Situation

Whimsical Cake Studio is a passionate, uniquely creative artisan bakery specializing in custom cakes and handmade goodies. They are self-proclaimed nerdy, and unpretentious. Since 2014, they have helped make people's celebrations unique and very memorable. They believe in making all of their ingredients, products, and garnishes from scratch. Their goal is to commit to producing the highest quality products and love what they do, and it shines through in everything they create.

Problem & Challenge

They were having trouble choosing the right advertising platforms for their audience and struggled to articulate the breadth of their product range, the experience of the bakery and its place in the community.

Their vision wasn't coming through the original logo of the bakery as well. It was outdated in style and didn't represent the new owner or her goals. They struggled to bring in new customers, reach a broader audience, and change the public's perception of the acquired bakery.

Some current customers at that time undervalued their work and were also unaware of the new ownership. As a result, sales were low, and they had trouble growing their business, team and resources. They needed to connect their mindset with their brand to help customers understand the studio's new business model and personality.

They needed a way to broaden their target audience, reach new customers and help change public perceptions.

Solution

Whimsical Cake Studio reached out to Ryan Mayer and Bluehaus Creative to help guide them in the process and create a new and improved brand identity for their studio.

Working off the ideas of “modern, fun, creative, playful, tasty and something memorable but simple.” We initially started to work on some cake, cupcake and whisk concepts to see the different ways we could simplify these elements. We also started playing around with different fonts, from structured, classic, and retro to very playful and whimsical.

They knew their target audience was females aged 25-45 years old. Most traffic came from Google searches and a hefty word of mouth. We wanted the new brand identity to help her reboot in her new space, let go of the past, move forward, and attract fun and funky people.

After reviewing a couple of concepts, we settled on a negative-spaced, three-tiered cake with dripping icing for the logomark. A hand-drawn modified type for ‘Whimsical” and a lovely modern, simple sans-serif font for “Cake Studio.” Altogether, we felt this logo captured everything she was looking for, and it checked off all the boxes and more!

Whimsical knew the colours had to be bright, playful and also unconventional. The recommendation of purple and green hit the spot, so we ran with it.

We also played with taglines such as “spread butter, not hate” and “count memories, not calories.” These taglines and a few others were used throughout several customer touchpoints, marketing materials, and packaging.

Outcome & Results

The new Whimsical Cake Studio brand identity combines playfulness and fun with creativity and whimsy. The studio was rejuvenated through a new design language, friendly and approachable content, and the newly updated brand identity.

Since the brand identity redesign and launch, traffic increased to their website and heavy use of social media even though the COVID quarantine. Their goal of delighting their customers with personalized service is now more straightforward than ever. Customers now realize Whimsical Cake Studio was improved immensely, and they can't get enough! They have generated an increase in their average order value.

As a result, their return on investment revealed itself quickly with repeat online orders, many new first-time visitors, and catching the eye of passers-by, to highlight a few.

The renewed branding opened a new chapter as they moved into a larger space and have become a staple in the neighbourhood and throughout the city. They have since grown their incredible and very talented team. They still love the reaction from the customers when receiving their epic creations.

Takeaways

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