Blush & Bloom — Dare to Challenge 2023–2024
In this article, I will share with you my group’s and my experience in this semester’s class “Social Issues and Innovation” and our project on Mrs. Betty Tsakarestou’s “Dare to Challenge”. We created an amateurish start-up company that focuses on the action of animal cruelty that many make-up and skincare companies follow. During this class, we brainstormed, imagined, created, and presented our ideas to our classmates and teacher, forming our cruelty-free make-up and skincare company called “Blush & Bloom”. Our team includes the following students (alphabetically): Anagnostou Argyris, Gherasim Ntiana, Konstantilaki Nikoleta, Lakioti Lais-Eirini, Pergjoka Selina, Petridou Eirini-Amygdalia.
Our journey began during one of the classes we attended when we were asked to write down and discuss an important social topic that, in our opinion, needs to be addressed and dealt with. One of us commented about the cruelty animals face every day and another member brought up animal testing that is often used by make-up and skincare companies to test products we use every day. We decided that this is an issue that needs to be discussed more since, as you will read later on, not a lot of people are aware of the matter and its actual consequences.
So, after landing on the issue, we needed to create our means of action to deal with this problem. After a bit of thought, we created a start-up company called “Blush & Bloom” and we sell cruelty-free products and promote the stance against this action. Our slogan is “Grow to Glow” to emphasize that beauty isn’t just an exterior, but you can “grow” it emotionally as well by helping those in need. The attached photo no.1 shows Blush & Bloom’s logo whose colors are intentional. We use a lot of blues and greens, even on our media posts, to offer a clean and natural feeling for our products. A percentage of our income goes to organizations that support hurt animals and want to help them, and we try to do the same thing by bringing awareness to our audiences. How do we do that? Through our social media.
Social Media
As a company, that is led by Gen Z people, we know how important it is nowadays to have a good media image and be as active as you can. So, that is exactly what we are doing by frequently posting images on Instagram and Facebook as well as entertaining videos on our TikTok. Our goal through those posts is to engage with our followers and attract the attention of users who show interest in our cause. We share important facts about the danger these animals face and we inform them about all the ways they can help. After a little research, we realized that the people who are interested in the cause, don’t really know from where they can start and offer their help. It’s our job to make it easier for them and give them the helping hand they’re looking for.
Our posts conclude with information about our newest products and the best products for our followers to buy and try out. We make sure to guide them to our website where they can see the full description we have about their characteristics. We also have the informative posts we previously mentioned where we make sure to help our viewers understand the seriousness behind our cause. However, one of our main goals is to make the process as pleasant as possible and have fun. So, our 7-Day Challenge Campaign called “Animal Care” lets our users do what they’re the best at; Live their Lives! Just follow our page and each day check the added challenge. Post a picture of you completing it with the hashtag #AnimalCareBandB and win prizes like discounts, free products, and invites to our grand events where we will discuss and support our cause.
Teamwork
As for our process when working on each of our weekly projects this semester, we focused heavily on teamwork. More specifically, we valued working together through many digital meetings, in which every one of us got the chance to be equally involved in expressing our ideas and opinions on each of the given assignments. Communicating virtually can be hard but we made the best out of it with every tool we had. In addition to this, we also created a group chat in order to better communicate with each other and schedule meetings more efficiently. Therefore, it was easy for us to stay consistent and productive throughout the semester, while also meeting the deadlines of the assignments. Furthermore, it is worth stating that Miro Board was the one tool that we relied on to stay organized. This application allowed each one of us to neatly note down our creative ideas as soon as they came to mind, while simultaneously letting the rest of the team members view these ideas within their own spare time.
Whenever we held a meeting, we started by revising our Miro Board as a team so that we could narrow our ideas down to the ones we found most fitting for our organization. On top of that, the process of composing our PowerPoint presentations was made much easier since we could always refer back to our board. Additionally, we should also mention how we prepared for the final presentation. Firstly, we divided the parts fairly and gave ourselves a time period where we would practice individually before holding team sessions where we would perform together in front of a small audience composed of some of our friends who would, later on, give us feedback on things we could improve on. We helped each other get better and get ready for the presentation and rehearsed many times to make sure we would meet and not go over the time that was set for us.
Challenges
And of course, it is vital to refer more specifically to some forms of challenges that we faced throughout the entire procedure of planning, creating, and developing our cruelty-free brand “Blush & Bloom”. A brand is more than the products you sell, it’s also about your values and the causes you support.
Starting from scratch, the first challenge that we faced was the creativity and diversity part of “building” a start-up business. More specifically we, as a cooperating team, did not want to just create a simple brand and just stand for a cruelty-free makeup business. We wanted to provide our consumer audience with some deeper and more essential information rather than a website that provides a huge range of skincare and makeup products. We wanted to engage through the cosmetic consumption habits of the issue of animal cruelty and testing. Raising awareness of the issue was from the beginning of our work the most important challenge that we had to face.
Going deeper into our work, creating and developing a website, or researching rigorously for the cosmetic industry was not a hard challenge for us, as we had been already aware of the secrets that this industry hides through all these years of creating skincare and makeup products. The more challenging part was to fully understand the consumer’s habits and behaviors. Being aware of what we consume, and use has become nowadays one of the most important pillars for those who want to improve their quality of life more sustainably. At that point, we came to the basic conclusion that the challenge is not only to create plant-based or vegan products but also to be affordable and attractive to the customers’ needs and clarify this in each label or from other forms like social media. Achieving the embrace and engagement in the social networking part was the challenging goal. But in order to find out what really customers know about the issue, we had to come in contact with them.
