Chief growth and marketing officer at Unilever, Esi Eggleston Bracey, has said the company’s “Desire at Scale” strategy is designed to help brands connect with people “authentically and at speed to drive sales.” She described the company’s model as one that links culture, community, and commerce more closely than before.
The strategy points to an operating change inside large consumer companies, where the goal is to tighten the link between what people are talking about and what brands choose to make. It also connects those decisions more closely to how products are sold. Unilever’s 2025 annual report describes “Desire at Scale” as part of a broader push to build “a faster, simpler and technology-enabled organisation Fit for the AI Age.”
Bracey did not frame the strategy as simple ad optimisation. She wrote that the approach is about “relevance as a growth engine,” with marketing built around stronger cultural connection and faster action.
Product decisions in marketing
A recent Sunsilk launch has been reshaped around Gen Z beauty trends through social-first marketing and new product ideas. One example is Wondermist, a hair perfume mist designed around a “mood-boosting” concept. The company said the product uses fragrance technology tied to emotion and confidence.
Unilever cited research from Kantar showing that eight in ten people now seek holistic beauty routines that include self-care. In other words, beauty is being sold less as pure function and part of mood and routine. This does not mean every viral trend should become a product. But it does show how marketing teams are being asked to work closer to product teams than before. A trend may begin as a social signal, with the response shaping packaging, formula, and creator content. Retail timing may also shift to match demand. The challenge is to move fast without making claims that are weak or hard to support.
Speed and credibility
In categories like beauty and personal care, emotional language alone is often not enough. A product may be framed around confidence or self-expression, but buyers still expect some evidence behind the claim. That is why brands often pair lifestyle language with ingredient stories or testing. Sunsilk’s Wondermist is one example of that mix.
There is also a practical reason large brands are moving this way. Social platforms shape awareness and influence demand and product discovery. Buying intent often follows quickly. When a brand sees a clear shift in how younger consumers talk about beauty, waiting for the next planning cycle may mean missing the moment.
A tighter link between social trends and product launches may help brands react faster. It may also make brand planning less stable if every short-lived signal gets treated as a major opportunity. The harder task is choosing which signals matter and which do not.
Marketing is moving closer to real-time decision-making. Cultural relevance and product timing are becoming more closely linked to sales. Unilever’s “Desire at Scale” strategy offers one view of that shift.
(Photo by Melanie Deziel)
See also: Unilever partners with Google Cloud to expand AI use in marketing and commerce
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