Songbird Bakery began as a home baking business in 2014 and was later offered a shop in Bedford Street, a new retail development in Middlesbrough. They hired Beth as their PR manager in early 2016 to help publicize the new shop's opening. Beth introduced them to bloggers, grew their social media presence, wrote press releases, and organized promotions. Her PR work was invaluable as the shop faced delays, helping to build excitement until they officially opened in Easter 2016. The owners credit Beth's efforts for their successful launch and current business success.

1. Songbird Bakery (a partnership between friends Claire and Shelley) began its journey in January 2014, we
started off as a home baking business and we would attend fairs and take orders via Facebook.
Towards the end of 2014 we were approached by the Middlesbrough council about a new venture starting
in Bedford street which would be a "foodie" haven for the people and visitors of Middlesbrough. We jumped
at the chance and were offered a shop on the street later in 2015.
On January 29th 2016, we were inboxed on Facebook by Beth who was looking to work with us as our PR
manager to help us with publicity for the new shop opening planned for the Easter weekend 2016. We were
very happy to take her up on the offer as, with this being our first venture into anything like this, we would
not have been able to do a successful media campaign and build/set up the new shop at the same time.
We arranged a meeting with Beth on Bedford street to come and see the shop (which was a building site at
the time). Beth has been with us ever since, from the beginning of this stressful but brilliant journey to the
fantastic opening events and having her on board with us was invaluable to our business, we could not
have got where we are today without her.
The following is everything that Beth has done for us since that very first meeting.
Beth introduced us to the Bloggers scene, she suggested setting up a Blogging event for them to come and
see our new shop before it opened. This was very successful and the blogger reviews we got about our
business and the event were fantastic, we really enjoyed being part of this as we were new to it and had
not explored this before.
Although we had a very good online presence on Facebook we were unfamiliar with Twitter and Instagram.
Beth arranged to take over our accounts and promote them to give us a higher profile. This worked
extremely well as our Twitter followers has reached 554 from the original 78 when she took over and also
Instagram is now at 639 followers instead of the beginning 180. She has taught us so much about the
importance of social media and relevant hashtags which has brought us to the attention of other local
businesses.
Beth wrote a very good press release which was sent to all of the relevant media outlets, this raised our
profile within the local media and resulted in Beth writing several successful and well written articles about
us.
Beth suggested and arranged a very successful online competition of winning some cupcakes, which was
instrumental in raising our Twitter, Facebook and Instagram followers.
Several suggestions Beth made and then actioned were our "coming soon" leaflets, reward schemes,
student offers, and an online survey which helped us massively in understanding our market and what they
wanted from us as a business. She also told us about and created a flipagram, which was a great way to
show our followers the journey we had been on. Our followers loved it.
The journey to the shop opening was delayed quite a few times due to building issues and Beth was a
massive support throughout, she arranged to meet with us whenever we could and kept our PR going
strong despite set backs.
We are now in our second week of opening and have really enjoyed working with Beth, she has not only
been fantastic at doing our PR but also a massive support in general. We think she is set for a excellent
career in media and we wish her the very best success.
Claire and Shelley
Songbird Bakery