Latest / Coffee People Podcast / Megan Kanzler, Olive Ridley Studios

Transcript

Megan Kanzler, Olive Ridley Studios · Coffee People Podcast

• 0:27
  Can you see yourself? Kind of, I mean, it's far away,
• 0:30
  but still see it. So then we're good and we're
• 0:33
  talking and everything's fine. Welcome to the Coffee People
• 0:36
  podcast. Thank you.
• 0:37
  Thanks for having me. The only time I'll ask you to
• 0:40
  look at the camera if you wouldn't mind introducing
• 0:42
  yourself in the name of your company and why you're here at
• 0:44
  Coffeefest New York City. Sure my name is Megan Kranzler,
• 0:49
  I am the founder of Olive Ridley Studios.
• 0:52
  We are a branding agency based out of Savannah, GA and we are
• 0:56
  here at Coffee Fest looking for a potential new clients.
• 1:00
  We specialize in helping small businesses, so we came here
• 1:04
  hoping to find some new small businesses to help.
• 1:08
  When you say branding, what is that Encompass?
• 1:11
  Obviously our show sponsored by Rostar, so I think packaging
• 1:14
  right away, but what is the bigger picture of branding?
• 1:17
  Yeah. So it's a very, I'm going to try
• 1:21
  to answer this without going too much in depth because there's a
• 1:23
  lot involved in branding, but OK, basically, so your brand is
• 1:30
  the way that people perceive your business.
• 1:33
  So branding is essentially your effort to influence the way
• 1:37
  people perceive your business. Packaging is obviously a very
• 1:40
  big part of that, especially in the coffee world, but we always
• 1:46
  start with brand identity design and brand strategy to make sure
• 1:49
  you are building a brand that's aligned with your goals and
• 1:54
  building a brand that's actually going to serve your ideal client
• 1:57
  and connect with your ideal client.
• 1:59
  Branding is really all about connection and building a
• 2:01
  connection with your clients and your potential clients.
• 2:05
  And the first way you do that is visually.
• 2:08
  So you've got to stand out either through being different
• 2:13
  from what everyone else is doing or just by telling your story in
• 2:16
  a unique way. But basically branding is kind
• 2:20
  of that all-encompassing thing that it's every single touch
• 2:25
  point, every visual element. It's the way you sound, it's the
• 2:28
  way you speak, it's the language that you use in your marketing
• 2:31
  materials. Branding encompasses all of
• 2:33
  that. If I'm understanding correctly,
• 2:36
  because it is so broad, it kind of creates the feel that people
• 2:39
  get when they see something of yours.
• 2:41
  Yeah, exactly. Whether it's a coffee bag or a
• 2:44
  poster or whatever. Yeah, so if you, if you're
• 2:47
  shopping for coffee and you are scanning all the bags and you
• 2:51
  stop at one for whatever reason, you're like, oh, that looks
• 2:54
  cool, cool, nice, fancy, whatever term gets you going and
• 3:01
  gets you excited about it. Like, oh, or oh, that's a super
• 3:03
  nerdy niche brand. Like I love that It's yeah.
• 3:07
  It's how you connect with people and how they how they do you in
• 3:11
  the public. So I notice your brand, which I
• 3:15
  always find it interesting with people who are designers, how
• 3:19
  they fall upon what their thing is, because I think it's easy to
• 3:22
  keep questioning or keep tweaking and tweaking, tweaking.
• 3:26
  I don't think it's an accident. You're wearing a blue coat and a
• 3:29
  blue shirt that match your colors.
• 3:31
  How did you determine what you wanted your brand to be?
• 3:34
  And I think you mentioned to me just a moment ago you came from
• 3:37
  a bigger corporate world and decided to go smaller and
• 3:40
  smaller in the sense that you work for yourself, yes.
• 3:43
  Why? And smaller in the sense that
• 3:45
  I'm helping small businesses as well.
• 3:47
  I do have a lot of corporate background where I was working
• 3:50
  for multinational, you know, large corporations.
• 3:55
  And when I got out of that world, I kind of built my brand
• 3:59
  to be the exact opposite of that.
• 4:03
  I found the corporate world to be a bit stagnant and very
• 4:08
  restrictive in terms of design. Small businesses can just have a
• 4:13
  lot more fun than big brands can when it comes to their branding
• 4:16
  and their design. And so I really built my brand
• 4:20
  to be the opposite of that corporate culture.
• 4:23
  I wanted it to be fun and colorful, and those are the kind
• 4:27
  of brands that I love building. I love expressive and creative
• 4:31
  and fun and funky. And that's the kind of thing
• 4:35
  that really makes small businesses stand out, especially
• 4:37
  when they're going up against these bigger, larger
• 4:39
  corporations who have more money than they do.
• 4:42
  The way that they can really stand out and compete is by
• 4:45
  being different and doing something fun, doing something
• 4:48
