Sweetbay Brands

Sweetbay Brands is a creative studio for mission-minded businesses looking to nourish their brand and beyond. Website coming soon!

Sweetbay Brands is where irresistible experiences are created through strategic bold branding and tasteful websites to get you and your purpose to stand out, so you can consistently and confidently bring your mission to the world around you.

10/04/2022

Apparently it was world ostomy day a few days ago! What a great time to do a brand review on the for Belly Bags!

The mission of Belly Bags is to empower those with ostomy bags through their comfortable, secure, and confidence-building products and supportive resources. Their vision is to increase ostomy awareness by building up a community helping all of those seeking acceptance with their bodies as they are.

Typically, an ostomy is needed because of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD)-related issues. Purple is the color that is associated with IBD, so that means it was important to have it represented within the color palette. The colors chosen are bright and bold, tying back to the mission of empowering ostomates to be bold and have brighter futures as they accept and learn about their beautiful bodies!

The different squiggly patterns relate back to the concept of a colon, or large and small intestines. That may not the most glamorous part of our body system to portray, but these textures are artistically intriguing, grab the interest of the viewer, and can be utilized in so many touchpoints of the brand.

The colon/intestines are also represented in the customized type for Belly Bags as well as the idea of body inclusivity. Its organic curvature and flowing letterforms of all shapes and sizes are positively fun and unique! A sub-brand for Belly Bags for ostomy post-op goodies called the B***y Box utilizes the same font so it looks like it belongs under the main brand, but is customized a little differently to stand on its own.

And last, but not least, the little tagline sticker "you're the sh*t" just makes my punny self laugh 💩 I always think it's good to have a sense of humor when you're dealing with something difficult! In the end, you'll come out stronger for it and have something to laugh about, too.

I loved playing with all the ideas of how the brand could work throughout the entirety of Belly Bags! Maybe I'll pick this project back up again in the future and mockup a website as well 😉 What do you think?

09/22/2022

aaaaand…ACTION! 🎬

If only it was actually this quick!

As much as a I wish it were true—a good, strategic website cannot be built in a day. Period. But that doesn’t mean your results can’t!

For Kara at Kara Loryn Photography (), she invested in the Breakfast, Launch, + Dinner Package which ultimately helped her see some quick changes!

Some goals we wanted to accomplish with her launch was to increase exposure on social media, to have people sign up for her email list, and bring her audience to her new website.

Kara’s memorable launch experience boosted her exposure on social media and she saw an 18% increase in new followers within her two week launch timeframe and her debut email had a 67% open rate. 😮 Those incentives were just oh-so valuable to her audience!

But good results also take time…even without extensive marketing since her launch in March, she’s received almost one inquiry a week! 🤯 She keeps popping up in people’s instagram and Google searches, thanks to her launch strategy and SEO. And as the cherry on top, she gets to celebrate booking 3 weddings for 2023 so far!

I can’t give all the secrets away to my launch recipe… but if you’re interested in a little taste, comment your favorite food emoji 🫐🍅🫒 and I’ll DM you one special ingredient!

Check out the full website at: www.karalorynphotography.com

09/20/2022

✨Client Spotlight! ✨

Allow me to introduce to you, Kara Loryn Photography!

Kara Loryn Photography () is a Catholic wedding photographer serving Virginia, Washington, D.C., and Maryland areas. Her style is as enduring as a family heirloom and she creates experiences as unforgettable as the first whispered prayers together. Kara turns wedding days into reminders of a timeless love that lasts through the trials of life. She’ll document your day, every moment of it, with combined passion and the genuine care of a best friend.

Her mission is to provide photographs to her couples that authentically captures the sacredness of their marriage and the real, raw emotions of the day, so that they become keepsakes that brings each moment flooding back with a glance for years to come.

With a service so great, we needed a visual identity that could match!

Through customized type, a unique one-of-a-kind logo was created that evokes a vintage-like nature as her timeless photos bring by becoming tangible heirlooms for her couples. While tying in organic elements to bring in the idea of connecting or unifying, as a marriage celebrates the union of husband and wife, it also allows your eyes to naturally move through the words that ultimately fabricate her name. The entirety of it mimics the intricate details of a formal wedding invitation.

One of my favorite pieces is a hand-drawn calla lily icon mark. The beautiful flower representing life, fertility, and faithfulness will be used sparingly, mostly as texture, but adds some interest to her identity—like a little secret message that pays tribute to her own married name (Lilly).

It’s been fun to see Kara grow more confident in her business through narrowing down her offerings, becoming more aware of how to speak to her ideal client, and finally feeling like her photography style is translated behind the camera and in front of it before her clients even book!

