As I wrote earlier, since tomorrow is the final day that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will be considered senior royals, we should have been anticipating some updates…and we now have them.
A Sussex spokesperson has confirmed that this, above, will be the last time that Harry and Meghan post to “sussexroyal” on Instagram. The account will stay up but it will be inactive. Same goes for their website SussexRoyal.com. It too will stay up but will be inactive, meaning that going forward, they’ll be starting from scratch. They are also “winding up” the Sussex Royal Foundation. Travalyst, which was connected to the Sussex Royal Foundation, is expected to become an independent non-profit charitable organisation.
Harry and Meghan will continue to work with their patronages. And, as we already heard, they’ve made private security arrangements but will not be providing further details about this, understandably.
At the beginning of April, Catherine St Laurent will start in post as Chief of Staff to The Duke and Duchess of Sussex. She will also serve as Executive Director of their new non-profit organisation. She previously worked for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. That said, for media relations, Sunshine Sachs will handle PR for the Sussexes in the US “in the interim” and James Holt will manage media in the UK. Sunshine Sachs, by the way, is the publicity firm that works with Leonardo DiCaprio and Ben Affleck, among other high profile Hollywood celebrities. Remember last week when PEOPLE broke the news that Harry and Meghan are now living in Los Angeles? That had Sunshine Sachs written all over it.
The Sussexes are making it sound like Sunshine Sachs was only engaged to work on the Sussex Royal Foundation at the beginning and this is just an extension of that while Catherine St Laurent gets acclimated. Curious to see in, say, three to six months, whether or not Sunshine Sachs is still involved.
As for the whole naming thing and the dropping of the “royal”, we’ve known about that for weeks now. What’s raising some eyebrows though is that they have to start it from scratch. Like it doesn’t sound like they’re just keeping the IG and the website but changing the name. They’re going to launch another entire account and another entire website…? Which, I don’t know that anyone would want under any circumstances. It’s always best to be as seamless as possible.
So the assumption here is – was that what was forced on them? Was that the stipulation by the British royal family? Like it wasn’t enough that they can’t call themselves “royal” anymore but they can’t even carry over the content from their Instagram and website and just change the name?!
It’s about as clear-cut of a demarcation as possible. No, you can’t keep that IG because that was your life BEFORE. You must start a new IG because this is your life NOW. Hardcore petty, man. Hard.Core.Petty.
