Hey Guys,
It’s our first full week back at work since The Compact Summer Camp, and between you and me, I still feel like I need a nap. So we’re getting the long weekend started a little early with Happy Hour this morning. We’re off tomorrow and Monday and will be back with your regularly scheduled programming on Tuesday.
In the meantime, I wanted to take this Happy Hour to share with you some of our favorite (and most useful) products that made it into the hands of The Compact campers. Launching The Compact was, in no small way, a leap of blind faith for everyone involved. And as I’m sure you can guess, when you launch a new project, especially one that is unapologetically female focused, it doesn’t matter how many years you’ve been in business or how big your audience is; most brands aren’t willing to back a first time anything.
So it shouldn’t come as a shock that the companies who were most excited to support our inaugural event were largely woman-owned businesses who saw the value in what we were trying to create. Our swag bags felt more like care packages, and they allowed us to host the world’s most intensely competitive game of bingo I’ve ever participated in. So if you’re looking to treat yourself, or just want to support the people who supported us, here are all the goodies we got to give out at camp:
What’s a group event without a uniform? Woman-owned Skylar Yoo did a special print run for us to make sure that every Compact attendee could sport one of their retro-inspired mantra t-shirts. Can Maddie wear her shirt every day this week? Yes, she can.
Honestly, our gift bag should have been called things Maddie forgot to pack in her suitcase, but normally can’t live without, and included such treats as sunscreen and lip tint samples from COOLA (I take SPF protection very seriously), facial wipes from Kleenex (or as I call it, the #lazygirl’s camp shower), dye-free Ibuprofen from b+b , and a shampoo bar from Drifter Grooming that everyone in my cabin kept exclaiming was really good after they hopped out of the shower.
For winding down, BeeKeeper’s Naturals supplied us all with B.Chill Honey Hemp Sticks that were like the adult version of the honey sticks my mom used to get me at the farmer’s market when I was a kid. And Swanson Health hooked us up with their special Mellow Mag that I’ve been told several campers now swear by for better sleeping. We also all got custom tea blends from Oh, You TEAse (mine was called Get Out Of My Way, which felt very apt for the occasion). And we kept a supply of Zen Women’s Relief Balm on hand after our physical activities, which is great, because I definitely tweaked my knee doing a body roll at dance class.
StickerYou gave us these awesome magnetic name tags. I always hate the lanyards that get handed out at events (they never go with my outfit, and I always lose them), so for totally selfish reasons I was super into the idea of a name tag that is basically an accessory. Spoiler alert: I still lost my camp name tag on the last day, but at least I looked good while wearing it when I had it!
And Minted allowed us to give out customized journals to every camper, personalized with their names on the cover.
Lastly, the surprise hit of the swag bag were these bug trap lamps from DynaTrap, probably because we started getting bitten the second we arrived at camp and were like GET THE BUG LAMPS NOW. Our former intern turned camp counselor, Eve, just sent us a very gross photo of all the flies her DynaTrap night light killed after a week of use and let’s just say… they work. Now I’m just trying to figure out how to pilfer one of the giant outdoor bug lanterns DynaTrap sent us, so that I can use it at the farm and Michael can retire the bug killing gun he so gleefully purchased last month.
So thank you to all of our Compact sponsors, who helped aid us in our mission to make sure our campers felt taken care of all weekend long. And finally, a huge thanks to Squarespace who will be bringing you our camp recaps this and next month. Stay tuned for a behind the scenes look at camp and what we learned, coming soon.
But for now it’s the long weekend and it’s your happy hour, so get to it.
Cheers,
Maddie
Around the Web with Jareesa
She was slut-shamed while running for office. Now she’s fighting back.
Here’s your true-crime story of the week: This QAnon Guy Helped Solve a Murder by Knowing a Random Car Part.
I use two last names on Facebook and apparently it’s a thing: Why Married Women Are Using Two Last Names on Facebook.
Where True Crime Meets Crafts: Why Serial Killer Merch Is All Over Etsy
I can relate: Be Your Authentic Self at Work — But Only if You’re White.
#lifetip: How the hell am I supposed to read Instagram Stories so quickly?
“It Was Us Against Those Guys”: The Women Who Transformed Rolling Stone in the Mid-70s
