Inside Tower 28's New Sketch Comedy Series
The beauty brand tapped a TV writer to help launch their new product on social.
Last week beauty brand Tower 28 rolled out its first original sketch comedy series on social. The Blush Lives of Sensitive Girls features three episodes that each highlight a unique selling point of the brand’s new GetSet Blush in a humorous, tongue-in-cheek way. The series is written by Ruby Marker, a writer's PA on HBO’s The Sex Lives of College Girls, and directed by influencer-actress-comedian Olivia Sui. In a sea of product swatch videos and makeup tutorials, the strategy stands out.
Pitching any idea that falls outside of “what works” on social is a risk. It’s easier to look at what other accounts within your industry do when they launch a product or to lean into a format your brand has already tried. What’s the fun in that though? Audiences recognize and crave smart marketing. I appreciate that Tower 28 pushed themselves to do something different here. Hiring a TV writer to work on a script. Partnering with an influencer-actress-comedian to add “director” to her hyphenated credits—with her post promoting the series garnering a half a million views alone. One commenter noted, “Please. Every ad for your company needs to be this. Show these other companies HOW ITS DONE”.
I think a lot of brands write off this kind of content because it’s too “high-production”. I’d challenge you to instead think of it as simply “high-effort”. It doesn’t matter that you’re shooting it on a Sony FX6 or an iPhone 16—what does matter is that a lot of work happened before you pressed record. There’s a storyboard, a shot list, a script, a vision. You don’t need a big budget, you need a big idea. That’s what excites me right now.
For today’s newsletter, I talked to Alex Kalatzis, the Director of Marketing at Tower 28. I asked her about how the series came together, tactical questions around making the videos feel social-first, and what inspired her to lean into episodic content.
Rachel Karten: Thanks for chatting with me! How did the idea for The Blush Lives of Sensitive Girls come about?
Alex Kalatzis: When thinking about the ‘why’ behind launching the first-ever blush + setting powder, the biggest point of difference is the fade-proof staying power. I’ve always found the statement “I have a face that eats makeup” super comical and felt like no beauty brand had ever tapped into it creatively before, which is what ultimately inspired the idea of doing skits. How could we remind our audience of all the pain points with the current blush offerings on the market (color that fades, not sweat-proof, etc.) and position our new launch to be the solution, all while injecting a comedic spin staying true to the T28 brand DNA. A series emerged.
RK: I love all of the creative shout outs—working with Olivia Sui, Ruby Marker, and more. How did you land on who to work with for something like this?
AK: Our founder Amy is the queen of connections and introduced me to Ruby Marker who was a writer's PA on HBO’s The Sex Lives of College Girls—this was step one for me to wrap my head around where to even start on this endeavor. I tasked her with bringing that same energy and tone of voice into the work she was doing with us (very synergistic to our customer), which is also what inspired the series name.
For casting, Amy reached back into her rolodex and suggested Olivia Sui who not only is an influencer-actress-comedian multihyphenate and would help to bring the series some notoriety, but had also expressed an interest in taking on director projects—win-win. Olivia gained her following on a YouTube channel called Smosh (a comedy-improv show), and brought in all her fellow cast members to star in our skits. We also had our writer Ruby participate in one of them.
I had been talking to Second Story Films in the background for months trying to figure out how I wanted to work with them—I shared the concept and they were immediately in!
RK: This is super tactical, but did you shoot these in 9x16? What sort of decisions did you weigh to make sure these videos still felt social-first?
AK: Second Story Films were the consummate professionals and made us look good. We shot wide but had vertical frame guides to stay in social-friendly composition. I knew I wanted the skits to be <2 min (kind of just by gut), which I felt struck the right balance of establishing a plot without losing the audience’s attention.
RK: How involved was the social team during the concepting and shoots?
AK: We’re a small team and have to divide and conquer, so while this project sat with me, social came on set one of the days to capture behind the scenes content.
RK: The way social works these days, it'd have probably been "safer" to just do a lo-fi social roll out that showed how the product works paired with, for example, a trending sound. What made you want to release an original sketch series to announce your new blush products? Were you at all nervous about how your audience would react to it?
AK: If we were going to be as bold as to say we were launching the first-ever anything, then we had to walk the walk and do something inventive! This is a big test-and-learn year for us, focused on fewer, better. Not to mention, it’s fun to play in uncharted territory as a marketer—this sort of challenge got me out of bed in the morning! No nerves, we were really excited to debut this to our audience and eager to see their reaction. The skits (+ teaser!) have been shared on IG almost 2K times!
RK: Are these videos being used anywhere else besides organic social?
AK: No plans at the moment.
RK: Any other brands that you think are doing this sort of produced content well?
AK: I was super inspired by a TikTok I saw about how Brooklyn Coffee Shop launched this clever episodic series and grew their audience by 30K. In general, it felt like we were entering a movement of high production, scripted content (a total pendulum swing) and wanted to be among the first beauty brands to hop on this trend.
[Editor’s note: Brooklyn Coffee Shop is not a real coffee shop and is just a show by that name with its own account]
RK: How do the comments on the sketch videos differ from your usual content? Does it encourage you to lean into more serialized content?
AK: Those that got it, got it. We could feel the passion and engagement in the comment section. So many people praised us for the creativity and asked for more—they wanted the series to continue!
RK: Thanks so much for sharing! Tower 28 SOS Spray is one of my favorite skin products ever and I love seeing the brand take creative risks on social. Anything you can tease for what's next?
AK: Something new under the SOS “umbrella” is coming soon 😉
Want to dig into more examples of “high-effort” content from brands? Check out Gant, Alexis Bittar, Topicals, Tory Burch, Dunkin’, immi, City of Boise, Santoro’s Pizzeria, Burberry, Craighill, and LOEWE.
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I’m relieved that there are still brands out there willing to try something different. Also, the Kate Spade skits with Anna Kendrick (back when she was cute and less controversial) have always stayed with me — and yes, they have been on my decks when I’ve tried to pitch a longer form video piece!
“You don’t need a big budget, you need a big idea.” AMEN! & kudos to them for using Substack to spread the word about their methodology in a proper text format to meet their audience here.