He picked bad examples by going with the dirt cheap Walmart-grade brands, but the general idea is valid. Closer comparisons would be what you find at Target.

Bombas are fine, but you're paying Darn Tough prices for Target quality.

I haven't tried Tommy John, but a similar player in that space is MeUndies. They're fine too, but you're paying Ex Officio prices for, you guessed it, Target quality.

MVMT watches? Literally $15 AliExpress watches for Seiko prices.

Made In cookware? On par with Costco's Kirkland stuff, but closer to the price of All-Clad.

Could spend half the day doing this. Ritual vitamins, Greats sneakers, Jack Erwin dress shoes, Burrow furniture, Native deodorant, Quip toothbrushes, Bevel razors, et al. Not even sex toys are immune thanks to Maude.

What separates these from legacy brands is just that: they're not legacy. They've got slick, responsive websites that used bold colors and geometric sans-serif fonts until around 2019 when they switched to soft pastels and didone fonts. They donate to a charitable cause with every purchase. They accept Apple Pay.

The market segment that this appeals to is the middle of the Venn diagram of millennial yuppies who: 1) consider themselves appreciative of premium, well-designed goods (i.e. not Hanes socks) 2) consider themselves too savvy to waste money on overpriced luxury goods (i.e. Pantherella socks) 3) aren't inclined to figure out which products actually have good price-to-quality ratios (e.g. Darn Tough socks)

So they default to the ones that have been marketed to them where they are, like via ads on tech podcasts and NYC subways (e.g. Bombas).