5 brutally honest lessons from 5 years of Ensemble ✍️
Today is our official birthday!
Five years ago today we nervously but proudly took a deep breath and hit ‘go live’ on the Ensemble website. We had noooo idea what lay ahead. Though we saw tremendous opportunity in the future of media, if we’d had a crystal ball we’re not sure we would have had the courage to jump in. What we did have was lots of hope, ambition and gumption to build something fresh, from scratch.
Something stylish, playful, accessible, imperfect but endearing; a platform that took fashion, beauty, wellness and women’s issues seriously, while never being pretentious. We’ve been blown away by the support of our audience, the industry, friends and more since then, through all of the ups, downs, sideways moves and changes.
What have we learnt? We took some time to reflect, and landed on some honest (when are we ever not honest…) lessons. Thank you, and enjoy.
ZOE’S FIVE LESSONS
🦭 Remember the seals, but ride the wave
‘Remember the seals’ has become part of Ensemble lore, included in one of our early brand-strategy brainstorms as a reminder to stay weird (it’s a reference to this random but well-loved story). Staying ‘weird’ – colourful, distinctive, true to you – is even more vital as AI and a flattening of culture and aesthetics make the (digital) world feel blander. But the wave in this analogy is the zeitgeist; a reminder that things/people/brands must keep evolving too.
😵💫 Things will never settle down
I was 35 when Ensemble launched, and now I am 40. Both personally and professionally over those five years I’ve thought, many times, ‘maybe I should wait until things are a bit more stable?’. But things – career, industry, finances – will never be stable. This is true for the media (neverending chaos), fashion (which changes and stays exactly.the.same), technology (pivot to [buzzword]) and life (oh, life). Change is the only constant and you have to ride the wave (see above) or you’ll go crazy. Every day is all there is; embrace the chaos; it is what it is; just do it. You get the idea!
🫠 Aspiration is back
When we launched, I wrote a story about editing a ‘glamour’ issue of a print magazine and trying to resist the pressure of the aspirational traditions – and fakery – of fashion and women’s magazines. I truly believed that the model was shifting, and for a number of years it did, towards a more authentic, diverse, inclusive, values-driven, supportive, sustainable, kinder model. These words now feel a little like relics: across the board, we’ve gone backwards – the vibe shift to conservatism, regression when it comes to body diversity, obscene wealth as the ideal – and that includes media and models of storytelling.
I’m sorry to be cynical! But I hope that is a reminder that if you value something that has values, you need to financially support it (or vote for it; local elections are coming up guys) – or it will get swallowed up by the vibe shift.
🫂 People want to and will support you
When you’re deep in your own thing, it’s all too easy to dwell on the stress and challenges, and sometimes feel like you’re maybe not being supported by others. But when I reflect on five years, what stands out most is that people really do want to help – and they have. Whether it’s contributors doing things within our budget, designers and PRs championing us, brands and advertisers thinking of Ensemble for paid partnerships, friends mucking in and doing favours (SO MANY FAVOURS) or readers opening up their wallets to subscribe or buy tickets to our events, we would be nothing without that support. Despite my cynicism above, I do still hold hope that people really want to see cool and good things succeed and they want to support that however they can. (I wish more big brands and advertisers would do the same rather than reverting to the status quo.)
🫶 He aha te mea nui o te ao, He tangata, he tangata, he tangata | What is the most important thing in the world? It is the people, it is the people, it is the people
We all know this! But five years has reinforced it. Ensemble would not be Ensemble without Rebecca, and I know she’d say the same for me. Ensemble would not have launched without Dan, Ant, Nicole, Simon, Mette-Marie, Kerryanne, Duncan, Niki, Lofa, Jett. Ensemble would not be what it is today without Tyson, Lara and Georgie (and now, Sophie). Ensemble would not have grown without Imogen and Chris. Ensemble would not be an ensemble without all of the creatives who have written, photographed, styled and created wonderful things for us. Ensemble would not exist without our community, both online and offline. And I think that collective power is especially important to remember and advocate for as society becomes even more individualistic.
