IMC Hawks Blog

Tag: Entrepreneurship

  • The Key to Success

    What would happen if every company in the world was socially conscious? Would we diminish poverty or maybe end world hunger? This would be a simple solution to much of our worlds problems and it seems as though only a few companies have this figured out like The Giving Keys, a Los Angeles-based jewelry company.

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    The Giving Keys is not a nonprofit but a social enterprise.  They believe that the solution to ending generational poverty and homelessness is to provide jobs for those in need. Instead of raising donations, the company employs those transitioning out of homelessness. The Giving Key is a pay it forward company where you can purchase an collection of different vintage keys with phrases like love, breathe, courage engraved into them. You pick the key with the word that speaks most to you and then once you feel as though it has served its purpose in your life you give your key to a person who needs the message. Through your purchase you help those transitioning out of homelessness get jobs, the company has currently provided 70 plus jobs opportunities to those in need.

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    Simple and meaningful. These are two words which can be used to describe the keys. It seems as though it is the meaning and purpose behind the keys that sells them. Founder Caitlin Crosby says “We aren’t in this just to make money and be fashionable. We exist to change people’s lives”. Being socially aware and using that to set you apart from other companies can turn a simple idea turn into a widely known enterprise.

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    Check out their website and see how they are changing the world one key at a time!

    Does a company with a social purpose make you more prone to buying their product? Why or why not?

    • Isabella Martinez

     

  • Get your Fuzzy on!

    Looking for something new and exciting in your life?  The Fuzzy Peach is a self-serve frozen yogurt bar that allows their customers to be as creative as they’d like. Located in Racine Commons, and in three other sections of Wilmington, The Fuzzy Peach offers eight different flavors of frozen yogurt each day. Also available are rows full of toppings including fresh fruit and candy to make each yogurt creation unique. The Fuzzy Peach is a healthy alternative to dessert, but still satisfies the sweet tooth that we all have. Customers pay by the ounce, so they’re in control. Add on ten toppings, or maybe just one, but in the end the customers will have exactly what they’ve been wanting. Rocco Quaranto, Wells Struble and Jason Nista graduated from the Cameron School of Business from the University of North Carolina Wilmington in 2008. The trio met their freshman year in the dorms and ran track together. They graduated and continued on to peruse employment in the corporate field, but it didn’t take long before they were bored with their jobs and wanted something new and fresh. The young entrepreneurs came back to Wilmington, NC two years after graduation and decided to start their own business named The Fuzzy Peach. They got the idea of a frozen yogurt dessert bar from California and thought it would be a business that would be successful in the Wilmington market.  Needless to say they found a niche and have struck gold in the Wilmington area.   Did these young entrepreneurs place their yogurt shop in Wilmington by chance, or was it a strategic planned marketing move?  Their knowledge of the Wilmington area and their locations for their stores leads us to believe it was a strategic move on their part.  Their placement of the first Fuzzy Peach store is conveniently located close to UNCW, and their probable target audience is college students.  Through word of mouth and advertising, this location became a popular spot for college students in Wilmington craving frozen yogurt.  Once that location became a hit, they opened up their second location in downtown Wilmington.  This location offers free frozen yogurt to a different company downtown and their employees on certain Fridays advertised by the store.  This second store’s target audience is businesses and professionals working in the downtown Wilmington area. However, they are also still open late for young students wandering downtown.  Their Monkey Junction location is their third, and attracts people from the surrounding areas much like their newest location in Porter’s Neck.  A Fuzzy Peach yogurt store will be coming soon to Carolina Beach, which will further expand their target market.  Each location offers specials, such as T-Shirt Tuesday where customers wearing a Fuzzy Peach shirt into the store will receive 10% off their frozen yogurt purchase.  The future seems very bright for the three entrepreneurs who have brought a frozen yogurt empire to the Wilmington area. -Kelsey Bendig, Brooke Keller, Andrea Blanton, Brian Burch

  • Surfing Your Way to Success

    Entrepreneurs, as well as many other companies, rely on Integrated Marketing Communication to get the word of their business out to the public with multiple methods. A fellow UNCW Senior in the Communication Studies department, James Connolley, has been an entrepreneur using IMC to promote his business, JC Surf Camp. James has been teaching people of all ages how to surf for 8 years and has been an entrepreneur, owning JC Surf Camp for 6 years. His decision to start his own surf camp business started with a conversation with his high school bible study leader. James has a love for surfing, kids, and Jesus and decided the best way to combine all the things he loves into his surf camp. He likes to share his message through his surf camp by the quality and professionalism in his every day work.

    When the surf camp started in 2006, the only way James was communicating with his publics was by posting fliers in the storefront of a local surf shop. His business quickly started to grow and in 2007, James decided he wanted to market his business to a broader audience. He paid someone to build his own website and just recently added new content and features. James uses many other ways to communicate to his public by using mass emails, direct mailing, brochures, website, and social media. The best marketing overall with JC Surf Camp is word of mouth advertising and partnerships with other local camps in Wilmington. More recently, James was able to advertise his business through the local news station WECT.

    Link to WECT Live bit on JC Surf Camp

    The JC Surf Camp team considers surfing one of the greatest blessings in life and goes to great lengths to ensure others see it the same way. Each instructor at JC Surf Camp has gone through an extensive SurfInstruct Training Program before becoming a surf instructor. This program was developed to ensure every instructor knows ocean safety, surf safety, CPR and First Aid certified, and knowledge of different teaching methods for all levels, such as, kids, teens, groups, or private lessons. Another way James and his team ensure safety is by providing UV protected rash guards and soft-top surfboards. Safety is very important to all the JC Surf Camp instructors to make sure they are providing a safe learning environment. James stated it perfectly when he said if people feel safe, they are able to have fun. This is one of the messages James tries to communicate to retain and maintain customers.

    Many times entrepreneurs start from the ground up and have to take what they have and make the most of it. Since James is in the communication studies department at UNCW, he has been able to take the knowledge learned in communication classes and IMC classes and implement that in his business. James, as a student and entrepreneur, thinks of entrepreneurship as an adventure and has far exceeded what many entrepreneurs his age are capable of.

    Learn how to surf today!

    By: Laura Simmons, Dorothy Conley, Christina Stevenson, Mollie Berthold