Strategy Driven by Insight.
Activated Through Storytelling.
Building Brands For What's NXT
Fredrik Ekström
Independent Creative Strategist
With more than 20 years across brand strategy, creative direction, and marketing/PR, I help lifestyle, outdoor, and sports brands grow by understanding people and turning that understanding into strategy, concepts, and communication that actually work.
FIRST LINE: Winning Game Strategy
Based on First Line Sportswear Heritage, I created a global winning game strategy with brand DNA and direction, key target audiences, taglines, messaging, and playbook for activations.
HOUDINI: Winning Game Strategy
Based on Houdini's brand DNA and progressive outdoor positioning, we created a global winning game strategy with an updated brand approach, playbooks, and audience hierarchies.
TRETORN: Eco-Essentials Initiative
I created the sustainability brand direction "Eco-Essentials" as an engine for sustainability transformation, brand development, and positioning within sustainable innovation and responsibility.
TRETORN: Ghost Net Project
I created "The Ghost Net Project" as a sustainability concept, directing product development, design, retailer collaborations, and sustainability PR, thought leadership and advocacy.
WEEKDAY: Global Brand Campaign
The Class of Not Giving A F*ck. It was about sharpening cultural relevance with a generation that increasingly rejects traditional success narratives, rigid norms, and polished perfection.
TRETORN: SAREK Concept & Launch
The creation of SAREK and the collaboration with Nigel Cabourn led to a rejuvenation of the brand, reaching higher distribution and a lifestyle audience that resonated with the brand's ethos.
_edited_edited.jpg)
Get Expert Advice
with a 1-hour free consultation
Whether you’re launching a new product or struggling with marketing results, getting a bit of guidance can make all the difference.
Fast-track insight and strategy through creative sprints.
In a 3–4 week sprint, I align teams around key insights, sharpen directions, and turn insights into action.
Each sprint is tailored to your challenges, whether launching a campaign, shaping a go-to-market plan, or defining a long-term strategy.
Fredrik Ekström
Consumer-Centric Brand Strategist
The NXT Sustainable Consumer Germany
The report is a consumer research and trend report. It is a collaboration between studio MM04 and Above The Clouds—Future Series, a quantitative research study of 1300 respondents focusing on preferences, aspirations, status, and anxieties related to sustainability and consumption.
The NXT Outdoor Consumer Nordics
The NXT Nordic Outdoor Consumer 2025 is a consumer research and trend report based on quantitative data from a national representative base of 2500 respondents in Sweden, Finland, Norway, and Denmark and interviews of 27 brand representatives from Nordic outdoor brands.
The Business Case for Nature: Together with Dan Yates at EOCA, European Outdoor Conservation Association, presenting a keynote and workshop on how to make nature-positive thinking part of business growth and consumer trust.
Outdoor Impact Summit, Munich
From Sustainability Fatigue to Cultural Relevance. Sustainability isn’t dead; it’s just been misunderstood. Unpacks the emotional paradox modern consumers face and explains how brands can win them back through consumer-centric, insights-based messaging.
CPH Fashion Week, Copenhagen
How do we win the future outdoor consumer. Based on The Future Series Report of 3800 Respondents focusing on consumer needs through knowledge of aspirations, trends, triggers, and barriers.
European Surf Summit, Seignosse
Let's Connect & Collaborate
I offer a freelance consultant service where you as client get the benefits of in-depth expertise across a number of specialty areas, without having to increase your permanent staff or contract a full size agency.