Bird Girl Bottle Shop: S.W.O.T Analysis

Bird Girl Bottle Shop is a unique beer garden within the heart of the vintage Hilton Village in Newport News, VA. The neighborhood was established in 1918 and brings a cozy, historical backdrop. They are known for their incredible and flavorful pizzas, paired with beers from local breweries within Hampton Roads.

Owned by a small family, the owners' mission aims to provide a casual welcoming atmosphere while delivering carefully curated beer, wine, and a rotating selection of pizzas - with gluten-free cauliflower crusts as an option. Their cozy location offers limited indoor seating and plenty of outdoor seating for friends and family of any age! Dogs are also welcome to join in on the fun. After only just opening in 2023, they have had a successful start and have gained a decent social media following due to their charismatic and creative posts on their Instagram and Facebook.

This S.W.O.T analysis aims to analyze the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of a local organization for my Events Management & Leadership course.

Photo by Bird Girl Bottle Shop.

Strengths - Internal

• Before it ever opened its doors, Bird Girl Bottle Shop did an excellent job at marketing itself in the local area. In October of 2023, they were picked up by the Virginia Pilot before they even opened their doors.

• Their engagement with the local community has been successful in how they carried out the launch of their business. As renovations continued, they posted updates on repairs and engaged with locals of the neighborhood in Facebook groups. They created excitement as their grand opening approached.

• As a new business, they have established high ratings already through testimonies in their social media comments and through review sites such as Yelp.

Weaknesses – Internal

• Although they are renowned for their unique flavors and have many options to add to their pizzas, providing more pizza options on their menu would provide more variety. Additionally, rotating different pizzas more often could also help with this.

• Bird Girl Bottle Shop could provide clearer instructions on how to apply to work for them through their website and social media so that they could attract more employees if needed. If they do not need employees because they are family-owned, offering insight that they are not currently offering employment could help provide a clear message.

• Funding could be very limited since it is a new business and locally owned.

Opportunities – External

• There are so many opportunities for Bird Girl Bottle Shop to provide diverse activities for the community such as D&D night or adults-only tabletop game night. These community events could spread word of mouth and would increase sales.

• Collaborating events with local businesses would be beneficial for both businesses and could encourage supporting more local businesses. Some examples could include hosting a book club with local bookshops such as SeeWhich Books in Hampton, VA, or Paperback Ink.

• Bird Girl Bottle Shop also has the opportunity to market itself as a venue for smaller wedding receptions or private events. The beautiful outdoor patio under fairy lights and vast yard space makes this location perfect for smaller events.

Threats – External

• Threats that affect their business are negative reviews. With it being a new business, a negative review can easily make or break a customer's decision to try out their establishment especially if it is regarding food quality or cleanliness.

• Bad weather could also negatively affect the business because it is largely marketed as an outdoor restaurant because of its limited indoor seating.

• Unsafe neighborhood conditions is also a threat to the venue. While this area is generally safe, there is occasionally shootings in nearby locations that could deter families from visiting.

Event Recommendation

An event that I would recommend based on this research of Bird Girl Bottle Shop, would be a community event that hosts a “D&D and Beer” night. This could be a once-a-month event that takes place on a Saturday night. The event would invite adults (21+) and older to gather their friends for a night to kick back and enjoy local brews, and pizza, and start or continue their D&D campaigns with the community. The food and drinks could be a "fantasy" theme for the event each month and merchandise could be created that fits the theme and includes the Bird Girl Bottle Shop brand. Not only does this increase sales, but it also spreads marketing when people wear the merchandise in the local area. There could even be a contest for local artists to submit their design ideas which supports the community further.

This event also benefits the community by creating a space for adults to make new friends and share their love of Dungeons & Dragons. The event would have to consider if they have enough space to support all participants so guests would need to register in advance on their website. This would give a headcount before the start of each event so that the owners could announce on their social media if they have reached capacity for the event. Other considerations they would need to keep in mind are noise restrictions, in case the event causes issues to local neighbors, and weather, as the event would take place on the outdoor patio.

By providing this event, Bird Girl Bottle Shop would benefit from the spread of word of mouth, increased profits, and the optics of supporting the local community.

References

“Bird Girl Bottle Shop.” Bird Girl Bottle Shop, birdgirlbottleshop.com/about-us.

Bird Girl Bottle Shop. Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/birdgirlbottleshop.

Bird Girl Bottle Shop. Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/birdgirlbottleshop.

“Bird Girl Bottle Shop - Newport News, VA.” Yelp, www.yelp.com/biz/bird-girl-bottle-shop-newport-news.

Acker, Susan Smigielski. “Bird Girl Bottle Shop to Sell Craft Beer, Wine and Pizza in Newport News’ Hilton Village.” The Virginian-Pilot, 12 Oct. 2023, www.pilotonline.com/2023/10/12/bird-girl-bottle-shop-to-sell-craft-beer-wine-and-pizza-in-newport-news-hilton-village/.

My Digital Mentors

For choosing my digital leaders or influencers in my field of interest, I decided to go with a writer and journalist since I am focused on the communication field.

The first digital mentor I would like to introduce is Iana Murray. I chose her as one of my digital leaders because I consider her to have an inspiring career at a young age and have followed her work for quite some time. She is known to be focused on entertainment journalism (specifically film, TV, and music) and has had her work published in W Mag, Vulture, The Cut, and GQ to name a few. Additionally, I enjoy reading her work and interviews because of her stylistic writing and relatable tone.

