Though onlookers have been waiting for Meghan Markle to set up shop for more than a year, it wasn’t until Wednesday morning that anyone knew if they would be able to afford it. While the Duchess of Sussex originally announced a slate of nine As Ever products in tandem with the March 4 premiere of her Netflix lifestyle show, With Love, Meghan, prices were not revealed until the items went on sale on the brand’s website at 9 am EDT. Though the show’s high-low approach to dressing and gift baskets gave customers a pretty good idea of the aesthetic Meghan was working to evoke, it’s hard to judge the total package until you know exactly what it will cost you. Turns out, living the Montecito lifestyle will run you $121, if you buy one of everything.
Or that’s how much it would have cost if you managed to snag the offerings while they were available. All nine products sold out within an hour, with the $28 wildflower honey selling out in less than five minutes. The rest of the initial “seasonal collection,” which included peppermint, hibiscus, and lemon-ginger teas, the now-famous raspberry spread, flower petal “sprinkles,” crepe mix, and shortbread cookie mix, was priced from $12 to $14. My order—consisting of the baking mixes and all three teas—came to $64.
Overall, the launch makes it clear that Meghan is aiming, in both price point and aesthetic approach, for the market currently occupied by companies like Stonewall Kitchens, a specialty food producer based in Maine which is stocked at high-end grocery stores across the county. The price of the honey might have been the biggest surprise. Thanks to globalization and foodie culture, we’ve never had more options for honey available for purchase, and the current rage for boutique, single-origin honey has made consumers more comfortable paying top dollar for the good stuff. Flamingo Estate took the trend to the extreme and started selling the honey from celebrities’ personal hives, offering the honey from the bees at LeBron James’s Bel Air mansion for $250 a pop.
In view of that, $28 for a Meghan-approved product feels like a steal. The honey produced by the actual bees at King Charles III’s private home, Highgrove Estate, will run you $34 for 12 oz, but that is limited to 500 jars annually. Though the As Ever honey isn’t from Meghan’s personal bees, it does come with honeycomb, which might explain the higher price point. For comparison, Savannah Bee Company sells their raw honey with honeycomb at Williams Sonoma for $29.95.
That all of Meghan’s teas are herbal—and thus, not caffeinated—might seem abhorrent to an English tea purist. But during an episode of With Love, Meghan, the duchess mentioned that she doesn’t drink coffee and often opts for herbal teas. Her husband Prince Harry is also known to eschew coffee, even on extremely long days.
Article, a web design firm founded by Meghan’s friend Ryan Sax, made the As Ever website, and the duchess included Sax, along with makeup artist Daniel Martin and photographer Jake Rosenberg, in a Monday Instagram post thanking her “boys” for “being the best partners through thick and thin.” But the other surprise of the launch was that the site’s backend was integrated into the Shopify platform for payment processing, which simplifies the process for retailers and customers. Ultimately, it’s a sign that As Ever was designed to handle its influx of business on day one.
Courtesy of As ever.
The company, which was developed in partnership with Netflix’s Consumer Products division, will continue to release new product offerings seasonally, and the second season of the duchess’s Netflix show, With Love, Meghan, is set to premiere this fall. Though the television show was received with mixed reviews, the duchess’s raspberry spread has gotten the thumbs up from those who have gotten to try it, including Drew Barrymore, who hosted Meghan on her talk show last month.
She announced the launch on her own Instagram with an image showing her dipping a spoon into a jar of raspberry spread. “We’re live!” she said. “Come shop the As ever collection I’ve poured so much love into. So excited to share this with you.” Over the weekend, she shared images and videos of her friends, including Kelly McKee Zajfen, former Suits costar Abigail Spencer, and on Tuesday, the praise continued with videos from Nate Berkus and Jeremiah Brent. She also shared a video from an episode of Kelly Clarkson’s talk show, where Brian Tyree Henry praised With Love, Meghan and said that he and Elizabeth Olsen were drawing inspiration from her tips. “We’ve got to get into the flower sprinkle game,” he said. “Because Meghan is onto something.”