Texas A&M University named one of Fast Company’s 2025 Brands That Matter

The 2025 list, featured in the December issue of Fast Company, celebrates organizations that demonstrate cultural relevance, ingenuity and measurable impact. Texas A&M stands alongside stalwart legacy brands such as Coca-Cola, Netflix, McDonald’s and Nike and surging modern standouts like Atlassian, Bogg Bag and Squishmallows, making Texas A&M’s inclusion especially significant in a landscape in which universities rarely appear alongside leading consumer and nonprofit brands.

“Texas A&M does not merely exist to be the best in the nation,” said R. Ethan Braden, the university’s chief marketing and communications officer. “It exists to be the best for the nation. This recognition shows that our mission and our impact are resonating with audiences far beyond our campuses.”

Fast Company noted Texas A&M’s commitment to serving its community and surge to become the most-watched university online, thanks to its growing YouTube content catalog. It is listed alongside GoodRx, Owlet and Understood.org as “US-based brands whose work and products are known across the country.”

“Whether a brand is just starting out or has been around for more than a century, they are all facing the same challenge: proving they have a place in consumers’ lives — and underscoring their relevance by showing up authentically in culture,” the publication says. “It’s a fine line to tread, and not every brand does it well all the time. This year, Brands That Matter is recognizing 121 honorees that have successfully staked out their spot at the intersection of business and culture.”

Approaching its 150th anniversary, Texas A&M was the first institution of higher education in Texas and is now one of the largest and most in-demand universities in the United States. With more than 80,000 students and 600,000 former students, it has a long history of values-driven education, military service and public impact that reaches far beyond its campuses and into every corner of the world.

That legacy is at the heart of Texas A&M’s new brand platform, “Together, We Stand as a Force for Good,” launched in April 2025. The initiative set out to expand how people see and understand one of America’s largest and most consequential universities. The new platform reframes Texas A&M not just as a university, but as a contributor to the nation’s progress and security — a university that acts when it matters most. That combination, Fast Company notes, is what allows brands to cut through the noise and build enduring trust.

“Higher education continues to face questions about trust, cost and value, and those questions are intensifying as fewer Americans choose to go to college,” Braden said. “A unified platform like Together, We Stand as a Force for Good gives us a clear and consistent way to show what Texas A&M contributes to the country’s most urgent needs. Our impact is significant, and our brand platform is designed to tell that story.”

Texas A&M’s strategy focuses on three fundamentals. The university must be seen often and in the right places, remembered for what it stands for and connected in people’s minds with leadership and solutions that matter. These principles, central to modern brand building, have helped elevate Texas A&M’s national profile, with purpose-driven stories about research, service and student experience appearing more frequently in national media, on innovation stages and across the social platforms where people increasingly get their news.

As noted in the 2025 Marketing and Communications Impact Report, the Texas A&M brand is being seen more than ever and in places it may never have appeared before, going from insular to impossible to ignore.

• The university’s latest national commercial, Together, We Stand as a Force for Good, featuring the members of Dude Perfect and Buc-ee’s founder Arch “Beaver” Aplin III, all former students, garnered nearly 9 million views in two months on YouTube, a nearly unheard of number for a campaign spot in that short timeframe. This follows the 2024 What Texas A&M Stands For commercial, which amassed more than 25 million YouTube views and 80 million broadcast views in the past year.
• A rapidly expanding library of video content on YouTube — highlighting everything from Alzheimer’s research to resources for veterans and their families — has generated more than 80 million views in the past year, with about 90% of viewers watching from outside Texas.
• Partnerships with the Haas Factory Team in NASCAR and INDYCAR driver Felix Rosenqvist brought Texas A&M to brand-loyal audiences with more than 15 million people seeing the university represented at the tracks and on television screens during the Indianapolis 500 and Coca-Cola 600 alone.
• Collaborations with Stetson, Poncho Outdoors and Buc-ee’s generated more than 5 million social media views and more than 325,000 engagements across platforms.
• Independent national analyses show Texas A&M rising from the sixth to the second most visible and recognized public university in the country in the past year, reflecting major gains in awareness, reputation and national relevance.

Texas A&M’s impact is especially visible in disaster preparedness and response, where Aggies are often on the ground before most people realize help is needed. The university is home to the Texas A&M Veterinary Emergency Team, the nation’s largest and most sophisticated team of its kind, deploying to communities after hurricanes, wildfires and other crises to provide lifesaving care for service and working animals, livestock and pets. That team is one of many ways Texas A&M turns expertise into action, from wildfire resilience research and predictive flood modeling to rural health initiatives, energy innovation and national security efforts that help safeguard communities across the country.

Service also shows up in everyday campus life. Texas A&M is a proving ground for purpose-driven individuals who want to serve, support and lead. With one of the nation’s largest ROTC programs and a strong culture of military and veteran support, Aggies are known for showing up for one another and for their communities. Moments of collective pride — historic events hosted on campus, large-scale student-led service and emergency simulations — reinforce Texas A&M’s role as a force for good.

For Fast Company, Brands That Matter are those that demonstrate cultural relevance, ingenuity and business impact, with stories backed by real results. Texas A&M’s recognition reflects rising national visibility, record-breaking digital storytelling reach, unprecedented student demand and a mission deeply rooted in service. Together, these signal that character, community and purpose still resonate in today’s crowded media environment.

As Texas A&M looks toward its 150th year in 2026, the Brands That Matter honor affirms that its story — one of service, leadership and action when it matters most — is being heard well beyond Aggieland. Paired with a bold new brand platform and a long-standing culture of putting others first, Texas A&M continues to demonstrate what it means to stand together as a force for good.