Media Mash: A Simple Numbers Take on Current Headlines

The start of 2026 has brought a wealth of news, with new headlines emerging frequently. It can be hard to keep up, so in a recent Profitability Playbook: The Simple Numbers Podcast episode, hosts Brandon Gray and Mike Maxson sat down for a Media Mash, where Mike pulled relevant topics, current headlines, articles, blog posts, and news reports pertaining to entrepreneurship to keep you up to date on what’s going on, and what the Simple Numbers take is.

Here's the roundup:

The Return to the Office

In 2025, the Wall Street Journal released an article that posed the question, “Will 2025 be the watershed year for return to office mandates?” In which Jennifer Williams wrote, “That depends.” Throughout 2025, we saw people returning to the office after years of remote-first being the standard, largely due to government mandates to resume in-person operations.

The Simple Numbers Take:

We haven’t seen a large-scale movement to return fully to the office, as headlines have suggested, but we have seen more shifts toward a hybrid schedule. Certain jobs require being in-person, such as construction or landscaping, but beyond jobs that demand physical presence, many businesses are adopting a hybrid structure. The degree to which varies, with some organizations allowing employees more freedom in defining their schedule, and others dictating which days are in-office.

Some employees work better from home and with freedom, while some need structure and a physical presence. Lifestyle plays a significant role in how people decide to work, and we’ve seen that shifts in working from home to returning to the office may have prompted those on the fringe to opt for a remote work arrangement entirely, or vice versa. For those who haven’t been in person for years, a mandate to return may cause them to seek a new role. Overall, there has not been a significant shift, and we still see a spread across both sides of the spectrum. 

Fossil Watches

You may recall Fossil, a watch brand, which frequently gave discounts as a means to move volume. This ultimately failed them. In an article titled “The Watchmaker That Set Out To Lose Sales,” this approach and its downfall are discussed, stating, “Around this time last year, new leadership looked at the company and saw some problems. Fossil sold too many watches at a discount, which was eating into profits.”

The Simple Numbers Take:

Brandon rephrases the problem, stating it wasn’t the discounts that made them unprofitable, but that “They weren’t profitable because they did not sell enough that was discounted most of the time.” Businesses should ask themselves if they’re not selling a product due to the price, or if there’s a deeper disconnect between what the consumers want and what their competitive advantage is in delivering that. Misalignment there can’t be fixed by discounts. Businesses have to ensure they’re connecting with their Ideal Customer Profile (ICP), capturing market share, and marketing effectively.

Tariffs

Tariffs were a hot topic in 2025 and remain so. With “Global Business Activity Growth Flows as Tariffs Bite” in mind, we’ve seen a slowdown in business activity in various sectors across the U.S., Europe, and parts of Asia, where costs are finally being passed down to consumers. Higher prices are being largely blamed on tariffs, as prices are surging everywhere, contributing to an affordability issue.

The Simple Numbers Take:

The dust has somewhat settled from what we were seeing in Q1, Q2, and Q3 2025, where we observed substantial changes for many clients, ranging from simple cleaning supplies for clients’ restaurants to hundreds of thousands of dollars in increases for clients that contract manufacturing overseas. In some cases, some of that increase is absorbed by a third party, where the supplier takes half of the increase, and the end user takes the other half. Some companies instead adjusted their pricing, which in turn passed the increase on to consumers.

With the increase in tariffs, we’ve also seen employment growth softening and job creation stalling in the services sector, resulting in unemployment rising to 4.6%. Interest rates have been increasing since 2022, which plays a part, as does inflation.

These changes leave businesses wondering what to do in the face of so much uncertainty. It’s challenging to predict how things may shift, but entrepreneurial businesses are uniquely positioned to adapt and pivot quickly, giving them a competitive advantage.

Because there’s no apparent or predictable path forward, businesses should assume that, for the immediate future, the marketplace will not grow, and they must capture market share to grow. From there, determine how you’ll steal that market share, how much you need, and how much you need to move your gross margin dollars.

This is a good time for businesses to get creative. We’ve seen a client move away from digital advertising and shift toward community outreach—they bought an 18-wheeler full of bottled water branded with their logo, and they hand them out at local events. Getting creative and thinking outside traditional avenues is a key theme that will drive capturing market share moving forward.

Final Thoughts

Whether your business is navigating a shift to or from a virtual structure, dealing with pricing or demand issues, or you’re feeling the impacts of tariffs, it’s essential that business owners remain flexible, creative, and vigilant in uncertain times. Those who do it with gravitas will stand out.

If you are ready to start driving sustainable profitability or would like to learn more about CRI Simple Numbers, contact us.