{"id":201492,"date":"2025-06-21T03:11:10","date_gmt":"2025-06-21T03:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/201492\/"},"modified":"2025-06-21T03:11:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-21T03:11:10","slug":"authentic-netflix-not-meghan-markle-makes-her-jam-report-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/201492\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Authentic?’ Netflix, not Meghan Markle, makes her jam, report says"},"content":{"rendered":"

For all of Meghan Markle\u2019s talk this week about being \u201cauthentic\u201d<\/a> by publicizing her viral pregnancy twerking video or demanding that people \u201ctell the truth\u201d about her, a recent report raises questions about whether she\u2019s being straightforward about what\u2019s going on with her embattled As Ever lifestyle brand and whether she\u2019s selling jam, tea and other food products that align with current culinary ideas about what\u2019s \u201cauthentic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking of those products, the Montecito-based Duchess of Sussex announced this week<\/a> that \u201cfavorite\u201d items and \u201csurprises\u201d would go on sale again Friday after she saw <\/a> the first collection quickly sell out in early April. But potential customers might be interested to learn from a new report<\/a> on who\u2019s actually responsible for creating Meghan\u2019s \u201cfaux-country\u201d As Ever\u2019s products \u2014 and it\u2019s not Meghan.<\/p>\n

Puck business writer Rachel Strugatz reported earlier this month<\/a> that Netflix, the global, $500 billion company that streams movies, sports, games and TV shows \u2014 including Meghan\u2019s \u201cWith Love, Meghan\u201d lifestyle show \u2014 oversees the manufacture of her $14 jars of \u201craspberry spread,\u201d as well as of her honey, tea, cookie mixes and edible, dried-flower sprinkles.<\/p>\n

Of course, most people who managed to score some of Meghan\u2019s raspberry spread probably didn\u2019t think that the raspberries actually came from her and Prince Harry\u2019s Montecito garden. They also probably expect that Meghan, like other celebrity entrepreneurs, hires others to produce the goods carrying her brand name. The marketing copy on the As Ever website<\/a> admitted as much, though the copy also tried to make it sound as though Meghan remained intimately involved with making her \u201csignature\u201d berry spread, with its \u201chint of lemon.\u201d<\/p>\n

The copy said the product being sold was \u201cinspired\u201d by a recipe that Meghan \u201ccrafted in her home kitchen,\u201d while the former TV actor told Fast Company<\/a> in late May that she has a \u201cteam\u201d that works closely with \u201ca team\u201d at Netflix.<\/p>\n

As Strugatz noted, this Netflix \u201cteam\u201d also is responsible for mass-producing packaged consumer goods that are tied to some of the streamer\u2019s other shows, including \u201cBridgerton,\u201d \u201cStranger Things\u201d and \u201cSquid Game.\u201d The sale of these goods through Netflix\u2019s online shop represents the streamer\u2019s \u201copportunistic attempt\u201d to cash in on these shows\u2019 popularity, Strugatz said,<\/p>\n

Meghan told Fast Company that her \u201cteam\u201d is \u201con calls daily, working through product development, SKUs, and inventory.\u201d She also said: \u201cWe have a field trip tomorrow to look at different manufacturers and suppliers as we expand the brand.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Strugatz\u2019s reporting told a somewhat different story. Bottom line: As Ever would not exist without Netflix, if only because Netflix is funding Meghan\u2019s venture, as the duchess herself told Fast Company. But Strugatz also said that Meghan doesn\u2019t employ her own team to develop her \u201csad mix of white-label products.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s not building a lifestyle empire,\u201d an insider told Strugatz. \u201cThere\u2019s no one that works for the brand. She\u2019s outsourced the entire brand to Netflix. They send samples and she picks what she likes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another insider, familiar with the partnership, countered that Meghan is trying to build \u201ca dedicated internal team\u201d to support As Ever\u2019s growth, Strugatz reported. Still, whether or not Meghan actually meets with suppliers or works closely on developing the recipes and managing inventory, her attempts to attach a home-grown authenticity to her products aren\u2019t entirely convincing.<\/p>\n

The news that a Netflix team may be sourcing the ingredients or directing a factory to make Meghan\u2019s jam or her brand\u2019s $18 honey tends to erode any sense of authenticity. It\u2019s also not likely that Meghan and As Ever could ever say that their ingredients are \u201clocally sourced,\u201d something consumers can count on if they buy more affordable and fresh-tasting jam from a stand at their hometown farmers market. In the culinary context, authenticity usually refers to food that\u2019s not processed but \u201creal\u201d and \u201cnatural\u201d and associated with a designated place and made with ingredients from that place.<\/p>\n

Moreover, it\u2019s curious that Meghan\u2019s raspberry spread, <\/a>as presented on the website, comes with a familiar product label that purports to list \u201cingredients.\u201d But this label in fact lists no ingredients \u2014 just information about calories and percentages of fat, sodium or sugar per serving. With no ingredients listed, it\u2019s impossible to know whether the spread was made with actual, fresh raspberries, much less whether it contains certain kinds of sugar or preservatives. Similarly, the \u201cingredients\u201d labels for the As Ever crepe and shortbread-cookie mixes lack information about actual ingredients.<\/p>\n

In her report, Strugatz cited other issues bedeviling Meghan\u2019s brand. For one thing, Meghan\u2019s future plans for As Ever \u201cremain unclear.\u201d Up until this week, she offered conflicting stories about when new products would be available again. On her podcast, \u201cConfessions of a Female Founder,\u201d she said her company was on \u201cpause\u201d and she told Fast Company that she would not announce the release of new products until the first quarter of 2026, as she said she was shifting her focus to \u201cthe hospitality angle.\u201d<\/p>\n

One person who knows Meghan \u201cintimately\u201d told Strugatz that \u201cthe haphazard\u201d rollout of the As Ever brand was simply \u201cthe Sussex way.\u201d And while Meghan and her fans claimed that her products were so popular that they sold out within 45 minutes of going on sale, Strugatz said she was told that creating a product \u201cscarcity\u201d was always part of the plan; Meghan wanted everything to sell out within a day \u201cto create the illusion of demand.\u201d<\/p>\n

Either that, or too few units were produced. Strugatz questions whether the products were hastily created to capitalize on the March premiere of the first season of Meghan\u2019s eight-episode Netflix series. It\u2019s also well known that Meghan ran into copyright problems with the original name for her brand \u2014 American Riviera Orchard \u2014 and seemed to come up with As Ever at the last minute.<\/p>\n

Everything about As Ever \u201creads like a lazy, short-term solution to get something out there and into customers\u2019 hands,\u201d Strugatz said. \u201cIt includes little of the vision or personality of Goop, or Martha Stewart, or the other lifestyle brands that Meghan had delusions of building. Indeed, it maps the Sussex way \u2014 not fully thought out, hastily executed, prone to pivot.\u201d<\/p>\n

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