Musk and Trump, a bond made in merch

The bond between Elon Musk and President-elect Donald Trump is built not only on their shared interests in limited government, social media and golf, but also, it seems, on their common affinity for merch.

Not long after Trump’s announcement that Musk would join Vivek Ramaswamy as co-leaders of a new department of government efficiency, or DOGE, Musk took to his social platform X to let his approximately 204 million followers know: “The merch will be fire.” (Actually he wrote “the merch will be,” followed by three fire emojis, but we are paraphrasing.)

Even before it was clear what form the DOGE would take and before any staff members had been hired, Musk was thinking about the brand extensions. There have always been government souvenirs, including White House M&M’s and a House of Representatives brooch, but this was taking the promise of political shopping to a new level.

Merchandise has always been a part of Musk’s empire-building, just as it has been part of Trump’s. Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, has a digital storefront that sells assorted T-shirts (among other offerings), notably the “Occupy Mars” style that Musk often wore while stumping for Trump and various “Starship” logo looks, as well as other accessories. X has its own shop, featuring black-on-black logo caps and T-shirts that look a lot like the black “Make America Great Again” caps that Musk favors.

Even the Boring Co., Musk’s tunnel venture, has merch, most famously a fragrance called Burnt Hair that was introduced in 2022 for $100 a bottle with the tag line “the essence of repugnant desire.” The first drop of 10,000 bottles sold out in hours, according to news reports. (It is also currently sold out.) And Tesla has its own apparel and lifestyle collections, including a Foundation series of tees that Musk also wore on the campaign trail.

Merch has been a hallmark of Trump’s career as well. Not just Trump company-branded merch like ties and wine or Mar-a-Lago merch or campaign merch, but merch that furthers the narrative of his quest for power: sneakers with a map of the “Trump Nation” red states, gold watches and superhero NFTs.

Like Musk, Trump also has perfumes, including Fight Fight Fight cologne that comes in a box featuring the famous image of Trump with a raised fist. Like Trump, Musk also has sneakers: SpaceX-branded lace-ups.

Melania Trump has her own line of merch, which has included necklaces, Christmas tree decorations, her recent memoir (the one Donald Trump plugged in his victory speech in the wee hours after the election) and, most recently, “On the Move,” a digital book of photographs of her that costs $195.

That’s pricey, but in the end, the revenue — which is probably negligible in the grand scheme of things — is less important than the strategy behind the products. Namely, what it reveals about Trump’s and Musk’s ability to create and reinforce community, and how that relates almost to a cult of personality. It’s the core of the MAGA hat’s appeal and why the sea of red at so many Trump rallies was such a striking image.

Merch, which is easy to discount as cheap souvenirs, is a badge of membership in a group, a symbol of belonging that can be worn out into the world to create the appearance of support. It’s both an access point and a sign of fealty, a de facto uniform and visual proof that there is a group of people literally buying into a proposition. It’s a form of public commitment that is especially personal, because it goes on the body. One that both Musk and Trump know how to employ.

There’s a reason the fan club Tesla Owners of Silicon Valley (founded in 2018 and with 6,000 members in the San Francisco Bay Area alone, according to John Stringer, its president), noticed when Musk wore his SpaceX sneakers and posted a picture on X with the line “Wonder where we can get them?”

Stringer, who works in finance and technology (and said he helped found the group because of his own life-changing experience with a Tesla), said that members often wore SpaceX merch and other Musk-related gear as a gesture of allegiance to the values Musk represents.

There are, after all, places where cars (and rocket ships, for that matter) cannot go. But clothes? They can carry a message pretty much everywhere.

Indeed, if Musk — whose personal style veers between “Maverick”-esque aviator jackets and the black suit jacket, jeans and gothic-font MAGA cap — has a sartorial signature, it is his commitment to wearing his own merch, particularly the T-shirts but also the shoes and his Tesla Giga Texas belt buckles. He’s pretty much a walking advertisement, both for his brands and for the idea of dispensing with old-fashioned strictures about what a businessman should or should not wear. Why waste time thinking about fancy tailoring when you can throw on a T-shirt that tells the world you are thinking about colonizing Mars?

(Musk did don a suit and tie to spend election night with Trump at Mar-a-Lago.)

It’s little wonder that the promise of DOGE merch was met with a fair amount of excitement among Musk’s fans. A day or so after Musk’s original post, there were 22,000 comments under his merch statement, most of them eager to acquire.

“I’d certainly buy stuff,” posted Billy Markus, the founder of Dogecoin (Musk’s pet cryptocurrency).

‘I’ll take a hat,” another user wrote.

All of which suggests that this may be simply the beginning of the “merching” of this particular presidency, along with all of the agendas involved. It’s one way to sell an idea, anyway.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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