The Drink Cart: Chalamet Poker

Come for Chalamet-Cartier poker nights, vintage Rolex ads and scent bars bottling intrigue and then stay for the Spaghetti Western cocktail with the quick draw.

Greetings my marketing newsletter and card-playing friends.

I wasn’t expecting Timothy Chalamet to make inroads into poker in 2025 or this newsletter for that matter. I saw poker on the TV at the gym the other day and I was fascinated that it was still a thing.

Chalamet shook down Cartier with Cobra Snake early 2000’s era vintage style photos in his own luxury sponsored Poker Room. All this to celebrate his Oscar nomination at the Chateau Marmont and covered by GQ of course. Is there anything more classic than this tagline, “Always a safe haven. Always open.”

There is nothing edgier then celebrities playing poker sponsored by 178 year old jewelry brand from France. “Cut to a posh evening in a spacious suite on the sixth floor of the famed LA hotel—three full poker tables complete with dealers, bartenders, a DJ playing everything from Sinatra to “Let the Beat Build,” and a rooftop patio that included a cigar station—filled with friends both close and equally famous, including Tobey Maguire, Kevin Hart, Rich Paul, Nathan Fielder, Theo Von, Kid Cudi, and Kylie Jenner, with me as the outlier taking it all in.”

Is poker back?

Gambling story time

This does remind me of the time the online gambling brand I worked at gave Vice a stack of cash (I want to say $30,000) and instead of an ad, they did a massive editorial about them gambling the money in Atlantic City. The shoot definitely included David Cross, a luxury mini-bus and an all nighter at the companies expense.

It was one of those absurd online gambling moments when we started out trying to buy ads in a niche magazine, and ended up with an insane editorial spread as they spent all the ad money on one epic party night. All the photos looked like exactly Chaleamet’s poker night - just with 100% less Cartier.

And since we’re talking gambling, these Skybet ads are pretty stunning as was Anomaly’s process to get there.

As ECD Joe Corcoran shared it was daily creative sprints with up to eight creatives. “No interruptions, no reviews, no check ins. Just working together.” They were all focused on one single idea, “Thoroughbreds always beat any human athlete, from any era, hooves down.” And you can see how that shaped everything. Stunning stuff.

Three stats that I was not expecting this week

• Shocker: a lot of people don’t really like Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk. Pew Research Center found US adults have a 67% unfavourable view of Musk and a 54% negative view of Zuck.

• Double shocker: Back in the day full sets of baseball cards featured 792 unique cards. For the 2024 Topps Baseball set, there are now 43,568 unique cards. This makes collecting completely impossible.

• No rest for the wicked: Over at Linkedin which is still getting 10-11 million US visitors even on the weekend days.

And one anecdote about AI and search

I can’t for the life of me understand any of the data in this Datos report on AI and search. It certainly shows that Google is still dominate but that users are really using and driving traffic from a search perspective.

One thing I can tell you is that a few weeks ago I was at an Edward Albie play and the guy in front of me wasn’t Googling Albie, he was using ChatGPT and reading it to his partner. I think that tells you everything you know about where search and AI are headed.

When even the candles companies have private clubs

Diptyque launched their latest scent by creating The Orphéon Club. A fully immersive Parisian jazz club, just like the one the founders used to love. The club was launching the new Orphéon blue and the “iconic woody-floral scent captures the electricity of Orphéon jazz club and Paris nightlife in the 1960s” scent.

I like the total world-build or as they say smugly on their music enhanced web experience, “Pulsating live jazz is the soundtrack to a rousing scene, where artists, thinkers and scenesters come to meet, talk, laugh and dance the night away. Unexpected encounters abound in a milieu of pure energy and elegance.” But it could have been even more over the top.

Giant Blizzards

I’m still not over my trip to the snowy Montreal last week or even the icy sidewalks en route to the office yesterday. But I would eat the heck out of this giant Blizzard. The unique OOH ads use 7-foot tall DQ red spoons and giant Smarties to turn the snow banks of Canada into “Blizzard Blanks.” Totally smart, but I still hate the snow and ice.

Ad History: Rolex

This Rolex Matterhorn ad from 1964 features such a cool insight. A watch engineered for loneliest places, where there are no repairpeople. I’m not sure how there is Rolex’s for these 1960’s prices, but the copy is so worth it.

Ad history: Pepsi

This week I’ve been obsessed (I had ChatGPT doing deep research on them) with vintage vending machines. Here’s a fun fact from that work, “As early as 1615, coin-operated devices in English taverns dispensed tobacco (likely pipe tobacco or cigars) to patrons.”

So when this came up in my feed, I was surprised that I didn’t remember it. Pepsi answered the news that they finished behind Coke by 4x in revenue back in 2001 with this ad. Now I’m a Coke guy, but this is a great ad that really does speak to that fighting from behind aspect of a challenger brand.

Hat of the week: Unhinged Spring Training Cap

I usually have only hats I want to get. But this week, in searching for hats, I came across something that I’m not even sure I can explain. This is the Spring Training Grapefruit League hat that has all the league’s logos on it.

Not since Rob Lowe sported the generic NFL Logo has there been such a noncommital loyalty sports cap. Fanatics are out of their damn minds by saying, “Demonstrate your excitement for pre-season baseball with this 2025 Spring Training Grapefruit League 9FIFTY Snapback Hat by New Era.”

Last call: The Drink Cart Spaghetti Western

This one was a pleasant surprise. At our annual stop (at least it is now) at Nora Grey, a lovely spot in Montreal with probably the best service in a restaurant I’ve had in the last year. I think I said that if I was going to train agency staff on the art of hospitality and warmth with clients, I would take them for dinner here.

It was incredible. From translating the menu from French into things we had to have (their words were “this is insane” you have to get it) to selecting and telling two short stories about the wine pairing (without using any cliched wine talk), to the pace of everything. It was incredible. And the space still looks like your Dad’s wood paneled rec-room from the 1980s but elevated to the max.

Shameless content cross linking: I dove a little deeper into this story on my Linkedin this week if you want to read about what this experience meant for agency client service.

Where was I? Oh right, your cocktail.

They also served this after dinner drink. The Spaghetti Western which was born at Death & Co. it’s another lovely edition to the Old Fashioned extended universe and such a delicious way to end a dinner.

Here’s the recipe:

• 1 oz reposado tequila

• ½ oz Mezcal

• ¾ oz Amaro Nonino

• 1 dash Orange bitters

• Add ice and stir to chill. Strain into a glass over ice, preferably a single large cube.

• Do a little orange peel

Now, make yourself one and fire up the final duel from The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

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Drink Cart Approved™ agency discussion topics

• I’m still trying to figure out how or why Airbnb is using Wheetus’ Teenage Dirtbag in their current spot.

• The kids are all talking about “lore” now. Thoughts?

• Are you a “sit alone at a restaurant person” or can’t be alone type diner”?

• Would you allow a DIY plasma cannon at the agency Friday drinks?

• The American Psycho version of Linkedin is perfection.

• The end of an era for the Philadelphia Phillies infamous poop score bug.

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The Drink Cart is your weekly fuel for pop culture brains and ad junkies. A cocktail of ad insights and hot takes that feel like you’re hanging at your favourite dive bar after launching your latest campaign.