Twisted Tastes: The Pretzel Logic Behind Horseshoe Maximalism
It’s the time of year when the forecasts arrive – trend decks and consumer intelligence snapshots mapping the year to come. But this year, a different type of trend caught my attention. It goes beyond data, into ideology. The Office of Applied Strategy (OAS), a three-prong strategy practice, released Dossier 2: A New Pantheon.1 In it, they discuss the concept of horseshoe maximalism. Horseshoe maximalism, as OAS describes, isn’t about aesthetic maximalism – it’s a new cultural logic that embraces contradiction rather than seeking to resolve it. The distrust of institutions drives people to ideological extremes, but they converge on similar behaviour. In this new zeitgeist consumption is a form self-expression, resistance, and meaning-making.
In this month’s memo, we’ll explore horseshoe maximalism in consumer trends.
1: Raw Milk
One of the clearest examples of horseshoe maximalism expression as a consumer trend is raw milk. The raw milk trend has been growing in popularity in the last few years. RFK Jr.’s comments supporting raw milk dairy farmers for their independence and purity, and popular influencer Carnivore MD praising raw milk’s “ancestral benefits” are some of the driving forces behind the trend.2 Raw milk has now become a unifying symbol for two groups that rarely converge: natural-health purists from the left and anti-regulation, self-governing advocates on the right. Proponents of raw milk state that there are beneficial bacteria and probiotics that are killed during the pasteurization process (FYI - this is false).3 They claim it cures lactose intolerance, that it builds immune systems in children, or that it’s more effective at preventing osteoporosis than pasteurized milk (FYI – it does not). 3 These claims, although false, are why raw milk is being embraced by two opposing ideologies.
The motivations differ – one end seeks naturalism, the other seeks autonomy – but both reject “Big Food” and are against ultra-processed foods.
2: Nootropics
Another consumer trend steeped in contradiction is the growing interest in nootropics. Nootropics are a group of substances used for learning, thinking, memory, and cognition. They’re considered “smart drugs” for their effects of increasing blood flow to the brain, and influencing the chemicals in our brain such as dopamine, norepinephrine, and acetylcholine.4 Popular nootropics include Caffeine, L-Theanine, Creatine, L-Carnitine, Ginkgo Biloba, Guarana, Ginseng, and Fish Oil. These cognitive supplements attract two very different audiences. The performance and productivity maximizers from the right use nootropics to sharpen focus and optimize their outputs in their 9-to-5s. Whereas, left-leaning wellness crowds are using the same supplements for mental clarity, stress management, and emotional balance.
Both groups are skeptical of “Big Pharma” and see nootropics as a self-guided alternative to pharmaceuticals. Through opposite intention, behaviour converges.
This convergence extends beyond consumption and into how people interpret health and performance.
3: Tech-enabled homeopathy
Then there’s the unlikely integration of high-tech bio-tracking with low-tech herbal remedies. The natural health movement meets tech futurism in an interesting way. Consumers are now using high tech biometric trackers, (think wearables like Whoop, Oura, and Garmin), to track health measures. But instead of using equally high-tech, clinical interventions, they’re using homeopathic remedies to promote personal health.
This is a new hybrid logic: embrace Big Tech for diagnostics, reject Big Medicine for solutions. Futurism and folk remedies coexisting in one behaviour.
4: Ultra-Processed Indulgence
On the opposite end of the spectrum, another movement is gaining traction: the unapologetic embrace of ultra-processed indulgence. This trend is driven by two groups who rarely align - the anti-diet, anti-shame left and the anti-authority, anti-regulation right. The left rejects diet culture and body-shaming, accepting instead the idea that indulgence is human. On the other hand, the right believes that the government or regulatory bodies should not dictate dietary choices. Both ends of the spectrum reject society as a whole or regulatory bodies should supersede autonomy.
As a result, snack hauls are now permeating my FYP and the meme-ification of convenience food are thriving simultaneously in communities that would otherwise disagree. The commonality? A shared rejection of external control.
Marketing in the Age of Contradiction
Across categories, horseshoe maximalism reveals a world where the edges are becoming the new centre. Contradictory groups are adopting the same behaviours, not because they agree, but because they share a deeper skepticism of institutions. For brands, this shift demands nuance. Instead of choosing sides, the challenge is to understand the motivations behind the convergence and communicate in a way that resonates across ideological divides. In a culture built on contradiction, the strongest brands won't choose a side — they'll learn how to speak fluently to both.
The brands that succeed will market to the paradox, not escape it.
Sources:
1: The Office of Applied Strategy. (November 2025). Think Tank. Dossier 2: The New Pantheon. https://officeofappliedstrategy.com/think-tank/#oas-dossier-2-the-new-pantheon
2: Aggeler, M. (January 2024, updated November 2024).The Guardian. The truth about raw milk and why experts are ‘absolutely horrified’ by the trend. https://www.theguardian.com/wellness/2024/nov/26/what-is-unpasteurized-raw-milk
3: Federal Drug Administration. (May 2024). Raw Milk Misconceptions and the Danger of Raw Milk Consumption. https://www.fda.gov/food/buy-store-serve-safe-food/raw-milk-misconceptions-and-danger-raw-milk-consumption
4: Malik, M. and Tlustos, P. (August 2022). Nootropics as Cognitive Enhancers: Types, Dosage and Side Effects of Smart Drugs. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9415189/
