My husband is my best friend in the whole wide world.
What I love about our relationship is that when he can, he tries really hard to impress me. But he's also missed the “positive impression" mark several times since we've been hitched. Especially that one time he booked us a couples getaway at a "hotel" in Houston. Our stay ended with us fighting roaches off of us like we were part of the extended version of the movie 300, that included a not-so-ripped black couple.
The roaches looked exactly like this army.
It was the worst hotel that I've ever visited. Like ever. In life. But it was also the best time I've ever had with him, and it taught me that marriage is about making lasting memories. It also taught me to never allow your partner to book a hotel room without checking the Yelp! reviews first.
It all happened last summer when my husband and I started making plans to pick up our son from his granny's house outside of Houston. My son had spent six weeks of his summer vacation with his grandmother, and he was having the time of his life. To allow him time to eat breakfast, and say goodbye to his cousins, we made plans to pick him up on a Saturday afternoon.
The problem was that traffic on I-10 is congested at that hour, and my husband is a very impatient man. So he came up with an idea: We would drive to Houston when there was no traffic, and stay in a hotel about 15 minutes from his mom's house. In his mind, that would be the perfect opportunity for us to enjoy each other away from home before we picked up our son.
This sounded like a great idea to me, so I started probing him for details, but he wasn't having it. All he would tell me was that he found a great deal on a hotel room online, and that we were going to have a good time, and I couldn't ask him anymore questions. He was the boss of those plans, and he had everything covered.
So I went with his plan, and I even promised him that I wouldn't read the Yelp! reviews before we arrived at our destination.
Wrong. Move.
The minute we got to the hotel room, and before we could put our bags down, we started boxing roaches.
After our sparring matches, my husband, who was utterly embarrassed, called the front desk to ask for a different room. 20 minutes later, instead of coming back with a new room key, he came back with a can of roach spray. The front office had given him a really crappy excuse for why they wanted to keep our money, and not let us change rooms.
But my husband was intent on making the night memorable. He kept saying, "Baby, I promised you a relaxing time, and damn it we're going to have one!" I felt so awful for him, that I let him lead the way again.
Wrong move.
Because we don't have a roach problem at our own home, he didn't know that once he sprayed the room with bug spray, that it would make the roaches come out more. For the next several hours, we boxed with several dozen roaches like we were in a hood fight.
My boo and I went so hard fighting roaches that we slept a total of four hours that night. When we weren't fighting roaches, we were yelling expletives at them.
Even worse was the fact that my husband thought he saw some people selling drugs several doors down from our room. When he couldn't take it anymore, we hopped in our car, and drove as fast as we could away from our "trap house hotel." As soon as we got on the road, he started apologizing to me over and over.
But despite everything that happened, I had a blast and I let him know it as soon as he started apologizing. Not only did I lose a little weight boxing our uninvited guests, but he gave me one memory that I would never forget. Sure we could have stayed in a luxury hotel, but it didn't happen that way. He booked us a hotel that was really a trap house, and we ended up creating a memory we never will forget.
I also realize that I'm a really lucky woman to have a man who I consider my best friend. I know women who are married who would kill to have their husbands put in a little more work and do things that are thoughtful. I didn't see anything he did as failure. If anything, it showed him that he truly had a ride-or-die chick, because not many women would have stayed in the hotel room to throw shoes and shade at roaches, no matter how much she loved him.
But let's be clear - I would never stay at that hotel ever again, and I'll also never allow him to book another hotel room without checking Yelp! first.
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While an evolution is a natural progression that happens as businesses grow, a rebrand is a total change. Lola tells xoNecole, "A total rebrand is necessary when a business’s current reputation/what it’s known for is at odds with the business’s vision or direction.
"For example, if you’ve fundamentally changed what your product is and does, it’s likely that your brand is out of alignment with the business. Or, if you find your company is developing a reputation that doesn’t serve it, it might be time to pump the brakes and figure out what needs to change.
She continues, "Sometimes you’ll see companies (especially startups) announce a name change that comes with updated messaging, visuals, etc. That usually means their vision has changed or expanded, and their previous branding was too narrow/couldn’t encompass everything they planned to do."
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The Brand Doula was born in 2019, and its focus is on putting "the experiences, goals, and needs of women of color founders first," as well as brands with "culture-shifting missions."
According to Lola, culture-shifting is "the act of influencing dominant behavior, beliefs, or experiences in a community or group (ideally, for the better)."
"At The Brand Doula, we work with companies and leaders that set out to challenge the status quo in their industries and communities. They’re here to make an impact that sends ripples across the market," she says.
"We help the problem solvers of the world — the ones who aren't satisfied with 'this is how it's always been' and instead ask 'how could this be better?' Our clients build for impact, reimagining tools, systems, and ways of living to move cultures forward."
The Brand Doula has worked with many brands, including Too Collective, to assist with their collaboration with Selena Gomez's Rare Beauty and Balanced Black Girl for a "refresh," aka rebrand. For businesses looking to rebrand, Lola shares four essential steps.
1. Do an audit of your current brand experience — what’s still relevant and what needs to change? Reflect on why you’re doing the rebrand in the first place and what success would look like after relaunching.
2. Tackle the overall strategy first — before you start redesigning logos and websites, align on a new vision for your brand. How do you want your company to be positioned moving forward? Has your audience changed at all? Will your company have a fresh personality and voice?
3. Bring your audience along the journey — there’s no need to move in secret. Inviting your current audience into the journey can actually help them feel more connected to and invested in your story, enough to stick around as changes are being made.
4. Keep business moving — one of my biggest pet peeves is when companies take down their websites as soon as they have the idea to rebrand, then have a Coming Soon page up for months! You lose a lot of momentum and interest by doing that. If you’re still in business and generating income, continue to operate while you work on your rebrand behind the scenes. You don’t want to cut existing customers off out of the blue, and you also don’t want so much downtime that folks forget your business exists or start looking for other solutions.
While determining whether the rebrand was successful may take a few months, Lola says a clear sign that it is unsuccessful is negative feedback from your target audience. "Customers are typically more vocal about what they don’t like more than what they do like," she says.
But some good signs to look out for are improvements in engagement with your marketing, positive reviews, press and increase in retention, and overall feeling aligned with the new branding.
For more information about Lola and The Brand Doula, visit her website, thebranddoula.com.
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