CASE STUDY | 8 minute read

Going for it

“To spend more time with my son, and do inspiring work I love.”

Anna stated as the primary motivators for her decision to go “all-in” on her side gig as a wedding florist.

Growing up, Anna loved to help her mom bring floral creations to life for special events and weddings of close friends & family. It was one of her favorite forms of creative expression and true play. Her art 💐🥀🌼

As she got older, she continued carrying this love of florals out for her close friends & family.

She wondered if this passion wasn’t just a creative hobby, but her calling.

“I thought I could make something of it?” Anna remarked.

And the vision of a boutique Northeast Ohio floral studio was born. Today, proud Owner & Floral Designer at Story Floral, Anna Racjak would soon realize her dream.

Anna Racjak, Owner & Floral Designer at Story Floral (@storyfloraldesign) poses for brand pictures with Brandy Llewelyn of B Creative Studio (@bc.studio.art) at Social House Venue (@socialhousevenue).

But like most aspiring Owners & Founders, she was apprehensive.

How will she stand out in a saturated market?
How will she generate consistent leads & collect inquiries?
How will she build credibility and trust quickly?
How will she expand her business & introduce new revenue streams?

While doubts, challenges and uncertainties like these are common setbacks to starting a business, Anna was both determined & courageous enough to not let them hold her back.

Her son, she remembered. And freedom, flexibility, inspiring work… the many benefits of starting a small service business were clear.

Anna decided it was time to take a vote of confidence in her future business by building a brand that would take it to the next level.

Knowing when it’s time to invest

To create this business and future she envisioned, Anna knew a professional, strategic website was a must (and one that attracted and converted quality ideal clients better than her current, DIY site).

She also wanted to avoid the time, frustration and overwhelm of doing it all herself again.

As a small business owner who wears many hats, she values the benefits of working with experts in their field, and not staying stuck in the ‘doing’ (a key to sustainable growth for service business owners, as told by Michael Gerber in The E Myth).

To bring this next era of Story Floral to life, Anna engaged Bspace Studio on a custom, memorable brand design and website that would be as strategic and functional as it is beautiful.

This early investment in her commitment to all-in would be the foundation of a budding growing local service business.

As a specialized creative and marketing agency, our scope included:

a visual identity suite including logos, symbols, font styling, a color palette, supporting graphics and other new business essentials. Everything Anna needed as a new service business to portray a premium image, all through a descriptive, elegant design.
Core brand messaging, descriptions, a founder story and more, garnered from a few simple intake questions. We turned Anna’s initial concepts/drafts into polished website copy that conveys her brand and personality, answers common questions and inspires more inquiries.
Intuitive and aesthetic layouts, displays of imagery and carefully placed typography that tell Story Floral’s brand story. We helped Anna’s brand build credibility with intentional, on-brand design, imagery, backgrounds, graphics and more.
A digital home that’s more than a brochure. Our preferred host, Squarespace, offers Anna robust business and marketing tools like email campaigns, automations, commerce and so much more that makes it the ideal website platform choice for new small businesses.

And to package it all together in a solution that also drives effective marketing (because why have a website that’s just a digital brochure?), the Story Floral experience was optimized for marketing from the beginning.

This included hosting a “lead magnet” (value-add resource like a pdf, webinar or other content) that’s used to drive email newsletter sign-ups.

Anna chose a Sustainable Wedding Guide that helps couples plan sustainable and beautiful weddings, positioning her as a valuable resource to her ideal clients. Her new brand started to take shape in a simple 2-pager, full of valuable content that nurtures.

This simple effort helps Story Floral maximize organic website traffic, offering a way to engage with and nurture leads that aren’t quite ready to buy yet, but are interested.

In high-value local services businesses like Anna’s, common buying behaviors include a long nurture period before purchase, making email newsletters an effective strategy for getting warm leads over the finish line.

How does it go - The more facts you tell, the more you sell? Anna saw the value in starting Story Floral’s digital funnel from “launch”.

Story Floral’s brand design, website & new small business essentials (business cards, colors + lead magnet), by Bspace Studio (@bspace.studio).

Starting with strong foundations in brand strategy

Before the digital experience began to take shape, we started with strong foundations in brand strategy, creative direction and visual identity design.

As a floral studio that creates bespoke, personalized arrangements for couples who value premium floral artistry and custom designs, her brand and website needed to convey that.

Luxury, premium, quality.

We dove into the creative direction process by uncovering keywords, target audiences and more.

