We recently connected with Katy Doar and Brittany Schmid and have shared our conversation below.
Katy Doar and Brittany Schmid, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?
Making friends as an adult is hard. Brittany and I met in 2015 in Charlottesville, VA where we had both moved while our husbands were attending business school. Although both hesitant to move to a new town for just two years while our husbands pursued their degrees, we ended up meeting each other and making some of our best friends during this time. After Will and Mark graduated we found ourselves in new cities once again, but this time pregnant. As we struggled to meet other women in similar phases of their lives and embrace our new identities as moms, we stayed in touch and supported each other through our pregnancies as much as possible with visits, phone calls and lots of text messages. Despite this, we were really missing a physical community that allowed us to get out of the house and continue to meet other young families while stimulating our little ones.
In 2018 Brittany and her son Jack, who was 5 months old at the time came to visit my son John (8 months) and me in Chicago where we attended a music class. The room was packed with young moms who all seemed to know each other, and while we would have liked to introduce ourselves, there was never an opportunity. After this we started brainstorming about creating a space where new parents could come to feel like their old selves while embracing their new identities. We wanted to make them feel like they were in a safe, clean and elevated space where they could feel supported by the staff and one another, and this is how the idea of The Bunny Hive and our mission came to be.
Every moment that a customer or member walks in the door, we aim to make them feel safe and at home and create ample opportunities for relationship building within our community. Our staff knows all of our members by name, and our Director, Chelsea, has been with us since we opened our doors and has seen our many of our babies grow up. We start every class with a “happy and comfortable message”, letting participants know that this time is for them and their little one, and to do whatever makes them most comfortable in this 30 minutes. This could mean breastfeeding or bottle feeding, or letting antsy toddlers switch activities or take a break. We never want a caregiver to feel judged or uncomfortable doing what is best for them and their little one.
Since we opened our doors in 2019, Brittany and I are so proud of The Bunny Hive community, and are thrilled to see the connections that have formed in Atlanta among our members, staff and partners. We are thrilled to be introducing our concept to the Richmond, VA community in October.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?
Brittany’s background is in marketing and events and Katy’s background is in early childhood and nonprofits has allowed us to work together to create The Bunny Hive experience through our branding, events and curriculum. Opening our doors in September 2019, just 5 months before Covid hit has forced us to remain agile as a startup to fully meet the needs of our members. Most importantly, we are both moms of 3 (ages 4, 2 and 4 months!) and fully understand the joy and struggles in motherhood that are members are living each day.
We are immensely proud to see the friendships that our members have built. Our founding members in the Atlanta studio were mostly first time moms in 2019. It is amazing to see them coming back with baby #2 and sometimes 3!
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
We opened our doors in September 2019 when Brittany and I were pregnant with Baby #2, and started to turn a profit by February 2020 when Covid hit. Fortunately at this time Brittany and I had already seen our vision come to life and the impact that we were having on our members, and instead of closing our doors, came up with creative ways to continue to support our members and provide content. Some of these strategies included offering virtual classes, support groups and events such as cooking demos, organizing workshops, Q&A wine nights with obgyn and pediatricians and book clubs.
We were so fortunate to have many members continue with their membership packages despite the studio being closed and to retain our now director, Chelsea. We also launched a Go Fund Me page which received generous support from family, friends and The Bunny Hive community.
What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?
As a customer service based industry, Brittany and I are in touch with what our customers need when attending a class or event at our studio because we are experiencing the same joy, hardships, tantrums, breastfeeding, and postpartum challenges as our members.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.thebunnyhive.com
- Instagram: @the.bunny.hive