Case Study: Carolina Farmstead
How a name with roots—and product names with heart—turned a rural furniture maker into a booming national brand.

The Challenge:
When the founder of Farmstead Furniture came to us, he had built something special: a family-run business handcrafting solid wood tables and chairs on a picturesque North Carolina farm. Customers loved the craftsmanship. The values were strong. But the brand? It wasn’t working as hard as it could. The business was getting lost in a sea of generic-sounding competitors. “Farmstead Furniture” wasn’t wrong—but it wasn’t memorable, evocative, or ownable. And the product names? Purely descriptive. Square Leg Table. Round Top Table. Ladder Back Chair. Nothing that stirred emotion, told a story, or set them apart.

The Insight:
Customers weren’t just buying furniture—they were buying a feeling. A lifestyle. A connection to place, to legacy, to something that felt real and rooted. The brand needed to reflect that emotional value. It wasn’t just about tables and chairs. It was about the meaning those pieces carried into homes. And for that to shine through, the business needed a name—and a naming system—that could do the storytelling for them.

The Rename:
We rebranded Farmstead Furniture as Carolina Farmstead—a name that grounds the business in its idyllic North Carolina setting and conjures charm, quality, and authenticity. The addition of “Carolina” immediately evokes place and pride, differentiating the brand and helping it stand out both regionally and nationally. It’s warm, welcoming, and 100% ownable.

Then, we overhauled the entire product catalog—transforming bland, forgettable table names into story-rich invitations like:

  • Sit Down Dinner Table

  • Fancy Fixings Table

  • Grandma’s Kitchen Table

  • Appalachian Artisan Table

  • Coastal Lighthouse Table

And for chairs:

  • The Baker’s Chair

  • The Crooner’s Chair

  • The Quilt Maker’s Chair

  • The Farmer’s Chair

  • The Beekeeper’s Chair

Every name is designed to spark a story, trigger nostalgia, and create emotional lift. We turned ordinary furniture into instant heirlooms, without changing a single cut of wood.

We didn’t stop there. We renamed their custom wood stain line, too. Instead of using the same generic Minwax colors available at big-box stores, Carolina Farmstead created their own exclusive collection—dubbed (by us) Farmstead Hues—and we named every single one like:

  • Junebug

  • Honeybee

  • Potter’s Bisque

  • Barnwood Brown

  • Pecan Pie

  • Kettle

The Result:
The rebrand didn’t just look good—it worked. Carolina Farmstead saw a surge in engagement, brand recognition, and most importantly—sales. Founder Wayne Noble credits the names directly:
“The names Kelly developed for our products are an invaluable part of our brand. They are the key difference between us and our competitors.”

Since the brand refresh, the company has:

  • Grown its Facebook page to over 38,000 followers

  • Shipped handcrafted products nationwide

  • Been featured on HGTV’s Love It or List It, PBS’s A Chef’s Life, and Our State Magazine

  • Won Best of Houzz multiple years in a row

  • Maintained an A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau

  • Built a devoted customer base who champion the brand

The updated identity gave the business confidence to expand into digital marketing, secure new wholesale accounts, and raise product pricing to match the elevated perception. Carolina Farmstead became more than a furniture company. It became a brand experience.

The Takeaway:
Great naming isn’t just creative—it’s commercial. Carolina Farmstead proves that when every piece of your brand—from the name on the barn to the name on the chair—tells a consistent, compelling story, customers don’t just buy. They connect. They remember. They come back.

Case Study: Southern Wilds
How one bold, refined name unlocked brand power across bourbon, barbecue, and beyond.

The Challenge:
When this founder came to us, he had big ambitions—a lifestyle brand rooted in grit, independence, and Southern heritage. His vision included a premium bourbon label, small-batch BBQ sauce, and eventually books, apparel, and home goods. But his original name ideas were too narrow, clunky, or folksy to scale. They sounded more like a roadside stand than a legacy brand. And that was a problem, because he didn’t want to stay small.

The Insight:
To compete with national names in bourbon and BBQ—and support a growing empire of products—he needed a name that felt expansive, premium, and emotionally resonant. One that could live on a bourbon bottle and a book spine. One that could stretch, grow, and stand tall on the shelves beside the big dogs.

The Rename:
We created Southern Wilds—a name that evokes wide-open spaces, bold tradition, and the unfiltered spirit of the South. It’s clean, memorable, and inherently versatile. Whether it’s on a label, a leather tag, or the spine of a bestselling cookbook, the name signals quality and storytelling without being locked into a single product category.

The Result:
The client is set to launch his first two products—Southern Wilds Bourbon and Southern Wilds BBQ Sauce—to rave reviews and strong retail interest. The name gives him instant credibility and flexibility across markets. It positions his brand as both rugged and refined, an emotional anchor with room to grow.

The Takeaway:
Great names don’t limit you—they lead you.
Southern Wilds proves that the right name can carve out space for growth while capturing the essence of who you are. Renaming isn’t just about sounding good—it’s about strategic alignment. It’s about owning your market now while staying ready for what comes next.

