Welcome to the Hive!
My heartfelt welcome to you all for stopping by our new home!
My excitement about launching this new website for The Barreled Bee matches the thrill I felt at my first Fancy Food Show, with a smile just as big as the one in the picture. Our new website has been a long time coming, and long overdue. I always envisioned a website that would be a place I could truly engage with my followers, fans and customers. Before I jump into what's new and what to expect in the coming months, I want to take a minute to say thank you to everyone who has supported me emotionally, psychologically, and financially.
THANK YOU!
I could not have sustained the energy, the hope and grit to keep on grinding away while working full-time without your support. You helped me to be present when I saw friends, to get ready for events, to show a smiling face, when deep down I was crumbling away inside, overwhelmed with learning the ins and outs of running a business. Thank you for all the comments on my Instagram posts, when the most I could muster was a picture and a few words. Thank you for the offers of help, for showing up at events and watching my booth so I could take a break. Thank you for boosting my events and fundraising efforts well beyond what I had the bandwidth for, and sharing The Barreled Bee with your family and friends. Most of all, thank you for loving my products and appreciating the time and energy it takes to make these sweet dreams come true.
I could go on but I'll get teary eyed and this whole intro blog post will fall apart, so let's move on to telling you what has been accomplished and what the future holds. To learn more about how The Barreled Bee started check out the history section under our About The Barreled Bee page.
First great news: The Barreled Bee has a new production space! This is so important because the introduction of the Haute Honey Spicy Ketchup and the Honey Buzz BBQ Sauce, increased the need for more space to operate, for storing raw ingredients, finished product, and supplies for farmer's markets. Moving production from one place to another, as I've done over the years, became unworkable. That is why I was thankful to land at my current space because it includes a commercial kitchen, where I make my sauces. Now that I had a physical home, I turned to creating a virtual one.
If you've followed The Barreled Bee, you know that our website has never been ideal. My first website was a disaster. Hard to manage and navigate, keeping it updated became more of a chore, that I put off at every opportunity. Eventually, I moved over to Square, for what I had originally planned to be a short gap but became two years. Square was not ideal, it was more for selling and less for engaging, and I missed the features like blog posts, and embedded videos. I knew it was time to make a new website, that could convey my outgoing personality, let my inner queen bee shine, bee buzzworthy...You get the idea.
Welcome to The Barreled Bee's new website.
I have been hard at work getting the bones of this site up and running in time for the holiday season. The content of the site is just as I want it. But visually, it's not as pretty as I would like. In the coming months I'll be bringing on experts to polish the rough edges, so watch as we change our look.
What to expect with this new website?
- Easy online shopping
- Reviews from customers
- New product offerings
- Videos and articles celebrating The Barreled Bee
- New blog home
Thank you for taking this journey with me and I look forward to sharing even more adventures in 2024!