Emily Miller, author of BREAKFAST: The Cookbook, has launched a cereal brand with a difference. Not only is OffLimits the first brand to incorporate a female cereal character into its messaging, with illustrations by Shepard Fairey’s Studio Number One, but its products are formulated to enhance your mood. Selling for $24 for two large boxes on its website, OffLimits offers two flavors: DASH, made with Intelligentsia Coffee and cacao for an energetic kick, and ZOMBIE, which includes various adaptogens for a more chilled approach to the morning meal.

“Cereal is a vehicle for culture,” says Miller. “So it was important to use that opportunity to create a crew of counterculture characters that face and destigmatize human cycles of emotions, from anxiety to depression.”

As expectations on brands heighten, those that put social good first are likely to gain attentionStanley Kustamin (2020)

One of the consequences of the reinvigorated Black Lives Matter movement is that household food brands like Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben have been forced to change their mascots and branding because they reinforce racial stereotypes. As expectations on brands heighten, those that put social good first are likely to gain attention.

OffLimits is also launching during a pandemic, at a time when a third of Americans are showing signs of clinical anxiety or depression. As such, it’s significant that the brand’s cereals draw attention to and help to normalize anxiety and depression, which are often stigmatized. With over half of Gen Zers saying their purchasing decisions are influenced by a brand’s social consciousness, championing self-care and confronting mental health is one way for brands to reach this group effectively.

Louis Tozer is a Behavioural Analyst of Social Sciences at Canvas8. He holds a M.A. in History from UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies and is a former Research Assistant at The Institute of Philosophy and Social Theory in Belgrade.