REBECCA’S FIVE LESSONS
🪞 It’s impossible to make a living and the industry is smoke and mirrors
I will be 100% transparent with you. So far this year, Zoe and I have each taken $2500 from the business. We have spent much, much more than that on contributors, investing any income back into paying writers, photographers and our amazing intern Sophie who we pay $26/hr to help us for six hours a week (most other publications do not pay their interns, however this goes against everything we stand for and we hope to mentor and grow a more diverse range of voices in the industry than just those who can afford to work for free). Other income we’ve received is staying in the business to help us weather the ongoing media storm.
It’s standard practice to smile and say ‘great!’ when people ask how you’re doing, but it is tough. Everyone is doing it tough. I wish we could all acknowledge it without it seeming weak or like a bad investment. I’m proud of anyone publishing anything in this shit show of a media industry. It’s financially and emotionally tough out there. Some days I question why we do it; each day that we get up and show up for each other and our readers is a win.
💸 There is no budget for you
We are operating at a time when the number of PRs far outweigh journalists and publications. And when every piece of content we do comes at a cost (of time and/or hard money), your pitch had better be good. Or, even better, come with a budget. Please don’t pitch us ‘stories’ featuring large multinational brands who spend with other platforms but not us. Or, if you’re a large well-paid PR company pitching a ‘brand story’ from a multimillion dollar business that involves some kind of expensive content they’ve paid others to create, please don’t expect us to run it for free, or be insulted when I reply asking why we are the only people in the equation not clipping the ticket. It’s entirely likely that the person you are pitching to earns less and has a far greater workload than you. Please, be respectful.
🧐 Where are the progressive billionaires?
It feels like many media stories of 2024 and 2025 have been overrun with billionaires swinging their dicks and trying to control the narrative (James Grenon taking a majority stake in NZME, rumours about Nick Mowbray’s interest in NZ media, the Wright Foundation and The Platform, Trump and Paramount, Bezos and the platforms he owns/rumours he wants US Vogue). Yet no one has reached out to us, or any of our media-owning friends, rude.
📉 What progress?
When we first started back in 2020, we were excited by the potential to harness a perceived shift in readers desires and propel them into a better media landscape. We believed that predominantly social and cultural movements like BLM and #MeToo were helping shift the ideal on outdated societal norms and the future was exciting. When we joined Stuff one year later, they had both a #MeToo editor (Ali Mau) and a Pou Tiaka kaumatua (Carmen Parahi). Those wāhine and those positions are no longer in that business (nor are we, obviously). Victoria’s Secret is back, Ozempic has swept the global, providing no end of hot takes from a supposedly feminist perspective (I say supposedly because, and I say this with empathy for anyone trying to live in the fucked up society we are supposed to exist in, I believe any discussions on a women’s body to be unhelpful) and Trump is again in power.
When times are challenged we know that many advertisers are more conservative, rewarding those platforms who do not challenge the status quo or disrupt a passive acceptance of the times we live in.
💜 Our community is awesome
I like to think Ensemble’s great difference is that we care. Sometimes too much... It can be really hard when our limited resources mean we can’t cover everything we’d like. But when you aren’t drawing a salary, what sustains us is positive feedback, and we have that in spades.
To our paid subscribers who ensure our existence, know that I appreciate you so much that I sometimes well up when I think about you. We don’t have the time, the money or the emotional capacity to tell all the stories we want to tell, or to uplift as many voices as we would like. But know that we see you and appreciate you. Also, free Palestine.
Again, if you are in a position to support us financially please upgrade your subscription, or buy a ticket to one of our upcoming fashion film festival events. If you’re not, spend some time engaging on the site, throw a comment on here or an Instagram post; we love to feel the love.
Great post! Happy Birthday! So true, media is f***ing tough! x
You guys are brilliant