A positioning studio for early-stage founders.
Wolves Not Sheep is a positioning studio. We work hands-on with early-stage founders to shape & express the value they offer.
Building a successful startup hinges on one thing. Convincing others there’s value in it – that makes customers, investors, and talent take notice.
After working with hundreds of businesses, established and new, big and small, we’ve learned that clearly articulating this value sets the foundational direction of a company and is one of the hardest and most common challenges faced.
To help, our team utilizes a wide set of disciplines to shape and express the value each new venture has to offer. From guidance to hands-on support, doing this can include strategy, business design, as well as design and development of both brand and digital experiences.
Our focus is on pre-seed and seed-stage startups. We also work with growth-stage startups typically as they scale from early-adopters to the larger market and are often sought out by corporate innovation teams.
If you’d like to speak with us about your venture, please email [email protected].
headquarters
Focus
Portfolio
B2C and D2C early- and growth-stage startups and established consumer-facing companies. Recent engagements include a west coast ed-tech startup, a new retail concept, a restaurant group expansion, brand collaborations with an international hotel brand, and multiple innovation projects for a $1B enterprise partner.
Reviews
the project
Brand Consulting & Web Development for Restaurant Group
"I like how they think and what they bring. They aren’t coy about anything and get right to solving problems."
the reviewer
the review
A Clutch analyst personally interviewed this client over the phone. Below is an edited transcript.
Introduce your business and what you do there.
I am the director of brand marketing for RibCrib Corporation, a chain with over 50 barbecue restaurants in the south-central United States. We recently converted into a restaurant group known as the Chandler Hospitality Group, and we are opening up additional concepts.
What challenge were you trying to address with Wolves Not Sheep?
We recently began building an in-house team. I was looking for someone I could talk to objectively who had a similar experience as I did in the field but approached it from a completely outside perspective.
What was the scope of their involvement?
Wolves Not Sheep has proven a capable partner, providing both short-term and long-term web and branding services. Initially, I approached them with some of our brands and we began with websites. Some have launched, while others are currently in development.
Most people give you a bunch of pretty pictures of what the website could be, but Wolves didn’t approach it like that at all. We handle a lot of creative in-house, but in addition to developing our websites, Wolves helped streamline the logic of the sites, and layout growth plans that cover anywhere from 5–10 years. They’ve also been critical to wireframing and developing the websites’ content strategies and funnels (mini-sales funnels and data funnels).
We’re also looking at ways they can help me strategically manage brand growth, brand positioning, new audience connections, and ways to reinvigorate growth installed demographics.
What is the team composition?
I work with both of the managing partners and deal with them directly.
How did you come to work with Wolves Not Sheep?
Now that I am on the client-side, I feel like my perceptions are different than they were when I was on the agency side. I wanted to find someone I could work with that would be able to walk the walk, talk the talk, and have very frank discussions with me. If I pointed to a problem I was having, we needed to be able to get to the bottom of it and brainstorm ways to build a solution.
Wolves Not Sheep actually reached out to us with a pitch book. It was a mini-zine about thought leadership and challenging the norm, which I thought was really interesting. I knew Chris and Jack’s reputation in the market, and I felt it was definitely worth having a conversation with them. We talked, and they were already thinking big after our first meeting. I introduced them to the VP of Strategy at the time, and he liked them, and we were off and running.
What is the status of this engagement?
We began working with them in May 2019, and the work is currently ongoing.
What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?
The stuff they bring to the table is really valuable from a thought process standpoint. We didn’t ask them to come in and tell us how to run things, but we definitely wanted an outside opinion on ways we can improve. In the course of those conversations, they’ve drawn conclusions or connections between sets of data that we hadn’t either really considered as important or overlooked.
In regards to strategy, they’ve been great because they bring a lot to the table. I like how they think and what they bring. They aren’t coy about anything and get right to solving problems. This has been huge for me.
How did Wolves Not Sheep perform from a project management standpoint?
They are always on time and they communicate really well. Every time I ask for something, they deliver. I haven’t had any issues in that regard at all.
What did you find most impressive about them?
We are having really deep conversations. It just feels different, as it isn’t the typical agency song and dance where I am constantly wondering if they are trying to one-up me.
They are really candid. They tell us what we need to hit the ground running, how much it will cost, and what they guarantee.
Are there any areas they could improve?
Overall, I am pretty happy with how everything has gone. They’ve done everything they said they would. They communicate well, and I never have to play guessing games. If I have a question, they have an answer. If they don’t have an answer right then, they’ll get me the answer. It’s been a really positive experience so far.
Do you have any advice for potential customers?
Be open and willing to try new things, because it may not be the thing you expect.
Wolves Not Sheep offers an expert sounding board to aid in strategically developing new brand strategies and products. Their approach and no-fluff focus on critical information allow for more effective and unexpected solutions. Expect an experienced, collaborative partner with this team.