The Monday Media Diet with Anna Whiteman

On Margaritaville, The Troubles, and Wawa

Anna Whiteman (AW) is friend of WITI as well as an early stage investor and cultural obsessive. We’re happy to have her on the page for the first WITI of the fall. Hope everyone had a great break. -Colin (CJN)

Tell us about yourself.

I’m an investor at Coefficient Capital, a growth fund investing in consumer and technology businesses. I particularly focus on our early growth investment practice covering Series A/B brands. I organize the Coefficient Collective interview and event series for leaders in Coefficient’s relevant investment categories. I run a female founder collective called Rad Ladies that serves as a community resource for the phenomenal women behind top consumer brands. I love discovering and testing new ideas that move culture forward and I geek out on brands that can synthesize art, media, cultural commentary, and product seamlessly. I’m also an amateur motorcyclist and can speak some broken Italian.

Describe your media diet. 

Slack plays a big role in how I receive and organize information these days, though I’m cognizant of how sometimes these rooms can be a bit of an echo chamber. I read quite a lot of local beat papers and love watching local news to avoid getting fully subsumed in national politics. I admittedly follow some sharp meme accounts (Sainthoax, Naveen’s Memes) and a potpourri of goofy/innocuous accounts (F Advertisements, Slow Roads, Kook of the Day, Poolsuite, David Byrne) to lighten up some of the heavier stuff. No Twitter and very light reddit. On the substack/blog side of the world, love Snaxshot by Andrea Hernandez, Ruby’s Sunday newsletter, and After School. Pitchfork is full of itself but it lives on my bookmark ribbon with an inevitable eye roll. When I’m not pretending to be cooler than I am I read WSJ and Financial Times.

What’s the last great book you read?

Please Kill Me is an insane oral history of the punk come-up in New York in the ‘70s. It touches a bit on the music but focuses mostly on the day-to-day mischief of people like Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Joey Ramone, Patti Smith etc. It’s remarkable how hardcore that scene was, I gasped audibly so many times while reading.

What are you reading now?

I’m reading a book called The Heart’s Invisible Furies which is dark comedy fiction about a boy growing up in Ireland during the Troubles fumbling his way through discovering his true identity. I read Say Nothing recently which was a fascinating non-fiction review of the key players in Northern Ireland/Britain during the time period. [Read Patrick’s MMD here -CJN] The language and turns of phrase that come out of Ireland are remarkable, I’m really digging it so far.

What’s your reading strategy when you pick up a print copy of your favorite publication?

I pick up Homme Girls and read that one at the kitchen table because it’s a pretty penny and the pages are quite delicate. I subscribe to print copies of Travel and Leisure, Conde Nast Traveler, and Vogue which I read on the beach with my sisters and we plan vacations together that we never go on. Then we bring them home and cut up the pages into visionboards (no joke this is my favorite hobby).

Who should everyone be reading that they’re not?

David Foster Wallace, Chuck Klosterman and Eric Jarosinski. DFW is one of my heroes.

What is the best non-famous app you love on your phone? 

Wawa is a convenience store in Philadelphia where I’m from, there’s no reason why they need to have an app but when you pay with the Wawa app you send this tacit message to everyone else in line that you’re a Wawa regular and you take your convenience shopping seriously. So for that I love my Wawa app.

Plane or train?

Train, unless it’s a fun puddle jumper.

What is one place everyone should visit? 

South Jersey

Tell us the story of a rabbit hole you fell deep into.

Jimmy Buffett deep fandom is one that I fell into and suspect I’ll be steeped in for a while. I had been a fringe Buffett fan prior to quarantine but his music/outlook gave me so much happiness over a dark 2020. I went to Key West recently with my buddies for two months and being steeped in the Parrot Head lifestyle for that period of time hammered it home for me. His message is so simple, have fun while you can and don’t take life too seriously. My car radio is now default programmed to Radio Margaritaville and I really can’t wait to get to the new four story Margaritaville outpost they’ve built in Times Square. (AW)

Thanks for reading,

Noah (NRB) & Colin (CJN) & Anna (AW)

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