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🧡 How Kevin Durant Turned a Meme Into a Business
Why owning the joke became the smartest move of his personal brand
Jeff Chen
February 11, 2026 • Estimated Reading Time: 5 minutes
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Let’s dive right into it…
MARKETING BLUEPRINT
This superstar athlete just turned his ashy skin into a lot of cash, but only because he stopped running from the internet’s jokes.
Most athletes avoid becoming the punchline of online jokes at all costs, especially when you’re the world’s greatest basketball scorer ever.
But Kevin Durant’s ashy legs have been a viral meme for years.
Instead of hiding from the dry skin, KD owned this narrative.
That’s why this Kevin Durant and Cerave partnership was genius.
KD leaned into the internet’s jokes and turned embarrassment into brand moisturization monetization.
This is a personal branding lesson on how to turn self-awareness into the marketing strategy itself.
The best brands (personal and corporate) don’t fight internet culture but instead understand it, embrace it, and then profit from it.
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FREE THROWS
Sharing the tools and resources that I’m using this week:
🏟️ Brand Bowl Report - Gopuff tracked which Super Bowl ads resulted in instant sales by tracking units ordered in the hour after each CPG ad aired.
📧 beehiiv - With TikTok under new U.S. ownership and the app acting up ever since, it's more important than ever for brands and creators to own their audience through email using platforms like beehiiv.
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POST-GAME
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- Jeff Chen | 🏀💡👨🏻‍💻
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