“Romantic” and “whimsical” were among core brand traits discussed in our creative strategy session, an essential meeting that helped us get to know Anna’s vision with Story Floral, and steer the overall visual strategy.

After brainstorming and reviewing initial creative concepts, we landed on a logotype that’s full-of-feel and descriptive in itself, incorporating a pairing of rings intertwined to symbolize love, forever and the events that most commonly call her services - weddings.

Without another word or image, the logo would tell her story alone.

And lucky for her niche, flowers at events are always beautifully photographed, too.

To compliment the logo and library of swoon-worthy brand imagery, a bold, fun font and bright, fresh colors brought everything together, and differentiated her style.

Catchy brand messaging, animated GIFS 🥂 and design reflect her personality and laid-back nature, helping couples determine that who Anna is as a person is someone they want to work with for their special day.

We packaged her new brand identity for ease of use in a variety of file types needed for all digital and print applications, plus a concise Brand Guideline including color values, example applications, font styling and more.

Anna started to see the value in this investment as phase 1 took shape, and she was ready to (excitedly & proudly) start sharing her new brand with the world.

A digital experience, or all-in-one business & marketing tool?

Like most small business owners, Anna wanted her website to be more all-in-one business and marketing tool and less static, digital pamphlet.

After consulting with Bspace and learning about our approach with Squarespace-hosted sites for small businesses, she started to see how the platform her website would be hosted on was an important decision, especially as a new Owner.

Today, Anna doesn’t have to pay (or wait) for a designer to complete every future update to her website.

She’s able to make edits, add imagery, events and leverage other in-platform marketing tools like email campaigns, automations, pop-up banners, subscriber data, analytics, commerce and so much more.

She’s already hit the ground running on using Squarespace to its full potential.

Since the initial launch of storyfloraldesign.com, she’s expanded her business in impactful ways, introducing new revenue streams with an online store for special arrangement orders and subscriptions.

Best of all, she made these enhancements all on her own, leveraging our design foundation and creative direction with Squarespace’s intuitive editor.

And by working with Bspace Studio (a Squarespace Circle Member) on the initial website build, her first year of hosting was 30% off.

The added marketing tools weren’t the only clear benefit of choosing a website designer that develops in Squarespace for small businesses.

Building a community brand

At Bspace Studio, we’re all about helping new owners in practical ways, consulting on the power of relationship nurturing and email list building with all of our small business clients.

A promising strategy for growth in today’s digital world, Anna’s brand and website gave her the platform and foundation to do just that.

And much more.

Today, Story Floral is making her mark partnering with local businesses like Social House Venue, Yada Yada Coffee and Sense by the Falls, offering community events and pop-ups throughout Northeast Ohio.

In addition to planning for 2025 weddings, fulfilling custom arrangement orders and strategizing future growth strategies, Anna’s side gig has quickly become a promising growing local service business.

Story Floral’s new era is a testament to the opportunity and impact of small service businesses in today’s economy.

In an increasingly boutique and decentralized market where expertise, artistry and niche know-how is highly valued, passion projects and side hustles that turn into growing service businesses are becoming desirable lifestyles for families more and more.

Time freedom, unlimited income potential and inspiring work… Anna was realizing this dream with each new marketing endeavor her new brand and website helped unlock.

And best of all, Story Floral is hers.

A passion project and legacy that bloomed from the joy of flowers and love for a little human. How cool is that?

Giving wings to the vision

Tailored brand and website design for small businesses

“I was amazed at how quickly everything came together.”

Anna reflects on her experience working with Bspace.

Most new small businesses want to hit the ground running, fast, as we’ve come to learn. In a short ~6 weeks, we built the foundation she needed.

“It’s everything and more that I wanted for my branding and website.”

“Helpful, communicated well, and so organized through the process."

We fulfilled our mission to make professional branding and website design possible, equitable and a breeze for new owners.

The best part of it was watching Anna fulfill hers.

Helping dreams like Anna’s take shape is our why.

💡 If you have an idea, we’ll help you turn it into an offer & marketing plan.

💼 If you have a business, we’ll help you get your boots off the ground right the first time.

💭 If you have a story to tell, we’ll help you get heard in a way that drives your growth.

Bspace Studio is a boutique brand, marketing & creative studio empowering ambitious and aspiring Founders + Owners. We blend a decade in marketing and design to create stand-out digital experiences and content. Strategy, design + copy — one partner.

From side-hustle to growing local service business: How Bspace helped shape Story Floral’s next chapter