When evaluating a company, one of my favorite questions to ask is whether it has an aesthetic. We don’t talk about aesthetics as the highest form of brand or story or a reflection of team cohesion, because investing on “vibes” or “look” or “mood” is very frowned upon. Even using it as a data point is beaten out of us. But if you look at any entity that’s successful across industries, you know its aesthetic. A singular company doesn’t just have a brand, it has an aesthetic that dominates its culture, its people and all products that come from it, whether the font on the wall art or the core product its selling. It’s not just best companies. The best sports teams have an aesthetic. The best artists. The best campaigns have strong aesthetic. And the more cohesive an aesthetic is, the more successful and durable the culture is. If you’re trying to decide which candidate is going to win an election, ask yourself which team has a more cohesive and stronger aesthetic. If you’re trying to decide which company will dominate a market, see if you can pick out the company’s people or products out of a lineup. Numbers often lie. Narratives can be false. But it’s really, really hard to fake aesthetic. And if a company has one early and it’s genuine, it’s often much more durable than it appears.