During our project, we conducted interviews to collect valuable information. Specifically, we conducted two interviews and we came in contact with a person who owns a pet and one person who doesn’t have one. Our interviewees answered our questions regarding the cruelty-free movement and animal testing. Through our contact with them, we wanted to understand if they were aware of the movement and the dangerous consequences of animal testing. Our choices aimed at understanding deeper through which criteria they make their decisions regarding the makeup industry and if the fact that one is a pet owner and the other one doesn’t have a pet affects their opinion about this cause. That became our next and biggest challenge. The results by themselves were a challenge for us as we realized that the interviewees were not aware of what truly happens behind the cruelty and animal testing procedure. What really impressed us was that even though they could understand the discipline aspect, they honestly replied to us that the cruelty-free or vegan factor does not really affect their consuming habits no matter their livelihood.
And last but not least, we wanted to refer to the challenging part of amplifying through the power of influence. We were highly aware of the power of influence that helps create a link between a brand, social media, and consumers. Creating a powerful and strategically relevant campaign was the challenge and the main purpose was to raise awareness and not force consumers to a vegan, cruelty-free behavior just because is healthier for the flora and the fauna. We needed to attract and properly guide them, not scare them.
Main Problem and Our Solution
The main point of our project, as a start-up company that loves animals, was to bring awareness around the topic of animal cruelty and the values that this movement comes with. At the same time, we aimed to support the animals in need, making donations to different shelters through the earning of our skincare and biological makeup products, as a cruelty-free company. We wanted to find out if people are aware of this movement and the consequences for animals that are being tested.
From our research, we observed that a lot of people don’t know a lot about animal testing, the consequences, and how this works. They don’t know exactly what happens when products are tested on animals and how harmful it can be, as animals are being injured, tortured, or even killed by this process. Our goal is to educate, inform, sell good-biological-plant base products to the market, and of course help animals. For most people, the main criterion for buying a product is to fit the needs of their skin type and to be affordable. The cruelty-free criteria come in second place. Even the people who are pet owners said that they don’t actively search for cruelty-free products. Is not their priority. As a company, we want to reach our consumers’ needs and make them try new skincare products without being afraid for their health. We know how important products are for sensitive skin, allergies, and irritations, so we created vegan products, herbal-based for all skin types. Moreover, we want to provide education and information about animal cruelty via campaigns on social media, challenges that people can participate in, and facts about animal cruelty on our packaging, without ever being harsh. Lastly, our content on all digital platforms will provide information about our makeup and skincare products and their ingredients, as well as ways anyone can help in our cause with just a simple ‘click’.
As a team, we tried to find the best solution for our project. First of all, the best way to inform people nowadays is through social media. For this reason, we created accounts on the most famous digital platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok and we shared our beliefs there. More specifically, we decided to post on Instagram some statistics we found about the brands that use animal testing, invitations for our organization’s events, the opportunity to win prizes by learning and sharing important information about animal care, and, of course, our new acne care products.
Moreover, for those who don’t use social media the best idea was to create a website. The more digital content the more sensitized people. On our website (https://selenapgk3.wixsite.com/blushandbloom2024) the first thing you can see is cruelty-free products, which can buy in a very easy way. Trying very hard to find a product is the worst thing you can face while trying to make a purchase, so we managed to avoid it. Of course, information about “who we are” is very important so that’s the second thing you see while scrolling down. A clever trick was to connect the Instagram page with the link to the website by clicking it in the profile and simultaneously by clicking the link of our social media on the first page of our website.
Our main thoughts were how we can best inform the public and we believe we have taken great action on this part. Also, communication with the public via the Internet is the key to rapid and easy interaction. In this day and age, all businesses interact with their clients by sending emails or typing Instagram messages. Surprisingly, that’s a more common way than a phone call. As we consider all the above, the launching of cruelty-free products (for example an acne-friendly foundation that can be used perfectly on all skin tones) from a startup company, combined with the information we share online was the best solution for every challenge we faced.
Reflection
As a start-up company, we decided to focus on the cruelty-free movement and animal testing, as it is an important issue, and we desire to raise the awareness of people. Through our research, we managed to understand the reason why this issue is vitally important. More and more companies should adopt the ideology of cruelty-free options and remove themselves from brutality. Humanity needs to create a safe environment for animals without having a strong belief that profit is the only goal.
In conclusion, we conveyed our research to collect information, and through the conduction of our interviews, we desired to gain an understanding of our consumers and their knowledge about our topic. Our project has the potential to affect the dominant ideology of profit and make it clear that animal testing has serious consequences. We offer alternatives and show that cruelty-free products are possible to support a business without sales on quality. Our goal is to bring awareness and be the next step to this important, but, fairly, neglected issue. To grow as a person is the only way you can glow, and Blush & Bloom is the company that can help you!
Our experience as a team on this year’s “Dare to Challenge” in Social Issues and Innovation with Mrs. Betty Tsakarestou was unique. We learned and gathered so many important tools and knowledge that will help us during our educational path and our future careers. We developed our skills as a team and created a start-up that we are proud of. We truly believe in this problem so it was important to us to do a good job and share our findings with the world, hoping that one day, the store shelves will only have cruelty-free options that support and teach us the rights these animals deserve.
Social Media & Tools: Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, MiroBoard, Website.
Team Members: Argy Anagnostou (Argyris Anagnostou), Ntiana (Ntiana Gherasim), Nikoleta Konstantilaki(Nikoleta Konstantilaki), Larena Lakioti (Lais-Eirini Lakioti), Selina Pgk (Selina Perjoka), Petridi Eir (Eirini-Amygdalia Petridou).
Project and Class Supervisor: Betty Tsakarestou
