Open Letter From Pirate Katrina: On To Another Chapter

We will miss you, Katrina. Once in the band, always in the band. 🏴‍☠️

Ahoy, Pirates!

It’s Pirate Katrina, and I’m writing to share that there’s a new pirate on deck.

If you’re part of the Category Design Academy or have reached out with a newsletter question, you’ve probably already seen Pirate Bri’s name pop up. She’s running the latest Category Design Academy cohort and making fast connections with the crew.

She will be helping replace my role moving forward—allowing me to continue on to the next chapter.

I’m incredibly proud of everything we’ve built together over the last three years.

When I joined Category Pirates in 2022, we were publishing mini-books on Substack and turning those into big books on Amazon.

Since then, we:

• Launched the Category Design Academy, now in its third cohort, with community members successfully designing, defining, and elevating their categories

• Created Strategy Therapy and Creator Capitalist, two courses helping entrepreneurs and companies refine their category lens

• Published 50+ mini-books from Radical Resilience to The Marketing Funnel Funeral to the Creator Capitalist series

• Launched the Creator Capitalist podcast and shared dozens of category design conversations to help you think about thinking

I’m proud of what we’ve accomplished. Working with Pirate Christopher, Pirate Eddie, and the team has been one of my greatest learning experiences. The entire Category Pirates crew (and the category design community) has taught me so much about thinking different, challenging assumptions, and building a meaningful career.

So why leave now?

Because I’ve discovered my own niche within category design.

Over the past few months, I’ve been working with entrepreneurs who have built their own Intellectual Capital through years of client work—but need help getting their thinking out of their heads and onto the page. This work feels like the natural next step for me. We came to the collective decision that what’s in the best interest of the band is for me to focus on this new chapter while the crew (Pirate Bri, Pirate Jack, and the growing team) continues to grow Category Pirates.

I’ll always believe in the mission to unleash 100,000 Category Designers into the world.

And I’ll always be grateful for the years I spent helping build this movement.

Thank you for reading, for the conversations, and for showing up in the Academy, Strategy Therapy, and Creator Capitalist. Most of all, thank you for believing in category design. Helping build Category Pirates has been one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had in business—and I can’t wait to see where the Pirates take things from here.

I’ll always be cheering on the crew.

All the best,

Katrina