I wish a successful brand strategy was like coming home after a long flight and as you’re walking through the airport terminal pulling your luggage, you see friends, family, customers and clients all lined up, holding signs that say “congratulations, you made it!” and “job well done!” and “your brand rocks!” The reality is that…
Many of my branding clients approach me initially because they’re unhappy with their website. “My website needs an update – it’s too vanilla/too corporate/doesn’t represent everything I do and offer.“ But the website is only (probably) the most outwardly visible sign of your brand. Let’s dig a little deeper – and in the words of…
“Making an engaging presentation is hard. We forget to Show & Tell.” – Dan Roam, author I was recently invited to be a guest speaker for a monthly call for a group of engineering educators working in higher ed, who will all be presenting research posters at an upcoming in-person conference. I was asked to…
Is there a creative, visual learner in your life that you’d like to thank, encourage, or support (or maybe that’s you, *wink*)? Here is a curated list of 15 fun and useful gift ideas for all ages, from free to inexpensive to somewhat pricey. The items are categorized into Books, Tech, Tools, and Toys.
In this week’s installment of #throwbackthursday, I’m throwing it way back to when I was in my late 20s/early 30s. It was the 90s/early 2000s and I was living in NYC and working as an environmental educator (more on that in a later post). To supplement my income I made jewelry from beach glass and…
“Shit is bleak“ Humor is often used to poke fun at tragic or depressing events. Good-natured comedy can help us cope with a negative situation. Take this Onion headline parodying the sober subject of climate change, for example, or this screenshot from comedian Marie Faustin’s pandemic-themed skit. What could be less funny than killer virus…
When the Stone Soup story is interpreted through an entrepreneurship lens, the full flavors of community and collaboration unfortunately go to pot. I am often asked how I came up with the name Stone Soup for my business. I refer to the popular children’s book, first published in 1947, which was based upon an even…
In 2019 I had the pleasure of leading a workshop at the Day of Innovation at Butler University, Indiana’s full day innovation event that brings together leaders and practitioners from all sectors and backgrounds, hosted by Centric Indiana. The conference theme was The Power of Together: Diversity, Inclusion, Collaboration and Team Building for Innovation. It…
This past spring my husband and I – along with our bulldog Violet – took a month to travel out west with our little Casita travel trailer in search of mountain biking adventures. Here’s a ~4-min re-cap of our journey, explainer video-style!
It’s 2021 and I’m celebrating twenty years of being self-employed at Stone Soup Creative. What does it mean to be a solopreneur and creative professional for this long? I’m old, and I’ve been at this for a while. But I’m also wiser than when I began. Here’s 20* lessons I’ve learned about running a business,…
