comfort media
This year ’90s style was back in full force, and—if the proliferation of eyebrow rings on my baristas is any clue—in 2025 we’ll double down on aughts style. Nostalgia is strong as ever, and it’s extending into the music, TV shows and movies we consume. The Twilight movies are having a mini renaissance. So is the band Creed. Bands are revisiting old albums front-to-back on tour. I recently made a playlist of all my early 2000s emo and it’s a surprising balm in tumultuous times. As we look to self-soothe through external chaos, we’ll return to the classics and might see surprising anachronisms—Gen Z with flip phones, a renewed demand for CD and Blu-ray players, and watches that only tell the time.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: Take cues from the ’00s, both for your products and your campaigns. Whether it’s a visual treatment or music selection, pull on tropes that bring your audience back to what they might see as a golden era. Even better: use modern tech to push your audience towards timeless analog experiences.
6. Perimenopause enters the chat
Perimenopause has been around since the advent of humanity (or about 50 years later if we’re being precise) but for the first time, it’s entering our daily discourse. Halle Berry has a masterclass called The Magic of Menopause. Miranda July wrote a blockbuster book centred on women’s shifting identities through perimenopause. One OB-GYN has garnered 2.2 million followers in her attempt to destigmatize it. Millennials are accustomed to sharing their lives on social media—and as elder millennials hit their 40s, their hormonal changes are starting to feature. Brain fog, mood swings, sleeplessness, night sweats, libido changes—these problems are coming out in the open, and more of us won’t accept that it has to be this way. In the same way brands have targeted IBS and bloating in recent years, we’re about to see a wave of products for perimenopause.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: If you target elder millennials or Gen Xers who menstruate, think about how you can meet them where they’re at: champion their sleep, fluctuating temperatures, sexual and mental health with novel products or by aligning your brand with opportunities for shared discourse and education. And if someone can rebrand HRT the way Arrae and Seed have tackled probiotics, they’ll have a ready audience.
7. Loyalty is the most important KPI
Here’s a recurring event: I’m on an initial discovery call talking about rebranding with a (typically older) founder who has been singularly focused on product or performance marketing, while their brand steadily loses relevance and the cost of acquisition keeps climbing. And they ask me, “How do you measure the ROI on this brand thing?” Or they say, “We like to reward people for performance. What kind of return can I expect on a rebrand?”
There are about 50 different levers that will impact your ROI (consistency and authenticity are the most important)—and once we hand off a new brand toolkit, what happens next is largely beyond our control—but I tell them the KPI they should be tracking is loyalty. As we all hold our purse strings tightly for another year, your existing fans are your greatest asset. You can pay to acquire a new customer, but loyalty is where you’ll get the best value.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: Launching your loyalty program is the easiest thing you can do this year to protect your bottom line. Think about partnering with loyalty platforms like Ethos to make it more than just a points or discount program—and keep your loyalty program true to brand. The perks of loyalty can be all sorts of insider moments—early access, events, exclusive collections. They don’t need to cost you much at all.
8. Durable and multi-occasion
I’ve been talking about circularity for, like, ever, but the next best thing is durable versatility. If you can get 200 uses out of a garment, you’ve dramatically reduced its environmental impact. Shoppers want to make fewer purchases this year, so those purchases need to last, and need to work in multiple contexts. I love this quote from Red Antler’s 2025 forecast: “Durability is the ultimate luxury.”
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: While we’re all in our price-conscious era, show us products that are versatile—one pair of shoes that can cross multiple occasions on a week in Italy, a coat that’s both downpour- and Michelin-star-ready, a single supplement that hits all our health goals. If you were to use the prompts “durable” and “versatile” to shape your next product or campaign, how would it change what you do?
9. Bonus: Kettlebell Dads > Dad Bods
I love a wildcard prediction, and here is this year’s (with valuable input from our Creative Director and resident kettlebell dad, Ryan Romero). Tradwives move over, this is the year of the Kettlebell Dad. There’s a growing social media subculture of dads who are throwing off the couch potato stereotype while also eschewing the gym. They want the flexibility of at-home workouts, max cardio and minimal equipment. The kettlebell is one fitness tool to replace them all. Feel free to sub in a toddler when you’re on the road.
BRIEF TO YOUR BRAND: What does recovery look like for kettlebell dads? What supplements complement their lifestyle? How can you engage moms/other parental identities as you tap into this trend?
There’s your 2025. I’d love your feedback—am I wildly offbase, behind the eightball or capturing something you want to jump on? Let me know.
And if you want to check my track record, read my 2024 predictions here (I was wrong about padel! But 6/7 ain’t bad) and here, 2023, 2022, and 2021 right here.
