Finch Case Study: How To Promote Brand With One Pressroom

12 mins read

Recently this successful project has turned 2 years old, and there are still only two people working on it. The story of Katerina Byakova and Maxim Golub is about how unfulfilled ambitions, enthusiasm, and creative ideas helped manifest the wildest dreams.

Finch Wear Logo

Today FINCH is the best young brand according to VOGUE Ukraine, the participant of Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days fashion-show, a holder of the first prize of the young designers contest in St.Petersburg.

Their collections are noted and appreciated by ELLE, STYLE.COM, VOGUE Italia, fashion photographers Adam Katz Sinding, Nabile Quenum, Adriano Cisani, a fashion journalist of The Huffington Post Sissi Johnson, fashion-bloggers Klara Sein from Austria and Jamie Gong from Japan.

The Eurovision-2016 winner Jamala, VOGUE Chief Editor Masha Tsukanova, the musicians of bands Mari Cheba, Grisly Faye and the frontwoman of The Hardkiss Yulia Sanina, they all wear Finch clothes.

FINCH: a new interpretation of downshifting

It all started with a cool print on a T-shirt: its creation was inspired by the gift presented by Katya’s friends — a pair of funny birds, finches. This bright finch bird eventually became a brand trademark.

Me and Maxim have always been creative people, but maybe parental attitudes or personal stereotypes and fears, made it difficult to challenge and demonstrate our abilities to the fullest extent. At that time, each of us had a stable job and unrealized creative ambitions. We both were approaching our 30th year, and felt remorse about doing the wrong business, — said Katerina Byakova.

Thus looking for a way for self-fulfilment, the guys created a clothing brand. The unusual sketches started transforming into prints on T-shirts and sweatshirts.

We were living a double life: in the daytime we worked and at nights — sewed, made thermo-labels and packed clothes — we kept it a secret from our bosses and even friends, — said Katerina Byakova.

The ideas were getting bigger and bigger, but the ongoing project limited the possibilities of the implementation of these ideas, as they required fundamental changes and much more time and resources. The economic, political and psychological crisis of 2014 became a catalyst for a decisive shift in the values.

On March, 28 the guys dared to change everything. On that day, a successful lawyer and a film club curator Maxim Golub and IT-specialist, designer and marketing expert Katerina Byakova got married in secret, quit the office work lifestyle and made a decision to launch the professional development of the FINCH brand.

A little finch flies around the world

There were no escape routes left. The couple carried out a market analysis, evaluated the needs and requests of different customer groups and chose a new niche. They started with the finchwear.com.ua website update and the FINCH model range renewal through an agreement with one of the best Kiev garment factories, thus significantly having improved the products quality. The style changed completely as well.

On the wedding anniversary, March 28, 2015 they performed their first professional FINCH collection fashion-show within the Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days / Fashion Scout Kiev. Despite the lack of pretension and eclectic nature of the models, they hit the runway and impressed fashion-critics: an eccentric FINCH hat with faux fur appeared in virtually all fashion world magazines and became a must-have in wardrobe choices of many stylish people, including the famous it-girl — a model, DJ and TV-presenter Olimpia Whitemustache.

Other FINCH discoveries reiterated this success in the following seasons: a puffer coat with a monochrome print in the shape of dinosaurs was appreciated by the chief editor of VOGUE Ukraine Masha Tsukanova and fashion expert of The Huffington Post Sissy Johnson; and a tech backpack-device TechPack in the shape of a pack of cigarettes, with an open iPad case and an in-built feature to charge mobile devices, made MBKFD spectators to go “wow”. This technological backpack TechPack was the result of FINCH and Bright Inside collaboration, it allows you to use the tablet without taking it out. The tablet is protected with the magnetic pad, which can be easily removed if necessary. The backpack itself can charge a mobile device.

These unique solutions, noted by foreign guests of FINCH shows, attracted the interest of buyers from different countries: the clothes gained popularity not only in the Ukraine, but also in Poland, Russia, the United States, Switzerland and the UK.

We have moved far from our original style and intention to create simple clothing. Each new collection is the work on errors/chance to perform even better, both in terms of tailoring, as well as in business decisions, — said Maxim Golub.

FINCH & PRNEWS.io

All the project aims — from design, tailoring, and collection presentation, to conducting sales and delivering orders all over the world are still carried out by them on their own. Katya and Maxim design and develop sketches of each model, select fabrics and materials, organize photoshoots, retouch photos, create lookbooks, update website content — as well as prepare the pitches for the press and be in touch with journalists.

Of course, we are coming up in media. In recent times, we frequently give interviews to various publications, we are invited to radio and TV programs, our clothes are used in fashion shootings, we talk to fashion magazines, and are supported by some local publications. But at the outset, it was necessary to send out dozens of press releases, asking to publish materials about us on thematic portals — and in most cases we got rejections, — said Katerina Byakova.

Considering the lack of opportunity to hire a specially trained press agent and with a vast amount of daily tasks, the FINCH creators use the pressroom of PRNEWS.io service.

The pressroom: when it is better to keep everything in one basket

PRNEWS.io pressroom handles all the task related to arranging communications with the press, storing all data about the contacts with industry journalists — including a personal mailbox — in a single account.

Maxim Golub: “It is very important for us that PRNEWS.io pressroom makes it possible to keep all the data and contacts at our fingertips, storing all the correspondence in one place. This is the possibility to develop the brand rapidly with minimal investment.”

For a business, that is run by only 2 people, this service is nearly irreplaceable: being functionally focused, it enables full control over all communications with the media industry. On top of this, the pressroom management is so simple that it does not require a separate employee to work with it. For a small company, PRNews.io solutions have the ability to organize a meaningful interaction with the media and to save resources for development.

A ready-to-use pre-packaged press kit: Includes detailed information for journalists

Besides organizing communications, the pressroom collects detailed information about the company, thus creating a final press package for any contact with journalists.

In the press room you can introduce and showcase:

  • the project concept, its ideas, and goals;
  • the background of company foundation and its development stages;
  • numbers and reports on the key results and achievements;
  • info/data about founders, interviews with them;
  • press releases;
  • publications in the press;
  • answers to FAQs;
  • dispelling company-related myths;
  • a media kit — photos, videos, audio files;
  • contact info links to project social media pages.

With the company pressroom link finchwear.prnews.io, a journalist gets access to all the information necessary for preparing interview questions or even writing the whole article. Then you may only get in touch with the contact person to make an appointment or to clarify the details.

The opportunity to develop new markets with PRNEWS.io

PRNews.io services offer to arrange both single thematic e-newsletters in local and industry media of any particular country, and a global PR-campaign. And all that can happen without you leaving your own pressroom.

It is important that PRNEWS.io platform has the outreach to the Western media. This enables to get publications in foreign media and present your company in a new market. The articles about us in Western media are of great significance for buyers, not to mention the press and customers in our country, — said Katerina Byakova

Articles in the foreign press not only introduce the company overseas but at the same time strengthen its position in the local market. Thereby, the latter enables the business to develop further and work more actively on taking new markets.

Even a small business, that creates a cool product, needs a sound and well-prepared communication strategy. You will remain a small local company unless you let people learn about you. In order to develop the market and expand, you need to promote yourself.

When you are most concerned about cost savings, the best solution is a single, simple and low-cost tool. The tool that will enable you to fully implement your communication strategy when working with online media at both the local and global market.

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