Destination Candice
Candice Burt is building Destination Trail as an elite brand, positioning herself as the lifestyle avatar of that identity.
In April 2021, she swore off Facebook and Twitter, because “she didn’t want to be on the menu.” I think she cited the male gaze on this.
A month later she reversed course, and now Facebook, Insta and Twitter were her, all the time.
Its A Material World
The media landscape has been transformed. What were once vices are now habits. Insta and TikTok enable a performative intimacy that might not have happened earlier.
We’ve seen this before. House Kardashian: where Kim transitioned from Paris Hilton’s Closet-Keeper to a freestanding multi-billion dollar brand family.
These ranked charts show where Candice Burt & Destination Trail figure in the landscape. CB/DT has a stronger Insta presence, and short-memory visuals drive impulse buying.
 |
| Weird Science. |
Obviously Kim K will probably never run an ultra, but she’s here to show top-end. Other notable ultra-entities and female athletes are shown as markers.
In the 1940s Bing Crosby and Frank Sinatra used improved recording technology to sing intimately to the listener, and not bellow to the back of the house. In the '90s St John Knits had the CEO Marie Gray St. John in their print ads stepping off a Caribbean yacht, Gulfstream etc, and her market followed her.
Back to the Present
Then the lifestyle references became clearer. Gone was the trucker-cap twin-braid trail girl. Now she was the doe-eyed resort-wear desert trail femme, in what turned out to be Tucson AZ.
There was plenty of daily evidence etc, but its only part of the picture.
She’s also surfaced as a vocal BitCoiner, which leads to how did she get there. That question may never be fully answered.
Close behind are her recent anti-vax tweets. I recall that everyone’s 2020 race calendar was blown to hell due to the COVID pandemic.
Upselling the Brand.
Ultras are not necessities. They’re a luxury. And at some point, Candice decided that the luxury branding aspects of the 200mi + were entirely the point. The subsidiary DT feeder races are a logical intake for the new arrivals.
In 2018 a BigFoot 200 entry was $900. Now a Tahoe 200 entry is $1600. Making up for lost time? Maybe. The greater point is that she can charge whatever she wants. So why not $1600? See Coach and Hermes if you need a parallel.
In marketing these events, most of the images are her. For those asleep in the Kardashian epoch this is startling. In ultras, its revelatory.
For women, its aspirational, girl-boss, whatever.
For guys, its a glamor lure.
Don’t kid yourselves here.
In the longer term I foresee a move to the subscription model, which provides the beloved Rundle [Recurring revenue bundle] to anchor the lifestyle events, gear collabs and merch.
And Now A Word From Our Sponsors
Sponsors stay on board as long as it works for them. If a client becomes problematic and hurts sales, they’ll find another venue. Or if the controversy works for them in the enragement/engagement algorithms of the FB/IG/Twitterverse, they’ll ride it out.
Where this leads going forward is anyone’s guess. My take is that she’s staked out a new position and intends to stay there.
===
Comments
Someone forwarded your post about me to me so I am just now seeing it. Of course you are welcome to have your opinion at my expense, but I want to correct a few items that are incorrect. I also want to say that I consider you a friend and it's surprising to see such a cold and opinionated article about me based purely on speculation and full of inaccuracies. Interestingly, another friend of mine once said to watch out for you, I stood up for you and disagreed with this individual. Perhaps I was wrong.
Here are some counterpoints and corrections:
1. I did not swear off facebook or twitter in april 2021. This spring I temporarily closed my accounts in order to have more time with my children as well as prepare for my Arizona Trail attempt. I reopened the accounts when I was ready to continue to share my poetry, writing and stories. During the time they were closed many people reached out to me. I was surprised people even noticed, but I never made any kind of announcement because it was personal. My children were going through some transitions with life and school as well and I needed some time to reassess.
2. I am not anti-vax. I am pro choice on vax. I fully support people who do or do not want to get the vaccination and I am grateful that we have a vaccination options that have allowed the country (and world) to begin to look a lot more normal! I think for me a lot comes down to freedom and body autonomy. I value freedom of choice and I am against mandating vaccines. I believe businesses should be able to require or not require vaccines for entry - their choice.
3. I still love (and do) wear my hair in braids! I am not polished although I do love dressing up and always have and I am not *just* the one dimensional person you (or anyone else) thinks they see online.
(rest of my response in next comment)
4. My personal instagram page https://www.instagram.com/runcandicerun/ does promote my events on occasion (when we open registration or I'm inspired), after all they are a large part of my life, but we also have our own Destination Trail IG: 48,100 followers where there's rarely a photo of me! So together with my page and my business page we have closer to 167,000 followers.
5. The price of 200s has risen in large part due to the need for more paid staff positions (we currently have 4 staff year around and many more per event), more paid medical folks, and the rising prices of rentals, permits, food, you name it. Our food costs doubled this year as did the cost of our rental vehicles and the cost of renting the start finish lines. Our entry fees this year are $1495, not 1600. Considering the event is a fully marked, catered 4-4.5 day event that is still a very good deal imo. Bigfoot was $895 in 2018 only because we tried to encourage that race to sell out as it was lagging behind in entries and we lost money at that price point. It was only an early bird 2 week entry price and then went up to over $1000. All our other 200s were priced at over $1000 at that time. Lastly, we had to cancel all but one of our events in 2020 due to covid, all added up to the events costing more now for us to organize
6. Prices of these kinds of races, comparisons:
-The 2021 Cocodona race was $1400, similar price to ours. This year it is currently $1395, again, around the same amount - definitely comparable.
-Tor des Geants: $950 usd (2021) however, they also take 800 runners and we only take 250.
7. Bitcoin: you really should try to understand decentralized currency. It's fascinating stuff. Start with "The Bitcoin Standard". Your post seems to point to some kind off odd, perhaps nefarious background, which really seems like grasping at things to complain about, but go ahead. WithBitcoin, we can truly own our money. We are also not at the whim of inflation. Yesterday the fed came out with an inflation rate of 6.2%, that's the highest inflation in 30 years! I guess you could say my foray into investing is my desire to set myself and my children up with a savings that will weather the issues I see with the USD and the fact that saving money in a bank only means losing it over time to inflation.
8. Comparison to Kim Karadashian: you mention being startled by my use of photos of myself to promote my races. Have you seen my DT instagram page? Please count the number of photos of me there then get back to me https://www.instagram.com/destinationtrailraces/
The actual truth is when I was starting out (2013/2014) there were a LOT more photos of me :) nowadays we do not use my pictures to sell the races.
9. I am a human being. I have feelings. I consider you a friend, you and I have had many good chats, and I am saddened that you wouldn't reach out personally with your concerns, instead you try to bolster yourself and your website by trying to tear me apart. To top it off, so much here is speculation and just wrong that it's concerning.
Hope that helps! Give me a ring, I'd be happy to discuss any of these items with you.