Strong Brand Strategy for Handcrafted HoneyBee

The following post is by Stacia Guzzo, the owner of Handcrafted HoneyBee. We recently worked with Stacia to create a new brand identity for her business and wanted to share her post about developing a strong brand strategy. Please enjoy Stacia’s thoughts about bringing a business dream to life by calling on our expert team at Aeolidia.

Can a Skin Care Kit Inspire a Girl to Dream Big?

by Stacia Guzzo

Some jobs are too big to do on your own.

Six months ago, we sat down to chart a course from Big Dream to Grand Reality. It was an ambitious plan that would require us to redesign everything.

We knew that Handcrafted HoneyBee had the potential to reach an entire generation of young women. To inspire them to become future leaders, makers and explorers.

But in order to fulfill that potential, we were going to need help from the very best.

A Great Mentor Can Make All the Difference

Before we touched a single thing, we needed to develop a smart strategy.

So we went to the very best in the business–the incomparable Lela Barker of Lucky Break Consulting – for help in designing a sound structure with a blueprint for success.

With her mentorship, we dug deep into understanding the purpose and goals behind our Big Dream. And we spelled out a clear vision for the future:

• Offer girls a unique experience designed to inspire them to dream big for their lives
• Connect girls with tools, skills, and mentors to help them achieve success
• Get girls interested in Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math (STEAM) with fun, memorable activities
• Help girls to learn more effectively with Whole Brain learning, taking advantage of the increased number of neural connections between the left and right hemispheres in the female brain

As former educators with experience at the elementary, high school and college levels, we knew that the last thing a child wants is to feel like she’s been given an “educational” gift. So we intentionally concealed the lesson inside a super-enjoyable hands-on activity.

We read mountains of educational research, studying state-of-the-art teaching techniques and proven classroom strategies. Every aspect was carefully considered and planned out.

The new Create-Your-Own Skin Care Kits were born. On paper, at least.

Speaking the Right Language

We needed someone to translate those goals into a style that could speak the language of teen and pre-teen girls. At the same time, we wanted to connect with adults looking to help a special girl to dream big.

Enter Aeolidia–the single best design team on the planet. (OK. Maybe we’re a little biased, but we love these guys!)

We gave the team at Aeolidia a tall order:

• Design a look that can appeal to smart, motivated girls without coming across as childish
• Make sure that the look also instills confidence in the moms, aunts and other adults buying our products for girls
• Develop a cohesive visual style for a broad collection of offerings: kits, skin care products, online content, perhaps even giftable items like stickers, prints, t-shirts, etc.
• Craft an unboxing experience that takes a girl on a journey from curiosity to interest to excitement to inspiration

Our designer, Sarah, took every piece of our input seriously, and let me tell you–she seriously delivered.

The style that she designed is clean, beautiful, and distinctly feminine without feeling “girly.” It conveys everything that we want our girls to feel about themselves: confident, special and on the verge of an exceptional adventure full of potential.

Take a Closer Look

Sarah started by pairing our name with the goals we wanted to accomplish. She loved the reason behind the name of our business: all of the honeybee workers are female, working together to create something functional, strong, and elegant.

Borrowing from the honeybee, Sarah designed a logo that incorporates that same sensibility, balancing strength and elegance, clean lines and artistic flourishes.

The honeycomb hexagon is a motif throughout her design, able to stand alone or build up into a larger pattern. I love the way it evokes exponential notation in our secondary logo.

Although she looks like your average worker bee, our new mascot Nodie is actually a light-emitting diode (LED). She is bright and beautiful on her own, but when she teams up with her sisters, she casts a blinding light.

Sarah designed Nodie for our logo, but she was simply too good not to use elsewhere. So look for her throughout the kits and online as well!

Sarah has composed every element of our Create-Your-Own Skin Care kits and our HHB Skin Care Collection. The result is a consistent style that will captivate a girl’s attention and make learning enjoyable.

Remember that unboxing experience I mentioned earlier? Well, with Sarah’s help, we have included several cool surprises when a girl is opening her kit for the first time.

From the distinctive informational activity booklets to the intriguing designs of our supplemental materials, those little touches help to reinforce a girl’s feeling of doing something special, grown-up, cool, and informative.

We couldn’t have brought this dream to life without a lot of assistance. But that help doesn’t end with a great business mentor or a phenomenal design team.

We believe that a skincare kit can inspire a girl to dream big. But the hard work of encouraging passion and instilling confidence in the next generation of young women is only just beginning! Working together, we can all help girls to shine brightly.

This article was originally posted on the Handcrafted HoneyBee blog and is reposted here with permission. Thank you so much for letting us share your thoughts, Stacia!

Does your brand deserve the royal treatment?

Get in touch with us today, and we’ll email you right back to discuss your objectives and make a plan to make your brand “come true” like we did for Stacia.

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