Male Opps: Bonobos announces upcoming acquisition as digital spend skyrockets (Score 67)

Sales Lead: Walmart officially announced that it will soon sell menswear brand Bonobos for $75m, a steep loss for the company.

• The brand will be acquired by a management firm, WHP Global, and a retailer, Express.
• Walmart acquired Bonobos for $310m in 2017 as an effort to diversify its online presence, with which it had little luck.
• I've got Bono-bonus details; per Express CEO Tim Baxter, “Bonobos is delivering double-digit sales growth and we plan to continue that momentum while also realizing operating synergies and other economies of scale."
  • To continue this momentum, Bonobos will likely keep investing heavily in digital advertising (more below).
• The deal is expected to close later in 2023.
• It shows that Walmart has started tightening its core retail business focus in preparation for an upcoming rough economic environment.
  • ​​​​​​​Unfortunately, Walmart hasn't done very much to develop this brand since having acquired it in 2017.
• The brand will likely:
  • Continue ramping up spend
  • Seek new agency partners, especially considering recent DM shifts (more below)
• Target demographic: 
  • Gen-Z and millennial men

Additional spending insights:

• Broadcast insights (TV ad creative spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: So far this year, Bonobos has spent approximately $66.9k on national TV commercials, only around half of the approximately $121.4k spent within the same 2022 timeframe.
  • Last year: Last year's estimated full-year spend of $1.6m skyrocketed from that of $248 in 2021.
  • 2023 ad programming: Bonobos's 2023 commercials have targeted Gen-X watching shows such as SportsCenter, Epic.Awesome.Videos, Morning Joe, Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, and Chopped.
• Digital and social insights (digital ad spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: The brand has allocated roughly $2.1m toward digital ads YTD, a huge increase from the roughly $365.3k allocated by this point last year.
  • YTD data: Since the beginning of 2023, Bonobos has earned ~269.4m digital impressions via Facebook (49%), Instagram (43%), YouTube (4%), desktop display (2%), and mobile display (2%) ads.
  • Last year: In 2022, the brand allocated around $3.4m, up 34% from when it allocated about $2.5m in 2021.
• Additional channel insights  
  • The brand utilizes digital, local broadcast, Google Ads, Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, and online video (via Youtube.com) ads.
  • As you can tell from the video above, Bonobos also invests in sports sponsorships with athletes such as PGA Tour's Justin Rose.

Additional agency insights:

• Opportunity: If you haven't yet done so, reach out soon to get on the radar of Krissie Millan, Bonobos's CMO since late last year.
• Current agency roster:
  • Observatory Marketing: Creative agency partner
  • Preacher: Creative agency partner

Insight Sources: Broadcast insights estimated by iSpot; digital spend insights estimated by Pathmatics; additional channel insights estimated by Vivvix.