A PAIR of Yorkshire ‘twinpreneurs’ have revealed how they felt the need to hide their identity in order to break into the creative sector.
Chloe and Abigail Baldwin are the brains behind Buttercrumble, a branding, illustration and graphic design business launched following their graduation from Leeds University in 2017.
Now they’ve published a book, The Brand Power Manifesto, to highlight how branding can empower other female entrepreneurs. And they’ve revealed that when they first shared their work as young girls, they hid behind social media handles for fear of being “outed as frauds” due to their age and background.
“We grew up in Scarborough, and in our young working-class minds, we didn’t belong,” said Abigail.
“Imposter syndrome flowed through our veins, but this wasn’t based on nothing. Barriers and prejudice are engrained within Britain’s creative industries.
“The reality is that as young girls from Northern England who didn’t go to posh art school or come from a place of privilege, the sector was – and still isn’t – as accessible.”
Polling by the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre previously revealed that 16 per cent of creative jobs – less than one in six – were filled by people from working-class backgrounds.
Additionally, Chloe said "young women face an additional hurdle. Upon graduating, she said the pair interviewed at many male-dominated design agencies “awash with machismo and lad culture.
“Drinking and video games were their lifeblood, and all the deals were struck in pubs, so if you were teetotal like us, then you felt excluded,” she added.
“Even now we get asked which art college we study at, despite having operated a profitable business that’s grown year-on-year for seven years.”
That business has evolved from a “side-hustle” into an award-winning agency with bases in both London and Leeds.
Having initially secured commissions with notable brands and US-based YouTube channels, the pair eventually dropped their social media handles and under Buttercrumble, the pair have worked with big names including John Lewis and Mamas & Papas.
“When we launched Buttercrumble, we found that branding empowered us,” said Abigail. “It acted as a shield and gave us the confidence those two teenagers in Yorkshire who started off via YouTube understandably lacked.”
As such, their book aims to provide the recipe for other female entrepreneurs to organically build a business or brand from scratch – and to help them stand out from the crowd.
“We want to help as many people shatter the structure that has for too long held so much creative talent in the UK back, while inspiring women who don’t realise how empowering a brand can be,” added Chloe, who also said it was up to the industry to do more.
“It needs to look beyond gender, class, and location and end the regional parochialism where people only want to work with locals.
“Britain is awash with unearthed creative gems. We want our book and story to encourage these diamonds in the rough to find their voice.”
