When Gap Inc. announced the launch of its new loyalty program, Encore, a lot of people read it as a retail story: points, tiers, credit card perks. The usual array of inexpensive but persuasive perks in the more-or-less usual arrangement.

But that’s not what it is, y’all. Encore is a media play. Gap Inc. is announcing, in the plainest possible language, that it is no longer just in the business of selling khakis. It’s in the business of owning their narrative.

Don't take my word for it. Take theirs. CEO Richard Dickson said in the press release: "Fashion is entertainment, and today's customers aren't just buying apparel, they're buying into brands that shape culture and tell compelling stories."

If that sounds like a media company talking? It is.

The Evidence Is Kind of Overwhelming

Encore isn't just a loyalty program with a Disney collab thrown in for fun (though there is a Disney collab). It's the consumer-facing infrastructure of a full content and entertainment strategy. We're talking AMC Theatres. NBCUniversal. Exclusive drops. Behind-the-scenes content. Curated cultural moments. A rotating members-only marketplace. The whole enchilada.

More tellingly, Gap Inc. now has a Chief Entertainment Officer. They have a Sunset Boulevard office opening this spring. (Yes, that is the same street as Chateau Marmont and the legendary Whisky a Go Go.) That is not a brand that is dabbling in content, y’all. That is a brand that has decided content is the product, and the clothes are how you fund it.

And Gap isn't even the most dramatic example of this shift. Did you know Dick’s Sporting Goods has won an Emmy? I’m just kidding. They’ve won two of ‘em.  And Under Armour has built an entire episodic content studio. They're not producing ads. They're producing shows.

Not convinced? Let’s look at some big money, baby. 

• LVMH — yep, owners of Louis Vuitton, Bulgari, Dior, Tiffany & Co, Moët & Chandon, Dom Pérignon, etc. — has launched 22 Montaigne Entertainment with Superconnector Studios

• Starbucks announced Starbucks Studios in back in June of 2024

• Tech giant Google is in the mix now, too, with film/TV production initiative 100 Zeros

If that doesn't make you rethink what "content strategy" means for your brand, I'm not sure what will.

The Rent vs. Own Problem

For years, brands have been renting attention. As a company, you pay for reach on platforms you don't own, to audiences you don't control, governed by algorithms that change without warning. And those platforms charge more every quarter. You get the eyeballs for as long as the money flows. But the second the money stops, so does the relationship.

The brands making these production moves have figured out the alternative. When you build content people actually want, you build an audience that belongs to you, not to the algorithm or the platform. If your customers dig what you’re putting out, they can find it across platforms, but they can also find it inside your own moat. Where you control the whole message ecosystem, not just the rented bits someone else allows you to use.

So What Does This Mean for You?

I get it. Gap Inc. has a nine-figure marketing budget and a Sunset Boulevard office. Most brands don't have…any of that. But the underlying logic scales. (As long as you don’t put your CEO on camera referring to your new burger as “product” and taking a wee baby bite of your new rollout. Woof. That was a swing and a miss, McDonald’s.)

The brands that figure out storytelling first are going to build audiences that can’t be nuked by someone else’s algo. And this is especially true for complex concepts like fintech. Everyone else is going to keep paying more and more for reach that was never really theirs to begin with.