Arrrrr! 🏴☠️ Welcome to a 🔒 subscriber-only edition 🔒 of Category Pirates. Each week, we share radically different ideas to help you design new and different categories. For more: Dive into an audiobook, listen to a category design jam session, or upgrade to a Founding subscription to ask the Pirate Eddie Bot your category design questions.
Dear Friend, Subscriber, and Category Pirate,
Marketers think their job is to get attention.
So they burn millions on “brand campaigns.” They measure impressions. They brag about reach. They smear peanut butter marketing across every channel and call it strategy.
And they wonder why nobody remembers them 48 hours later.
(Like the Sydney Sweeney ad the internet already forgot)
Attention isn’t the goal. The goal is to create a cultural movement.
Nobody knows that better than Ryan Meegan, co-founder and Chief Marketing Dude at Dude Wipes.
They didn’t try to be the 9,000th toilet paper brand “raising awareness.” Instead, he went to war with toilet paper. What started as a joke between friends became a cultural strike. Suddenly, talking about your butt on national TV wasn’t taboo—it was funny, unforgettable, and impossible to ignore.
“It wasn’t just about selling more wipes. It was about making it a cultural thing people would talk about.” - Ryan Meegan
That’s not impressions. That’s a movement.
Customers spread it. Retailers lined up for it. Competitors couldn’t wipe it away.
Category Kings design Lightning Strikes that move the market from A to G.
Most marketers stop at A.
One splashy ad. One stunt. One Super Bowl spot. And then nothing.
But legendary Lightning Strikes move people (step by step) through a sequence that ends in a cultural movement. A world where the market bends around you.
That’s what Dude Wipes did.
Each strike wasn’t random. Each was part of a deliberate framework. A system for making sure the market couldn’t look away—even if it wanted to.
In this conversation, Ryan breaks down exactly how that system works.
Why a $10K UFC gamble became the blueprint for Dude Wipes’ rise and what it teaches about risk, culture, and timing
How to turn a one-off stunt into a strike that compounds into culture instead of disappearing in 48 hours
Why timing matters more than budget and how Dude Wipes decides when to pull the trigger
How to design WOM into your strike from day one so it scales whether you’ve got $10K or $10M
Why going to war with toilet paper was the real genius move, and how picking the right villain makes your strike unforgettable
This isn’t about ads. It’s about architecture. Ryan reveals the A→G framework behind every legendary strike and how to turn your brand into the story culture can’t stop telling.
Here’s how to navigate this conversation:
00:12 – Betting It All on a Butt Sponsorship: Ryan shares how sponsoring Tyron Woodley’s UFC fight with almost their entire budget became Dude Wipes’ “revenue-or-die” moment.
07:45 – When a Joke Becomes a Category King: How three friends riffing on a funny idea turned into a brand that went to war with toilet paper and why that villain gave them cultural firepower.
13:28 – Fear Is the Signal of a Strike: Why the best Lightning Strikes feel reckless in the moment, and how that fear signals you’re about to bend culture.
18:57 – Haters Make the Best Marketers: Ryan explains why backlash is a feature, not a bug, and how Dude Wipes uses critics to amplify word-of-mouth.
24:40 – The Day Toilet Paper Became the Villain: The pivotal moment Dude Wipes reframed toilet paper as “making the problem worse,” and how that POV turned the category upside down.
28:11 – The Power of the $50K Ceiling: Why their most legendary strikes have never cost more than five figures—and how constraints fueled creativity instead of limiting it.
33:09 – When to Hold, When to Shove All-In: Inside Ryan’s sixth sense for timing deals, spotting fire-sale opportunities, and knowing when to bet big on a strike.
41:40 – Protect Your Crease: The NHL campaign that proved the right copy can hijack culture better than a logo.
47:12 – The Mount Rushmore of Lightning Strikes: From Jake Paul knockouts to butt-wiping footballs, Ryan walks through the most iconic strikes that defined Dude Wipes’ rise.
50:57 – A Billboard Blitz Against TP: The inside story of a 700-billboard blitz that declared war on TP—and why it worked as a coronation strike, cementing Dude Wipes’ place in culture.
If you’ve ever wondered how a scrappy brand can hijack culture, outmaneuver giants, and turn bathroom humor into a billion-dollar movement, this conversation with Ryan is your north star.
Want more on Lightning Strikes?
Arrrrrr,
Category Pirates 🏴☠️
P.S. — DUDE Wipes didn’t outspend Charmin. They out-thought them.
That’s the power of Category Design.
Legendary Lightning Strikes come from framing the problem differently, naming a villain, and daring to bet big while everyone else plays safe.
In the Category Design Academy, you’ll learn how to sharpen your POV and create the kind of movement your competitors can’t copy—no matter how much money they burn.
Applications for the Fall 2025 cohort are now open.
👉 Apply here to design the movement your market can’t ignore.
