Ashley Alexander was a content creator with a dream: to build her brand beyond social media and launch her own product. 

As a matcha aficionado, that product was always going to be matcha. 

“I really wanted to be an AAPI woman business owner,” she says, “specifically of matcha (where many brands are male-owned). I just wanted to be like ‘you know what? I’m going to have a really good matcha that the girlies can trust that’s owned by a girlie herself.”

Ashley’s followers recognize her sincere passion for the tea. Much of her content revolves around consuming matcha, from ranking the best cup in Manhattan to visiting tea fields in Japan. In fact, her audience had been asking her to develop her own matcha for years.

Moby Ventures—Whalar Group's creator-centric venture studio—partnered with Ashely to help her achieve her entrepreneurial dreams.

This would also be Moby Ventures’ first brand launch from scratch so success was going to be down to a genuine “creator-market-product fit.”

How do you turn a creator’s followers into not just consumers but evangelists for her new product line? We invited Ashley’s followers into the process of building Nami Matcha. 

We named her super fans the “Matcha Mob” and helped her put some structure around the community she’d lovingly cultivated. We built it off social/ off platform and away from the whims of the algorithm. Ashley could communicate with the Matcha Mob in a deeper way, whenever she wanted. Owning that direct relationship was key to Moby Ventures’ strategy. In effect, we transformed a social media audience into a first-party database of future consumers. 

To keep the Matcha Mob engaged, we polled them about features and color palettes and asked for input along the product development journey. The Matcha Mob felt they were co-creating the brand with her and even had their own space. Throughout, Ashley nurtured that connection with exclusive, behind-the-scenes content that tied them closer to the brand. 

The creator was willing. 

The product was her passion (unlike some cash grabs you see on social) and perfect for DTC. 

And the market was curated, dedicated, and part of the process. 

The perfect creator-market-product fit.

Moby Ventures was the operational partner. We built the brand from the ground up with supply chain management, logistics, ecommerce set up, and more. 

Together with Ashley, we sought suppliers, negotiated deals, and managed relationships. We helped shape the brand voice and designed the logo and packaging. 

The 38k brand-loyal Matcha Mob were rewarded with early access and saw their product decisions come to life. It was their brand as much as Ashley’s.

The public launch followed a week later and sold out in 24 hours with $0 media spend.

Soon after we launched internationally—very unusual for a creator’s product to move rapidly to this phase so soon after launch—with subscriptions opened too.

And, in October 2024, the first IRL appearance of the brand (including new products) went on sale at a Shopify pop-up. Ashley hosted a meet-and-greet and a DJ set ended the day which saw queues around the block. A New York City block, that is!

Following the launch, Moby Ventures continues to provide comprehensive operational support and project management. 

By identifying early brand advocates and creating strategies to engage them, we fostered brand loyalty and drove sustained growth for the business.