Overview
Bear Bakes MNL is a dessert shop selling baked goods specifically custom korean cakes, diy cake kits, cupckes, and cake pops. This small business is mainly owned by my friend as the CEO baker, that I partner with.
Problem statement
The client wanted to create a brand for her small business selling the famous trending korean minimalist cakes. She wants to create a brand that sells both good looking and yummy cakes. My original goal was to help create the brand perfect to her passion, but now with the partnership and team that we’ve come up together, it is now my goal as well to properly communicate what Bear Bakes really is.
Role & audience
I am the Chief Marketing Officer of the brand. I am responsible in creating the branding, promotions, and communications of Bear Bakes. I mainly handle the social media platforms for stories and posts. I sometimes curate photo or video shoot projects. Also, together with the team, I assist and work together to think of product ideas, projects, and cake designs/specials. The brand intends to serve treats for everyone, with happiness in every bite. The colorful bright image of the brand aims to bring inclusivity and joy with no exception whatsoever through a friendly and sweet tone in how we present ourselves to all.
Process
Brainstorming & research
The client (aka my dear friend) send me a couple of brand names she had thought of. It was a simple list of names and she asked me what would be nice to have. Along with the list of names she sent, there was also one peg for a logo, which is just a bear with the brand name. She also sent me a simple notes with regards to her goals and copywriting examples.
Notes given by client as well as the Pinterest board I created
Given that she wanted to sell handcrafted and fresh trendy minimalist cakes from Korea, I wanted the illustration direction of the brand to be similar to those of Korean illustration. I researched more pegs online and saw how most korean drawings are flat yet fun and absolutely cute. It did not need any textures or extra details, it was relatively simple, which makes it more hand made, just like the baked goodies to be sold, and friendly with the low detail and roughen edges.
Brand profile
Out of the list she sent, Bear Bakes stuck with me the most. Aside from its cute catchy name, it matched with the bear logo that she wanted to have. Also, since I knew her personally, the cute image matched her personality as well. With all those considered, that was the perfect choice for the new small business.
From choosing the right mouth of the bear to the perfect color, we finally came up with the bear perfect for Bear Bakes. With this, I used a handwritten Korean typeface that matches the friendly smiling bear icon.
After polishing and consulting with my friend, Bear Bakes tagline and brand goals were identified as well. We finally have Bear Bakes.
Made with Adobe Illustrator
Brand profile
Mascot
The smiling bear on our logo is named Bella Bear, to have the same BB initial as the brand name. She is the key point of the brand’s image as not only does she represent the bear name but also she is the link to properly interact with the customers. Bella Bear can be customized in the promotional materials as well as our product specials. This little bear represents the cute and friendly personality of the brand.
Mascot made with Adobe Illustrator
Initial & running promotions
As a new cake small business competing against many other ones, I wanted to really make use of the graphics and mascot to have a different image from them. This was why I often posted Bella Bear posters and boards in our social media page. This is of course accompanied by the cake flat lays. My direction for the photoshoot was the cake to be at the center with random fun objects and stickers around it.
The original feed was upgraded when we hit 2021. I decided that the feed should center more on the products it-selves, but at the same time, I still wanted to retain the fun graphics that we post. For the photoshoots, the cakes are not the sole center piece and the shots are now closer to see the details of the cake itself. Some minimal complementary props may be used such as a grid, a cup, books, or paper sheets. I edit the photos to make the images brighter and have a yellow hue to it, making the feed feel warm and homey. To not defeat the highlighting of the actual products in the feed, I relied on the stories for these instead.
Instagram feed in the first few months vis a vis start of 2021
Highlighting stories
According to research, aside from the lower cost, stories have been fast growing and perform better than feed posts. The short videos we post on our stories are vibrant and fun using different motion graphics and a matching cute fun background music. It is also easier to interact with the customers, which is what we highlight as a brand. We can create fun stories and ads, as well as let the customers answer polls, etc. in our stories. It is also easy to affirm and remind the customers in our stories. We also post their feedback to our stories as a way of gratitude for the good words they tell us.