One of the social platforms I analyzed was Twitter/X (@ianamurray) as this is how I first stumbled upon her many years ago. Through looking at her profile, I can see that she is quite active because she tweets several times a day; however, it never seems to go overboard. She posts pictures once a week - either of herself attending festivals or of events and memes, and also posts witty one-liners. She converges both her professional life and her personal life on it because while she does talk about work-related information, she also writes sarcastic jokes and opinions as well. Regardless of how personable she appears; I never seem to find anything controversial. Because she is quite young, she has the personality of someone in their 20's that you would expect but she never seems to cross the line of unprofessionalism.

Another social media profile I reviewed was her LinkedIn. This showed me basic information about her experiences, along with a portfolio. She has never posted on LinkedIn so this shows that she doesn't quite use this actively for networking purposes. However, this did give me insight into her professional career and helped me discover that she wrote for Netflix.

She displays leadership through posting about her work and experiences while also being a humble, relatable figure with an accomplished career. This is why I would consider her a digital leader because in a world of influencers and nepotism, it is nice to find someone in the journalism field that has made a name for herself at a young age.

The next digital leader I want to focus on is Taylor Lorenz, a journalist and writer of the new book, "Extremely Online: The Untold Story of Fame, Power and Influence on the Internet." I recently read this book and it was very thought provoking so I decided to look more into the author. As someone who hopes to do research in digital communications when I one day pursue graduate school, her career and work has given me a lot of insight into the field of study.

Some of her credentials include her work as a social media editor for the Daily Mail and a technology reporter for: Business Insider, The New York Times and the Daily Beast. She is now currently a columnist for The Washington Post, as well as a published author for the book aforementioned.

Upon my first impression of her Twitter/X profile (@TaylorLorenz), I saw that she had a very high following count, showing that she is active and involved online and many of her recent posts were regarding her newly published book. She frequently retweets other online reporters and is also not afraid to share controversial opinions related to politics and trending internet topics. Some of the leadership I see displayed here is that she shares important news coverage for current topics and also highlights serious issues regarding the COVID and online misinformation.

From my own personal perspective, I do not see anything extremely concerning but this could be due to bias, since I agree with many of her opinions post online. From an objective point of view, I can see how some may find many of her opinions disagreeable, but she does state them in a professional manner. Furthermore, her replies are turned off which is probably a good idea to prevent the nature of twitter trolling that can come with the territory, especially in the Twitter world.

Another social profile I reviewed was her Instagram. Much like her Twitter/X, all of her recent posts are articles highlighting her new book. She also frequently posts reels with clips from a podcast. I noticed that her comments are open on Instagram and while she does receive a lot of support, there also seems to be many negative comments attacking her. However, she does not seem to acknowledge or engage in these comments which shows maturity. There will always be hate and negative comments on opinions so this is quite hard to avoid for anyone with a public social profile, which is why I don't see any issues regarding how she presents herself online. Employers or other organizations may not love when an online figure has negativity surrounding them, but because she does not engage in it, I do not see the blame shifting to herself as much.

Her profiles did not change my opinion too much on her but I did not realize how public she was on social media and how involved she was in current politics and events. Both digital figures reinforced my want to have a more private social media presence but they also taught me how to engage if I decide to go public again as a professional in the future. In communications, sometimes having an online presence is important but my main takeaway is to always conduct myself appropriately and to not feed into negativity online.

Re-curating My Portfolio

A portfolio has been a vital part of my studies as a communication student and has been proven to be quite useful in marketing myself for internships and future jobs. As each semester passes, I realize the importance of keeping it current and curated, so I have made some changes as I begin my senior year at Old Dominion University.

I re-created this site from my old WIX site because I felt that it needed a different template that catered to my professional and academic needs. My original site used all original content without a template and I felt that it was difficult to add content and edit. I realized that a simplistic design with fonts and a color scheme that fit my personality would suit me better in the long term!

Some of these changes included updating my home page to keep it more concise and to use it as a home base. Previously, I had each section added to the home page along with the tabs for individualized options, but realized this was repetitive. I also updated my resume, skills, about me, and creative portfolio sections as I have gained more experience over the summer.

The following questions are to answer for COMM 495 (Digital Communication) regarding creating and curating my e-portfolio:

1. What was the easiest part of setting up your Wix account?

I love that there are templates that provide us with so many options and has so many elements built into the platform.

2. What was the most challenging part of setting up your Wix account?

While it is amazing that there are so many options, it can be quite overwhelming figuring out how to design and curate for both professional and academic needs while also keeping a personal touch.

3. How would you describe what CMC is?

CMC, or computer mediated communication, is what I would describe as the various ways that humans communicate online and the social behaviors associated with technology.

4. How would you describe the role of CMC in your personal and professional life?

CMC is a very important role in my personal and professional life because it is so vital for my everyday communication. In my personal life, I use social media daily to keep up with current events and to check in with friends and family and also use this professionally because I communicate with various departments for work online as I work in a hybrid environment.

a. What are some of the pieces of technology and/or apps you use most often for each area?

In my personal life, I use Discord, Instagram, Facebook, and Gmail often and in my professional life I use Outlook, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and SharePoint very often as well as Canvas academically. This technology includes my laptop, desktop computer, and cell phone.

5. What questions do you have at this stage of the ePortfolio project?

I do not have any questions as of right now for the ePortfolio project but am open to any feedback on my resume or porfolio.