Photographer 📸:
Copywriter ✍🏼:

09/19/2022

Who else here is a self-proclaimed perfectionist?

I have prescribed this trait to my identity for as long as I can remember and I didn't realize how much harm it was actually doing to me!

I had a friend hit me with a brick recently, well a couple actually...

🧱 Brick #1: "You're actually just full of fear"
Ouch, that hurt 😖 and it's true—I have fears, but perfectionism is just an excuse, or a disguise if you will, for my intense fear of failure.

🧱 Brick #2: "You're just adding more stress"
Oh, me? Stressed? I'm a constant worrier, never feel like I'm good enough, am an all-or-nothing thinker, and a die-hard people pleaser. Oh yeah, and forget about taking risks! heh heh *insert eye twitch here* 🥴 (all attributes of being a perfectionist).

🧱 Brick #3: "You say perfectionism, but I see procrastination"
Woof, another big one 😬 I feel as if I have to have everything laid out 'perfectly' or it isn't complete. I can be so blurred by the definition of what 'complete' means to me that my ideas end up taking waaaay longer than they need to.

This is especially apparent with building my website and showing up on socials!

Let's be real, I've had this ghostly account since the beginning of this year 😂 !! I may have the skillset as a designer, but I can humbly admit that I don't have all the business stuff or internal processes down just yet. But I'm here anyway (building what I’ve got with all these bricks 🧱🧱🧱!) because I know there's a lot I can still give with what I've got.

How am I changing my attitude? I'm becoming more aware of my tendencies, focusing on the positives, allowing myself to make mistakes, and setting more reasonable goals with deadlines. It'll take time for me to lower the pressure I put on myself, but I'll take this step as a small victory of moving in the right direction 🤗

Let all of us perfectionists remember: "I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence I can reach for; perfection is God's business." —Michael J. Fox

P.S. the website part is coming soon, I promise 😂

09/17/2022

My temporary website officially has an inquiry form available! Head over to sweetbaybrands.com if you’re interested in working together. Sounds like a good time to share a little more about my services!

09/14/2022

Hi, Hey, Hello! In case you missed it, I'm Lauren—the owner and designer behind Sweetbay Brands!

I'm so excited to finally be showing up on here and can't wait to get to know all of you wonderful people. I figured there's no better place to start than a few fun facts about me + my business...

1️⃣ I have a B.F.A. degree in Art and Visual Technology, which is really just a fancy way of saying Graphic Design lol. Before pursuing Sweetbay Brands, I worked at two Fortune 500 commercial real estate companies in the retail/restaurant sector and also in the non-profit space at two smaller organizations. Completely opposite experiences, but the jobs helped me find my love for working with small businesses! 💙

2️⃣ I'm an enneagram 2 and an INFP, though, people always mistake me for being an extrovert! Maybe because I love meeting new people and am usually the goofy one in the friend group 🤡 you'll probably find me dancing (terribly) on here soon enough 😂

3️⃣ The name Sweetbay translates to a type of herb you probably have in your kitchen—the bay leaf! 🌿 The Sweet Bay Laurel Tree is where the bay leaf comes from and my name, Lauren, can be interpreted to mean "Laurel Plant". I also loved how the name could play along with my cultural roots of being an Italian who loves to cook and is quite obsessed with food! 🤌🏼

There's so much more I want to tell you! I might even have some secret surprises up my sleeve 😉, so give me a follow and help me get to know you, too—comment below, introduce yourself and say hello, and maybe add a fun fact or two!

09/13/2022

Introducing your new friend on the block—Sweetbay Brands!

Hi there, I'm Lauren 👋🏻—the owner and designer behind this creative studio for passionate, mission-minded businesses looking to nourish their brand and beyond. Sweetbay Brands is where irresistible experiences are created through strategic bold branding and tasteful websites to get you and your purpose to stand out, so you can consistently and confidently bring your mission to the world around you.

As a seasoned designer in the corporate world for 6+ years (ranging from Fortune 500 companies to the humble non-profit space), I've gained invaluable experiences and lessons that I'll certainly carry with me throughout my career. It has fueled my ambition to experience a new journey...growing my own business and seeking those little, but mighty, ways to make an impact in the world.

I'm a mover, maker, and shaker—and I have passion for the delicacies that go into branding + web design which pairs perfectly with my desire to whip up identities that get others excited to move, make, and shake all that they got, too!

Are you passionate about something? Have a mission you believe in? Let me hear 'em below! 👇🏼

Address

Washington D.C., DC

Website

http://www.sweetbaybrands.com/

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