Some of the Instagram story ads created made with Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe After Effects
Special projects
Speaking of stories, one of our current projects is the affirmations and motivations that Bella Bear gives to the customers. Before, it started with Bear Quote of the Day, which are inspirational quotes from bear characters in the cartoon world. It started from graphical posters to stories as well. However, I wanted it to have a more personal touch to it, and have the words told by Bella Bear instead. In this case, each poster is unique and our mascot is customized making it even cuter to the audience. Inspired by this artist of posting cute doodles of animals, I wanted to create my own take on this through Bella Bear. Not only do we provide happiness in our baked treats, but also through our words and comms, we are able to uplift the same value.
We also create special photoshoots such as this video created with my CEO baker slash friend’s nieces. This was a month after our launch of the DIY kit, which became a hit to little kids! I thought of creating a cute video wherein the two sisters have fun and create their own cake. It was a mess, but the creative mess became the message of the product, which is for you to simply do whatever you want with your design, still have a laugh or two, and enjoy the delicious cake at the end! Hopefully, we can create more videos. We also tried to have a TikTok account, given the platform’s craze, but we have yet to create more content for it.
Made with Adobe Premiere Pro
Giveaways and special bundles are also what we do every other month! We have done Mother’s Day, a Kpop group’s anniversary, and Valentine’s Day. We try to incorporate all our goodies and creativity in these special packages. For our Valentine’s Day, aside from our bear cake design and cheesecake cup, we added Bella Bear’s photo card and a line-art of you and your loved one. We asked each customer who availed the bundle to send us a photo that they would like to have a line-art of. I created the art for each one, and we printed it so that they would have a minimalist representation of their love.
For our anniversary, I created an Instagram filter to celebrate us and our customers. Two effects have a face element: a bear tatoo and chef bear ears. This is for fun selfies for the team and our customers. The other two are for the clients to use for the cakes, one just says that it is made with love by bear bakes and the other says how much they love cake in general. This filter can just be another cute treat that we would like to share to our lovely bears!
Made with Spark AR and Adobe After Effects
Results and lessons learned
As of Oct 2, 2021, exactly a year after we started, we have reached 854 followers on Instagram and 760 likes on Facebook. We continue to grow each day to offer handcrafted bear baked goodies made with love.
Project takeaways
I honestly did not expect to be part of a small business. At first, I really just wanted to help my friend in her branding and then a few posts. I personally enjoyed what I was doing when I helped her so it wasn’t much of a problem to me in creating comms. As unexpected it may have been, I am grateful to have the opportunity to co-run a small business especially with such a cute and fun branding. It is like a breather and a passion project when I create comms for our social media channels. Sometimes when you really do enjoy on what you do, even in its ups and downs, you still get to see its value to yourself. I do my job not only for each customer but also for the team.
As I run the comms, I have to adapt to the current trends yet still remember to stay grounded in our value. It is okay to apply different styles and work your way to what’s best for your brand, but you should always remember to stick to the main goal of your business. I have adjusted our feed a bunch of times, I still aim to make it even better in the long run. It is a matter oftrying out things and seeing what’s best for your target audience.
Time management is always important! As I handle other work and projects as well as my own daily life, I should always remember my role in this business. I work together with my team to create and let this brand grow. Even if I do have other responsibilities, I need to remember that I accepted this job as well and I should be responsible for what I agreed to do. Having it as your own may look easy since you really don’t have deadlines set by your boss or you aren’t asked to do this or that, but in having the freedom of time when you do the work makes it more challenging. Since you are the one who handles it from planning until execution, you must be the one as well to remind yourself of who you are in this brand.
Thank you to my friend and amazing CEO baker Clarisa Guerrero for giving me the opportunity to work with you in such an amazing business! Thank you as well to Kristel Oliveros who acts as the brand’s COO and always helps our baker in doing the goodies.
