Meghan Markle Merch: artisanal lavender dog soap, anyone?

Kate Middleton news derails Meghan Markle’s big plan

The global outpouring of goodwill for the Princess of Wales as she fights cancer may leave Meghan Markle in a very difficult position.

Daniela Elser

March 26, 2024 - 4:01PM

Are you in need of a new dog lead or meditation cushion or wine carrier or drawer organisers or marmalade or a bird feeder? How are you doing for pet shampoo, lanterns and tisanes?

If you are then, boy, do I have some good news for you. Meghan the Duchess of Sussex has heard your cries and soon you could be able to buy all this and much, much more from her new American Riviera Orchard (ARO) lifestyle brand.

Those industrious sorts over at the Daily Mail have somehow gotten their hands on ARO’s trademark application which for the first time reveals the scope and ambition of the duchess’ first major solo commercial project and golly gosh it’s a big ‘un.

To which I say, amen. Build it and they will hopefully come and spend money. Dream big and then embroider it on a pillow you can sell at a massive mark-up. I am all in on the return of Business Meghan seven years after she shuttered her blog The Tig, even if that was blandly derivative.

Meghan Markle’s new lifestyle brand American Riviera Orchard will have quite the array of goods. 

However, in the ten days since ARO’s Instagram debut, the world tilted on its axis with Kate the Princess of Wales’ announcement that she has cancer.

How could the incredible global deluge of support and sudden lovey-dovey messages of goodwill for the princess affect the public reception of ARO?

Basically, will discerning shoppers fork over large wodges of hard-earned cash for artisanal lavender dog soap to a woman who is not on speaking with Kate? And who has spent the last few years chipping away at Kate’s image?

No launch date has yet been revealed for ARO but it mustn’t be far off.

For the better part of the last year reports have circulated that Meghan was beavering away at some entrepreneurial online turn with the only oblique hints being that it would be authentic and whatnot.

Then on March 14 came the big reveal of ARO on Instagram, including a 15-second video of the 42-year-old looking like someone auditioning for the part of a sister-wife, showing her arranging flowers and mixing something in an artfully rustic kitchen.

Meghan Markle's new lifestyle brand, seen in a promotional video posted to Instagram. Picture: American Riviera Orchard/Instagram

No matter what best laid plans might have been drawn up, just over a week later, on March 22, Kate released her video – the internet reeled and the Church of England sat down to write a special prayer (truly) to wish the princess a speedy recovery.

The worldwide reaction to the video has been truly incredible to witness.

It has been viewed 197.5 million times on the Waleses’ official Twitter and Instagram accounts alone. In the US, CBS broke away from their live coverage of March Madness basketball to broadcast the video, Prime Ministers and Presidents by the dozen nearly fell over themselves to show their support and the White House press secretary, Dr Jill Biden and President Joe Biden all separately shared their effusive best wishes within a matter of hours.

Then came the hand-wringing and the self-flagellating with millions worrying about the consequence of their gleeful reposting of bonkers Kate theories and speculation.

The end result of all this sympathy and suddenly caring bleating is that Kate has basically been deified in only a few days.

The Princess of Wales revealing she is undergoing treatment for cancer. Picture: Kensington Palace

So where does this leave Meghan and ARO? Could this dramatic volte face of feeling towards Kate have an impact on her business’ debut?

Join me as we really get into the weeds here.

One argument here is, the two women’s lives have precisely zero bearing on each other. Meghan and husband Prince Harry the Duke of Sussex put out their own one-sentence statement wishing Kate “health and healing” and according to People, the California-based couple have also reached out privately.

The Sussexes are entirely free agents meaning they can do whatever they fancy with their spare hours in between manifesting abundance and writing cheques for the small army of top London silks toiling around the clock on Harry’s hacking lawsuits. Meghan could join a Mars mission or convert their lesser sauna (they reportedly have two) into a rescue shelter for Pomeranians or run for Santa Barbara comptroller and it would be fine and dandy.

Whatever is happening back in Blighty has nothing to do with whatever the duke and duchess are doing.

Kate, William, Harry and Meghan reunited briefly after the Queen died in September 2022 but relations have remained strained since. Picture: Chris Jackson/Getty Images

However, the other argument goes, get real. That’s a wilfully naive interpretation.

For years, the Sussexes have largely built their US brand in opposition to the royal family. The couple put their hearts on their sleeves and shared, shared, shared, even sometimes when they were not being paid.

While Crown Inc. and Harry’s relatives were unconsciously biased, frigidly cold in the face of personal suffering and emotionally constipated, the Sussexes were the open, evolved version of royalty, them valiantly speaking truth to an antiquated institution and casting royal life as a protracted emotional and psychological trial. (Though seriously, how can anyone doubt them on that last point?)

Harry and Meghan with their Oprah interview, Netflix series and the duke’s memoir Spare, offered a deeply unflattering portrayal of William and Kate claiming that they had encouraged Harry to dress up as a Nazi, William had attacked Harry, Kate had made Meghan cry and in one shocking incident currently under investigation by the European Commission, Kate was reluctant to share her lip gloss with Meghan. (The Hague has also been notified.)

In November last year, the Dutch version of highly sympathetic Sussex biographer Omid Scobie’s Endgame named King Charles and Kate as having commented about the Sussexes’ son Prince Archie’s skin colour. The duke and duchess did not comment on the claim push back in any way.

The Waleses and the Sussexes have not been on good terms to say the least. 

Given this history, this story, the image that Meghan has cultivated post-Megxit is the yin to Kate’s yang, what could this mean for ARO’s launch?

In this climate, will Meghan pitching herself as a cosy domestic goddess with perfect taste land with shoppers and see the orders stream in? Or could there be some sort of shopping protest vote, so to speak, with people staying away from ARO out of sympathy for the Princess of Wales?

Will support for Kate see the credit-card toting masses boycott or avoid ARO? Or is Meghan’s US support base so big (and her taste so exquisite) that her sister-in-law’s health battle will have no impact?

(I have said it before and I will say it again for anyone who needs to hear it – the Duchess of Sussex has sublime style.)

It’s interesting to note that to date, ARO has attracted 570,000 Instagram followers, despite no content aside from that first video. That’s a truly impressive figure until you realise that in 2019 when Harry and Meghan launched @SussexRoyal, they set a Guinness world record for reaching one million followers in five hours and 45 minutes, then the shortest time ever. (Jennifer Aniston later broke that record.)

And William and Kate? They have gained just shy of one million new followers this year alone.

Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.