  funky, being bright, colorful, whatever, doing things that
• 4:51
  those large corporations just won't do.
• 4:54
  You're here at Coffee Fest and obviously engaging with coffee
• 4:57
  industry businesses. Why did you think this would be
• 5:00
  a good idea as far as like an audience that would maybe need
• 5:04
  your help and be willing to engage with?
• 5:06
  You yeah, that's a great question.
• 5:08
  So we specialize in helping product and retail based brands
• 5:13
  of a wide variety. Coffee is 1 very specific niche
• 5:16
  within that broader market. We actually went and walked the
• 5:20
  show last fall in Orlando just to kind of get a feel for it and
• 5:23
  see who was at the show and see if people might need our help in
• 5:27
  the coffee industry. And after walking the show in
• 5:29
  Orlando, we definitely saw that there was an opportunity for for
• 5:34
  us to come in and offer some design advice to these people.
• 5:38
  We actually did in Orlando. We did quick little 32nd brand
• 5:41
  audits for people at the show to see like that was, it worked out
• 5:46
  really well. Like I it started as kind of
• 5:48
  like a marketing gimmick because I was trying to figure out how
• 5:50
  to get people to talk to us at the show because we weren't
• 5:52
  exhibiting, we were just walking the show.
• 5:54
  It's always harder if you're like, if you're not in a place
• 5:57
  where they're coming. To you?
• 5:58
  Yeah, exactly. There's a.
• 5:59
  Stranger walking up saying let me tell you something.
• 6:01
  Yeah, so I made a shirt that said bet you a buck I can
• 6:04
  improve your brand in 30 seconds.
• 6:06
  Yeah, smart. And I actually, I had little
• 6:08
  fake dollars that I'd hand out to people with my information on
• 6:11
  it. I did have real dollars.
• 6:12
  And if I couldn't make a recommendation to you, I would
• 6:15
  give you an actual dollar. I only know only ended up giving
• 6:18
  away $1.00. So that told me there's
• 6:21
  definitely room in this industry for someone to come in and give
• 6:26
  some breathing advice, help people with design.
• 6:28
  So that's why we decided to make the leap and be an exhibitor
• 6:31
  here in New York. That way we can get in front of
• 6:34
  more people, people have the opportunity to come up and talk
• 6:37
  to us and we're not just trying to chase people around the show.
• 6:41
  You mentioned the Orlando show. I believe you're based down in
• 6:44
  the South. Southeast.
• 6:46
  But you work with clients anywhere anyone can reach out to
• 6:48
  you. How would they get a hold of you
• 6:50
  or find more about what you do and how you can help them?
• 6:53
  Yeah, so you can find us@oliveridleystudios.com.
• 6:57
  All of our information is there. If you want to learn more and
• 7:00
  see our work, you can do all of that there.
• 7:02
  We're also on Instagram at Olive Release Studios.
• 7:04
  You can see some of our work there as well, as well as a
• 7:07
  bunch of reels of me doing very silly things.
• 7:09
  So if that's what you're into, go check out our Instagram.
• 7:12
  Otherwise, the website is really the best place.
• 7:15
  There's a contact form to fill out if you want to work with us.
• 7:17
  There's a page full of resources for small business owners as
• 7:21
  well. So yeah, Oliver leestudios.com.
• 7:24
  OK, we'll make sure to link to that.
• 7:26
  I see a coffee cup you must have picked up on the way in.
• 7:29
  Yes. When you stop at a coffee shop
• 7:31
  somewhere, what do you order? So this morning it was a dirty
• 7:36
  Chai with oat milk. I'm an oat milk girlie, but most
• 7:42
  of the time it's a Cafe Ole with Oak Hill.
• 7:45
  OK, I have a team oats pin that I picked up yesterday so we're
• 7:48
  on the same team and the most important question I have does
• 7:51
  the turtle have the name? Yes, that is olive.
• 7:54
  Olive. Yes, the turtle is olive.
• 7:56
  Yes. I should have asked how you name
• 7:58
  the studio. Yeah.
• 7:59
  So Olive Ridley is a type of sea turtle.
• 8:01
  It's actually the smallest type of sea turtle.
• 8:04
  So it really kind of builds into our brand ethos.
• 8:07
  We help small businesses. Yeah.
• 8:10
  Sea turtles, when they're born, it's very dangerous, curious.
• 8:14
  Like, they come out of their shell and then all of a sudden
• 8:17
  there's danger all around them. They have to rush to the sea.
• 8:21
  I very much compare it to starting a small business
• 8:24
  because you're kind of thrown into the wild and all these
• 8:27
  people are trying to, like, sell you things and tell you what to
• 8:29
  do. And you have to just find your
• 8:32
  own path and make your way to the ocean.
• 8:35
  And just like in with humans, seagulls are trying to eat you.
• 8:38
  Exactly there at. The beach so.
• 8:40
  Exactly. Megan, thank you so much for
• 8:42
  joining the show. Welcome to Coffee PEOPLE and the
• 8:45
  Coffee Fest. Thank.
• 8:46
  You thanks so much for that. The.