NURSERYindustry Viewpoints Hollie Sassienie


Kate Robinson


Expand, but don’t lose sight of your original market


Kate Robinson, Founder of Bandino


When you design a product to fulfil a specific purpose, you almost always have your target market in mind. There is so much to think about when launching, that it’s a weight off your mind to know exactly who you want to sell too. Although our product, Bandino, a personalised band for cups and bottles had other potential purposes, we made the decision to start out focussing on one core market; parents.


It came as no surprise to learn that parents realised the potential of the product and started using it to personalise everything from scooters to buggies. Then we started getting enquiries from sports professionals, which brought with it a new dimension, we were really pleased as we had always known it was a versatile product. This was fantastic, but left us debating how best to continue developing our brand. Our website is very family friendly and all our marketing had been directed at parents. Making a change will involve time and work, and perhaps a total re-brand, and although realising the full extent of the potential is exciting, you should be careful not to weaken your original message or lose sight of what you initially set out to achieve.


Every child has to have a named bottle or cup to take to nursery, so our concept works perfectly for parents. It’s not as simple in another industry; your product can take on a completely different role, and won’t necessarily be classed as an ‘essential’. It might mean you have to completely adapt your approach, we know we would have to tweak our look to become appealing to people without children. Whilst it makes sense to be flexible and tap into as many markets as possible, it should not be at the cost of losing touch with your original fan base; after all we did design it for children.


Communicating with a new audience brings a set of fresh challenges; firstly you have to find a way to reach them, which takes time! Social media is great, and it allows us to talk to people from all different walks of life, ultimately though if you want to enter a new industry it will involve a lot more than this. We will always look to expand our market, but first and foremost we have a duty to families to ensure our brand remains as fresh and exciting as ever. It’s quite a task making a product appeal to more than one audience, but if you have a practical, versatile and affordable product it could be very worthwhile.


page 8 www.nursery-industry.co.uk


Media coverage is great, but the brand has to work


Hollie Sassienie, Founder of Sassy Bloom


The moment when your website finally goes live is one of the most exciting, yet nerve wracking moments a business owner will ever experience! I knew there could be no bigger anti-climax than launching a new website and not attracting any customers, so months before I was ready to go live I started planning my launch strategy. There is nothing more important than building anticipation and excitement around your brand - especially when you are introducing a truly new concept to the market place.


Obviously this works two ways, it’s difficult to get people interested in something that doesn’t yet exist. How can you market a website that is still being developed? I have learnt that although it is difficult it is not impossible. Explore all avenues and think outside the box, it’s easy to picture your idea on the pages of a glossy magazine, but creating a presence takes time and effort. You may well nab that feature in a national glossy, but don’t forget that there are also opportunities closer to home. Local press is a great place to start, and who knows where it could lead. Before the official launch of Sassy Bloom, my unique and personalised baby box subscription service, my story was featured on the Mail Online as well as in the Business section of the Daily Telegraph where I talked about the subscription box economy. Although it wasn’t the kind of feature I imagined being in at first, it worked brilliantly and I had a lot of interest from both pieces. It was a great start for us, and meant people were already reading about the brand.


Even if you are still in the development stage, as long as you have some samples you can send tasters to press, bloggers and even celebrities to create some hype. Although still very much in the early days Sassy Bloom has now worked with almost twenty different celebrities. There is no denying the power of a celebrity endorsement and also on a more everyday level, it’s a great way to boost social media followers and get your name out there. We have had a lot of success with the media, but that doesn’t mean we will be giving up our efforts, quite the opposite. We need to do everything we can to make sure parents not only keep hearing our name but that they realise the need for this product. Equally important to us is that nursery brands see what we are doing and want to get involved. We already have 60 brands on board so we’ll always have something new, exciting and creative going on at Sassy Bloom!


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