Amid Gwyneth Paltrow’s latest, headline-making “press dump,” the actor/lifestyle guru didn’t just talk up her hot sex scenes with Timothée Chalamet in an upcoming movie, snark about intimacy coordinators in some shade to the Blake Lively/Justin Baldoni scandal or tease her support for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s polarizing “MAHA worldview,” as one report noted. 

Paltrow also showed her command “of the narrative” by resolving a media-imagined feud with Meghan Markle, her globally famous Montecito neighbor and ascendant lifestyle guru of the moment, according to a new report in Puck. Not surprisingly, the women resolved the faux feud with dual social media appearances that suggested they had been trolling the internet trolls all along.

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This image released by Netflix shows Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, in a scene from “With Love, Meghan.” (Netflix via AP)But Paltrow’s PR partnership with Markle this week underscores the serious challenges the two celebrities face as ” female founders” of their own lifestyle brands.

A new Variety Fair cover story on Paltrow, as well as other reports, have described the various ways that Markle wants to emulate Paltrow’s supposed success with Goop, her long Zeitgeist-y lifestyle brand. Vanity Fair noted that Markle’s new Netflix show, “With Love, Meghan” celebrates a “fresh-veggie-filled” version of the California good life that seems very Goop-like. Both women also are promoting similar sounding podcasts that involve them talking to other rich or famous friends.

But perhaps, Markle shouldn’t rely too much on Paltrow as a role model for how to build “a sustained, profitable business.”

Puck business writer Rachel Strugatz reported this week that Goop still “isn’t profitable some 17 years after its inception,” despite the Oscar winner’s insistence that her business is “healthy” and her company’s “recitation of year-over-year and year-to-date rates of growth.”

Strugatz noted that Paltrow wouldn’t tell Vanity Fair whether Goop was profitable, but instead “offered marble-mouthed, almost Trumpian platitudes.” Paltrow said: “My business is a good business and it’s a strong business and the brand is strong.”

But even as Paltrow said that “Goop just had our best year,” Strugatz said that the company never shares actual revenue or sales figures. Last year, the company also dealt with several rounds of layoffs, while its efforts to sell its beauty products through Amazon, Sephora and Target were “underwhelming,” Strugatz said.

The company is in the midst of enacting a new business plan, born out of the restructuring and layoffs last year, Strugatz reported. Among other things, it is trying out a “new retail concept” in Larkspur — a store with a treatment room for “experiential facials” and other services.

Amid this restructuring, Paltrow’s involvement in the company “has been inconsistent” recently. Her involvement diminished last summer, possibly because she was filming her movie, “Marty Supreme,” with Chalamet. But another source told Strugatz: “Before the big layoffs, she stepped back from the day-to-day in a dramatic way.”

But Strugatz also reported that Paltrow’s past heavy involvement in the company has been part of the problem — a situation that could be an issue for Markle.

“Goop often seems like the vanity brand of a creative celebrity who wanted to dabble in business,” Strugatz said.

Paltrow’s decision to remain CEO has “inevitably dragged on the business,” with the actor failing to install proper leadership — as Kim Kardashian did for Skims, for example. “Vagina-scented candle drops don’t make for sustainable, profitable businesses,” Strugatz wrote.

It appears that Markle may be following in Paltrow’s footsteps in at least one way — which may or may not bode well for her future as an entrepreneur.

Page Six reported in December that Markle had named herself CEO of American Riviera Orchard — after spending months interviewing people but struggling to find a suitable candidate for the role.

Of course, there’s no more American Riviera Orchard. As “CEO,” Markle failed to overcome a series of trademark issues with the name, mostly because of her lack of “due diligence,” as Tina Brown, the royal author and former Vanity Fair editor, recently said.

Among other things, Markle’s application for “American Riviera Orchard” with the United States Patent and Trademark Office, was challenged by Harry & David, the Oregon-based 90-year-old gift basket company that’s famous for its brand of Royal Riviera premium pears.

So, at the 11th hour, just before the launch of her Netflix series, Markle announced she had come up with another name for her brand of jams and other food and lifestyle products. She announced that the new brand’s name: “As Ever.”

But alas, Markle’s new brand name may have hit another snag: The Daily Mail reported last week that the Patent and Trademark Office had returned her application, saying she needed to clarify some issues about certain items she plans to sell under the “As Ever” name. Above all else, Meghan needed to sign the application, without which it will not be “properly verified,” the Daily Mail reported.

On her Fresh Hell Substack, Brown slammed Markle for having an “unerring instinct for getting it wrong” and for being “inpatient.”

That may be true. But whatever happens with “As Ever,” Markle may have found another lucrative revenue stream that Paltrow hasn’t thought of.

This week, she launched a page on the ShopMy website, where she makes recommendations for 25 cosmetic products sold by other companies. According to the Daily Mail, experts say Markle is likely to rake in “millions” by making commercial endorsements.