Case Study: McKinley Transitions Therapy
How a simple name shift helped Judy attract the right clients—and more of them.

The Challenge:
Judy McKinley is a licensed therapist who had been operating under the name McKinley Therapy for several years. While the name reflected her professionalism and reputation, it didn’t tell prospective clients much about what she actually specialized in. As the market grew more saturated with generalist-sounding therapy practices, Judy found herself fielding inquiries that weren’t always aligned with her strengths or interests.

The Insight:
In a sea of sameness, specificity stands out. During our brand consultation, we identified a key differentiator: Judy’s unique focus on helping clients navigate major life changes—divorce, grief, retirement, identity shifts, and other pivotal transitions.

The Rename:
We renamed her practice McKinley Transitions Therapy—a small but strategic adjustment that did more than clarify her services. It positioned Judy as a specialist in a critical niche. The name built immediate trust, made her Google listing more relevant, and gave prospective clients confidence that she could help them through life’s hardest chapters.

The Result:
Within weeks of updating her business name and web presence, Judy saw an increase in inquiries from her ideal clients—those actively seeking therapy for transition-related struggles. She reported that new clients often said the word “transitions” was what drew them in and made her practice feel like the right fit.

The Takeaway:
Sometimes, a subtle shift is all it takes. The right word in the right place can move a business from vague to valuable—from overlooked to in demand. With McKinley Transitions Therapy, Judy didn’t just rename her practice—she redefined how it speaks to the people who need it most.

Case Study: Joggle
How one energetic, elastic name helped launch a digital startup—and the careers behind it.

The Challenge:
In 2010, a pair of young founders set out to build something bold: a platform to simplify life for members of amateur leagues, social clubs, and extracurricular organizations. It would blend messaging, scheduling, and social features into one sleek user experience. But their early name ideas felt generic or over-engineered—more like software tools than a movement. What they needed was a name that matched their energy, flexibility, and future-forward thinking.

The Insight:
The product was about movement—between platforms, people, and plans. It juggled tasks, toggled settings, and helped users stay in flow. The right name needed to feel playful yet functional. It had to work on a college campus and in a boardroom pitch. And most importantly, it had to be memorable, ownable, and scalable.

The Rename:
We created Joggle—a smart, unexpected blend of juggle and toggle. The name captured the product’s dynamic nature in a single, two-syllable word. Short, kinetic, and easy to brand, Joggle positioned the company as agile, modern, and built for growth. It didn’t describe the platform—it embodied it.

The Result:
Joggle helped the founders build early traction, pitch investors with confidence, and gain recognition in the competitive startup space. Though the founders eventually moved on to other ventures, the brand’s impact—and the clarity of its name—played a key role in their success and momentum.

The Takeaway:
When you're building something new, your name sets the tone. Joggle shows how the right word—rooted in energy, clarity, and strategy—can move more than just markets. It can move people, too.

Case Study: Rosemary Run
How one carefully chosen name turned a fictional town into a bestselling suspense brand.

The Challenge:
At Blum Creative, we believe the right name tells a story before a single word is read. So when our founder—novelist Kelly Utt—set out to write her first domestic suspense series, she treated the naming process just as seriously as the plot itself.

She needed a name for the fictional town where the series would take place—something that felt both inviting and unsettling. A name that could anchor a series inspired by Desperate Housewives and Big Little Lies—filled with secrets, betrayal, and small-town drama. And she needed a structure for the individual book titles that could grow with the brand and become instantly recognizable to readers.

The Insight:
For fiction, the town name is the brand. It sets the tone, evokes a mood, and becomes shorthand for what readers can expect. The name needed to strike a delicate balance—pretty, but with an edge. Familiar, but distinct. And the book titles needed to align with that tone while sparking curiosity and emotional resonance.

The Rename:
She named the town—and the series—Rosemary Run. “Rosemary” nods to domestic warmth, vintage charm, and suburban nostalgia. But paired with “Run,” the name becomes layered. It suggests movement, secrets, maybe even danger. A place to run to. Or from.

Each book in the series follows a consistent, rhythmic structure:

  • Her Deepest Fear

  • Her Hidden Past

  • Her Boldest Lie

  • Her Darkest Hour

  • Her Buried Secret

  • Her Worst Mistake

  • Her Broken Trust

  • Her Twisted Fate

The structure—“Her + Adjective + Noun”—offers instant genre clarity and bingeable appeal, which helped the series catch on quickly.

The Result:
Rosemary Run launched in 2019 and became a hit, gaining a loyal readership and putting our founder on the map as a novelist. The name gave the series a strong, cohesive brand identity that readers could trust and return to. Years later, it remains her bestselling series—with eight novels and more to come.

The Takeaway:
Naming isn’t just for products—it’s for worlds. Rosemary Run shows how a well-crafted name can give fiction the same strategic edge as a business brand. It built a foundation, created consistency, and helped launch a successful writing career, one suspenseful title at a time.