If you haven’t heard already, we’ve just introduced our brand refresh. Sow True Seed now has a new logo, new website, new seed packets, and all around a fresh new look. Our mission, values, and employee-owners are all staying exactly the same - now we just look as good as we grow! Check out the details of the brand refresh on our blog. 

Our staff has worked extremely hard all year on making this brand refresh come to life. Between crafting new graphics or updating signage in our garden shop with new fonts and colors, we know that strong visuals matter. Which is why we wanted to really bring our brand refresh to life with a new collection of photographs. And this past July, we made that happen. 

We have an amazing community of business and organizational partners that we get to collaborate with every day. When we were scouting locations for our two photoshoots - we got to partner with these groups in a new way! Two of our longtime partners, Green Mountain Plant Co. and Utopian Seed Project, graciously hosted our team in their gorgeous gardens. We had so much fun frolicking around Alex and Danny’s (of Green Mountain Plant Co.) pristine garden beds, and getting lost in the eight foot tall corn at Utopian Seed Project’s garden plot located at The Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy property - and the results speak for themselves! 

Nailing Down the Vision 

It’s no secret that visual content tells a story. In re-introducing Sow True Seed to the world, we wanted to craft a story that spoke to our deepest desires for the brand. The visuals should express our goals with switching things up; to better represent our stewardship of seeds and their stories, to center the gardener and their learning, and to be an accessible partner in shared growth and discovery. 

Photoshoot #1: Green Mountain Plant Co. 

From the get-go we had two different shoots planned because we wanted to get two different types of visuals nailed down. For the first one, we hoped to photograph in an actual home garden. Most of our customers are growing in their backyards, producing food for themselves and their communities. In brainstorming locations, we needed something large, well-maintained, and homestead-adjacent. Our friends up at Green Mountain Plant Co. immediately came to mind. You may be familiar with Green Mountain Plant Co., a plant nursery in Green Mountain, North Carolina, because they grow our seedlings for us! If you’ve ever purchased seedlings from our Downtown Asheville storefront you’ve planted a Green Mountain plant in your garden. Alex and Danny, the owners of Green Mountain Plant Co., are longtime friends of Sow True Seed and avid gardeners themselves, getting their start on farms around the country. Now, they operate out of two greenhouses at their home in Green Mountain with a beautiful garden in the front that produces quite a bit of their food. They graciously agreed to host us in weeding their garden and harvesting their cucumbers (there weren’t many weeds and the cucumbers were delicious). Our photographer, Jake Banta of Lux Focus Photography, joined us out in Green Mountain for a hot day of garden photos. 

Green Mountain Plant Co. by Sow True Seed

This was not only a fun day but we got to place our brand in the setting it shines brightest in: the home garden. Alex and Danny’s garden - built by years of experience and many hours of labor - is what we can all aspire to. But whether you’re growing in a sprawling network of raised beds or a couple containers on your balcony - Sow True Seed is here to support you every step of the way. 

Photoshoot #2: Utopian Seed Project

For our second shoot we were more focused on getting branded lifestyle shots in a more farm–centric setting. Utopian Seed Project has a plot at the Southern Appalachian Highland Conservancy’s (SAHC) Community Farm in Alexander, NC where they trial crops and do experimental grow outs of different varieties with the ultimate goal of identifying a wide array of crops suitable for our region and climate. Their plot at SAHC is picturesque - rolling hills set against a bright blue sky, surrounded by distant forests and cattle. 

We enjoyed strolling through the rows of unique crops and even had the pleasure of speaking to another farmer, Cricket of Wallflower Farm, who had lost their property in Hurricane Helene and has been growing at the SAHC property temporarily. Wallflower Farm produces primarily dye and fiber crops as well as edible flowers. On this day, Cricket was harvesting flax for fiber. 

Utopian Seed Project by Sow True Seed

What We Captured (And Why)

We walked away from these shoots with a great array of product photos, beautiful shots of our seeds in action midsummer, and lifestyle shots of our staff representing what Sow True Seed is all about out there in the field. It really solidified how ready we have been for this cohesive and professional brand refresh. 

As a small business, we’re often operating from a grassroots perspective. We don’t have the same systems or resources that a large corporation has - that’s part of what makes us great, and it’s also part of our story and our process. Experiences like this brand refresh, and these professional photoshoots, for example, is us stepping forward into learning how to make this company grow. In size, perhaps, but also in reach, in people and jobs, in cohesive storytelling, and in values. With better systems, with better photos of our products, and better, more centralized growing information - we can actually serve you better! 

Always, in Collaboration

These photoshoots were an essential part of making this brand refresh come to life and we got to work with the best partners in order to make it happen. Big thank you to Green Mountain Plant Co. for hosting us at their home. You can find them on Instagram @GreenMountainPlantCo, at the Yancey County Farmers Market, or at our Downtown Asheville Storefront every time we have plant starts. And another big thank you to Utopian Seed Project, an essential part of our local food system and food education here in Asheville. Find them on Instagram @UtopianSeedProject and follow along! They host a ton of great, educational, and delicious events every year that you won’t want to miss. 

Some of Our Favorite Shots

Thanks for following along! This brand refresh has been a learning curve for us, as well as for our customers and community who are getting used to the new look. We appreciate your collaboration and feedback! Sign up for our newsletter to stay up to date on all things Sow True Seed. We’ll see you in the garden!

	Article Written by: Hannah Gibbons
	About the Author: Hannah Gibbons, an employee at Sow True Seed since 2020, has nearly a decade of experience in the agricultural industry. Their passion for environmental education and regenerative agriculture has been the cornerstone of their work, aimed at making gardening accessible to all.