Client Spotlight: Gearharts Fine Chocolates
Tim Gearhart began his journey to chocolatier by wandering the world through its kitchens. He toured the Far East as a Marine Corps cook, trained in pastry at the Culinary Institute of America, and then honed his craft everywhere from an English castle to a Western dude ranch. Inspired by his travels and eagerness to craft chocolates that reflected them, he returned home to Virginia to set up shop amid Charlottesville’s emerging food scene. Emboldened by the confidence of a fellow chef and former boss, Tim launched Gearharts Fine Chocolates with Bill Hamilton in 2001. Outfitted with a small office kitchenette and armed with only two forks and a bowl, Tim hand-dipped about 700 pieces of chocolate a day during that first holiday season.
Scope
Gearharts Fine Chocolates started working with us in 2012, specifically for media relations to promote their business and chocolates on national, regional and local media platforms. Hive’s media relations’ efforts over the next few years would result in coverage for Gearharts on the Food Network and TODAY Show, in the New York Times (twice!), Food and Wine magazine, Good Housekeeping, Bon Appetit, Martha Stewart Living, epicurious, Candy Industry Magazine, Candy & Snack TODAY, and in countless local and regional media, news programs and blogs.
Over the next five years, Hive slowly transformed into integrating social media, email campaigns, and general marketing into their work with Gearharts. In November 2018, we started helping Gearharts with social media organic posts, ads campaigns and custom graphics for campaigns. Since 2019, Gearhart’s Fine Chocolates Facebook page has gained 1,100 followers with the aid of the Hive Creative Group’s social media strategies.
More recently, we designed the packaging for their new Hot Honeycomb! Adrian focused on keeping the colors within the Gearharts’ branding family palette of rich browns and gold. The pattern in the background is a nod to honeycomb, and the icons and script font were a way to make the packaging feel a little more fun and unique.
During the summer of 2020, Hive helped with promoting Gearharts’ first "Virtual" Summer Open House. This event is usually held in person, but with COVID, it was decided a week-long virtual event would be a great alternative. We did daily giveaways on social media, and Adrian went to the production studio to Facebook Live stream Tim Gearhart and special guest Amanda from Virginia Distillery Company making a Virginia Highland Malt Whisky and Candid Lemon truffles.
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We would love to discuss how we can help your business grow. You can browse more of our social media, branding, web design, and package design examples on our portfolio page.
