We were lucky to catch up with Valiencia Allen recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Valiencia, thanks for joining us today. Let’s start with what makes profitability in your industry a challenge – what would you say is the biggest challenge?

Surplus! When COVID-19 embarked our nation it was detrimental to small businesses and their surplus. The demand to produce was high tend yet we could not gain access to our packaging that consumers were in love with nor the advertised packaging we had once displayed all over our e-commerce advertisements.

Valiencia, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Many folk know me for having stage IV endometriosis and launching a brand.

I know me as a girl with a dream of something bigger then little ole me. I remember starting the brand and telling my late father and he said “you’re gonna go to jail, you can’t make products in. Your house”. He was a southern soul and he was completely unaware that it was in fact possible to do that and so much more. As, the brand grew he starts to get excited and too great interest in all that I was doing. It was such a joy to watch a man from Alabamba see his very own daughter do exactly what they always told him he could never do.

I am most proud of my team. We have had many consumers bash us, belittle us and even question our standards. Consumers are a tough group of people. I started the brand with very little knowledge on how consumers can make or break you. I come from a healthcare space and while the patient was always right, I decided to adapt that same logic into my small yet mighty brand. While we can’t offer 24/7 customer service. We do offer customer initiatives such as service recovery measures and customer retention programs.

Our brand strives to keep rising to the top. I don’t believe in bad press. All press is good press because it always generates a buzz. I am fully invested in the quality and fulfillment of our products using the very best ingredients. Are we perfect? Absolutely, not!! Everyday, I learn something new about the industry. Can we do better? Ah…yes, of course. We strive to give the greatest. And we need consumers to do so. I am extremely grateful for our customer base and all those who have supported the brand for the past 9 years.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Whoosah…..Social media is a tough cookie. I actually never knew needing a pretense on social media could impact my brand. My teenage son was about 14 and he challenged me to embark on. Instagram to start selling my products. Being a 70’s era baby that seemed so far fetch. Well, fast forward to the millennial era. I would follow and unfollow folks that I thought could possible be interested and host giveaways on random days. It was very finger intensive laboring and many sleepless nights. I eventually became a brand that consumers grew to love and desired to follow.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

A unlearned lesson for me is caring. Yes, I know that sounds horrible. I don’t mean this in a harsh way. by any means. It simply means I had to disconnect emotionally from internalizing the thoughts and perceptions of people. I see, it as noise. Once I did that and focused on the quality of the brand it got quite around me and by giving that less of me the brand was able to sustain. The biggest hang up is that Amazon has consumers believing that small businesses adhere to prime memberships when it comes to fulfillment. If you don’t meet these standards you are labeled as a horrible customer service and poor shipping. It’s almost impossible for a small brand with under 5 FTEs to ship on the same date of purchase. Also, if you don’t respond immediately to email you are disregarding a consumer and you’re rude. Unfortunately, consumers are less likely to have a voice of reason where small brands are concerned. They create huddles and generate bashing sessions. I have learned that this is all a part of the journey and it’s never personal it always business. I just have to work twice as hard on proving that the products are far greater than any backlash.

Contact Info:

• Website: Honeyshandmade.com
• Instagram: Instagram.com/honeyshandmade
• Facebook: Facebook.com/honeyshandmade
• Linkedin: LinkedIn.com/honeyshandmade
• Twitter: Twitter.com/honeyshandmade
• Youtube: YouTube.com/honeyshandmade