Today we’d like to introduce you to Bridget Connelly.
Bridget, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
Eight years ago, I moved to San Diego from Chicago. I didn’t know anyone and didn’t have a job, but it felt right in my heart. Right when I landed, I felt at home. I had a few jobs in Marketing and Health/Wellness. I ended up taking a job promotion to Dallas in 2014. There, my life changed courses. I lost loved ones, and life took a new very difficult direction. My job also did not end up being what I imagined to be.
Within a few months, I left a job I had for years, an important relationship ended, and I left a place, San Diego, that always felt like home to me. I needed time to heal and recover. I ended up moving across the world to Uganda in East Africa. There I worked in social media and operations for a local startup. It was a time I needed for deep healing and clarity, in a place that has always been very healing to me.
It was much harder then I expected. Time alone brought up wounds I had not known needed healing. It also provided me with peace and allowed me to start moving forward. I ended up back in Chicago in 2016 and began working at lululemon. I became the Chicago storyteller. The time back home in Chicago allowed me to reconnect with myself, the people that mean the most to me and helped build me back up again.
The connections, opportunities, and knowledge this role gave me in storytelling, social media, and health and wellness changed the trajectory of my life. When I felt my two feet solidly back on the ground, I took this new experience with me to take on a risk — in Sydney Australia. I didn’t know anyone there and had never even been to Australia, but it felt completely aligned with where I was meant to be.
It was a time of deep growth, joy, and expansion. I loved it there and would have stayed, but the distance was just too far from my family. When my contract ended, I took a role at Creative agency back in San Diego. I took the time to reconnect and reground myself in a city that has always been my home. My heart knew it was time to finally come back.
In this new role, I learned a significant amount about Marketing, Sales, Strategy, and Creative Branding. At the same time, I kept working away at what business I could begin in the health/wellness space that involved storytelling and giving back. I saw the kombucha market grow massively in the states and abroad, and then watched how the Hard Kombucha market began booming in San Diego.
Over the summer, I met kombucha brewer Claire Ridge, who soon became my business partner. With her vast experience in brewing kombucha, holistic health coaching and teaching yoga combined with my background on fitness, wellness initiatives, and global marketing/storytelling, we launched Luna Bay Hard kombucha. www.lunabaybooch.com
To start, we are launching the company and products in Chicago, an untapped market, but will eventually bring the company back out West and then abroad – we see you Australia. Luna Bay is the combination of our passions — products that make you feel good, do good and bring people together.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
We have had several struggles along the way, especially with both of us working two jobs for the first several months. We have had to wear many hats, with operations, marketing, learning about yeasts, nutrients, margins, and the beverage industry as a whole. We have had big learning curves as we have developed the business and many the late nights working until we pass out.
We have been turned down and told we wouldn’t be successful. But I believe with enough passion, drive and a strong work ethic anything is possible. Resilience in any challenge, be it personally or professionally, ultimately will define who we become. Every challenge I have been given that I have taken time to work through and not let defeat me, has taught me invaluable lessons. They have all made me a better woman.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Luna Bay – tell our readers more, for example, what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
We are a Hard Kombucha company. We use non-GMO, natural fruits, and herbs. Our products are naturally fermented and gluten-free. Luna Bay Booch is a low sugar libation. We value good quality products and support businesses we believe in. We do not take shortcuts when it comes to sourcing our ingredients.
We believe in creating opportunities and pouring into the communities Luna Bay will be produced in, right now in Chicago and eventually expanding back out West. We are a female run brand and seek to elevate, collaborate and empower other female-run businesses. We are also apart of 1% for the planet.
An important mission of ours is to invest in impact initiatives and play our part in taking care of one another, ourselves and our planet. https://www.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
Our plans will be to expand our business in local retail stores in Chicago, then bars and restaurants… From there, we will expand in the Midwest and then in California. We will continue to innovate and create new flavors and recipes. Eventually, we will launch our Hard Kombucha in Australia.
Pricing:
- Single Can $5.50
- 4 Pack $16.00
Contact Info:
- Website: www.lunabaybooch.com
- Email: bridget@lunabaybooch.com
- Instagram: lunabaybooch
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