Client - Pie Bar

My Role - Product designer and social media manager

Project time - 6 Months

When I started working for Pie Bar they were but one shop in the heart of Ballard, Washington. But owner, Natalie Bleifuss had ideas of growing into something much bigger.

I started by building the company’s voice on social media. I searched out trending hashtags that were not only relevant to the type of business Pie Bar is but also hashtags that could connect us to the local community. I started us following all the other local businesses and local charities we wanted to be involved in. I wanted to bring the feel of what Pie Bar was to the language of the posts; a family run business with a small, close and dedicated staff. To have a bit of humor to things and make it feel genuine and engaging as opposed to the basic cliche posts you might see from a large company. Rather than just have a picture of pie I wanted to be a little more artistic with our shots.

The Logo

We needed a last minute post to promote Pie Day so I quickly drew a 3.14 and held it to a mirror to do the old 3.14 kind of looks like PIE backwards thing. Owner, Natalie had been looking to update the Pie Bar logo and said “That’s it! That has to be the logo!”. Natalie forwarded the post to a designer friend who came back with a few ideas similar to the post.

When talking with the staff about how customers described Pie Bar they used words like “adorable” “warm” and “inviting”. I didn’t feel like the logo idea we were working with expressed that. I felt a bigger and rounded text would be more suitable to what Pie Bar is.

So I started sketching some ideas.

I sent these sketches out to Natalie and the designer. Natalie loved the new look and the designer came back a more polished version that became the new Pie Bar logo.

Now that we have a trademarked logo we wanted to get it out in the world. So I started designing merchandise and things like to go bags. Natalie always seemed to be in a hurry to get an idea done so I created a group of 8 people who fit the Pie Bar customer demographic to send the ideas out to to see what were the favorites. I wanted to be sure to keep a consistent aesthetic and tone to the wording whenever possible to match what we had been doing on social media.

The Pie Bar Food Trucks

The original food truck found a home in Kirkland Washington outside a convenience store across the street from the beach. Natalie wanted to display some A frame signs around town promoting the truck. I walked around town and noticed that not only were there no A frame signs around but not even a flyer on a telephone pole. I reached out to the Kirkland City Council to inquire about the laws involving business promotions and discovered that A frame signs were prohibited. The walkways around the beach needed to be clear of obstructions. But there were patches of land that lined the sidewalks that I found that I could use. So what I did was made lawn signs as a compromise. It worked just as well and was much less expensive.

We next had an issue with the menu. It was hand written every day under the serving window with bright, colorful markers. People had a very difficult time reading it and if it rained the colors would run making it even more difficult. The section where the menu was written was a large piece of metal that hung in front of the window. So I made a menu on magnets. Each flavor had it’s own magnet so if one ran out it could easily be taken off the board. I used the signature shade of pink against black for good contrast and readability. I also only put the price of the pies on the header magnet so if it ever changed we would only need to replace that one that listed the price.

The Pie Van

Next Natalie came to me with a Pie Van. These would be smaller but go to various locations. She bought two vans that were going to be wrapped in a design rather than painted. She had one design that she sent my way. I didn’t think that it utilized the space very well. She asked if I could work on it and I said sure but then she added the design needed to be submitted that evening. So I got to work!

The original design looked like this:

But considering that this van would be driving all over town, I wanted to make things bigger and bolder. So after a few changes and input from the demographic list we settled on this design:

Pie Instruction Stickers

Thanksgiving is the biggest time of year for full pie orders. Pie Bar isn’t open on Thanksgiving day so all of the orders are picked up the day before. In years past there were a lot of questions about how to prepare it and keep it fresh. I asked the staff the most common questions they get regarding the full pies and then talked with the baker to answer those questions. I then designed a sticker to be placed on the full pie boxes that cover the keep and preparation of the 3 varieties of pies that are sold.

Takeaways

Working at Pie Bar was very fast paced. I had to learn how to do UX on the fly. I had to research if what was being asked to be done could be. I had to research price points for materials and factor in shipping costs and time. Also maintaining the voice of the brand across all platforms and merchandise. I had to speak with a very diverse group of staff members to get their input on what they were comfortable with being said when addressing where the company stands on important issues over social media during some intense times of protest. There was always a new challenge and I ended up learning a lot.