Turning the realities of motherhood into products that make mothers feel seen, supported and cared for.

This one is my personal brain child that i beleive needs its own spotlight.

Smoode began with a simple observation: pregnancy and postpartum products are often clinical, fragmented and designed as an afterthought.

I created Smoode postpartum with twins to change that combining thoughtful product design, real maternal experience and emotionally resonant storytelling to build a modern care brand for motherhood.

Company: Smoode Essentials
Founder: Crystal Adesanya
Industry: Maternal Care and Consumer Products
Scope: Company Strategy, Product Development, Branding, Marketing and Launch

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The starting point

Mothers deserved better products

My experience with pregnancy, birth and postpartum recovery made the gaps in maternal care impossible to ignore.

After experiencing IVF, a high-risk twin pregnancy, hyperemesis gravidarum, an emergency C-section, a blood transfusion and exclusively pumping for twins, I understood how overwhelming motherhood could feel—and how little of the existing product experience was designed around the mother herself.

The products were scattered. The language was clinical. The packaging often made recovery feel like an embarrassing medical problem rather than a transition worthy of thoughtful care.

I saw an opportunity to create something different.

Not another baby brand.

A brand for the mother.

The challenge

Creating an entirely new brand while living the problem

Smoode needed to bring several ideas together:

• Practical products that solved real maternal needs
• A soft, modern and recognizable visual identity
• A brand voice that felt honest, warm and culturally relevant
• A product line that could grow without becoming confusing
• A launch strategy that could build community before significant retail distribution
• A business model that worked across direct-to-consumer, wholesale and gifting

The challenge was deciding what to build first—and turning a deeply personal idea into a focused consumer brand.

The approach

Build around the mother, not just the moment

Rather than beginning with a long list of generic postpartum products, I started by defining how Smoode should make mothers feel.

Every product needed to deliver some combination of:

• Ease and simplicity
• Comfort and softness
• Confidence and dignity
• Emotional recognition
• Thoughtful functionality

This became the standard for evaluating every product, design and campaign.

What I built

01. The brand foundation

I developed Smoode as a modern maternal-care company supporting pregnancy, birth, postpartum recovery and everyday motherhood.

The brand was intentionally positioned between traditional medical products and lifestyle wellness brands: practical enough to be genuinely useful, but beautiful and thoughtful enough to feel like a gift.

The identity was built around:

• A soft, calming color system
• Warm, direct language
• Modern editorial design
• Realistic representations of motherhood
• Products that could remain visible in the home without feeling clinical
• A community-first message centered on caring for the mother

02. The product ecosystem

Smoode’s product strategy was designed around moments when mothers commonly feel uncomfortable, overlooked or unprepared.

The initial ecosystem included:

The Smoode Mom Kit

A nine-item maternal-care kit bringing postpartum recovery essentials together in one intentional experience.

Instead of requiring mothers to research and purchase recovery products individually, the kit simplifies preparation and gives families one meaningful product to buy, gift and recommend.

The Smoode Hospital Gown

A soft-touch maternity gown designed for greater comfort, access and confidence during birth and recovery.

Its thoughtful features include a wrap design, snap-back access, full opening, pockets and skin-to-skin functionality.

Mom Mode Reusable Under-Eye Patches

A recognizable self-care product for the everyday realities of motherhood.

Mom Mode extends Smoode beyond the recovery period and gives the brand a visually distinctive, highly shareable product that mothers can incorporate into daily life.

Mama Soothe Relief Drops

Reusable hot-and-cold breast packs designed to fit comfortably inside a bra and support mothers experiencing engorgement, tenderness or pumping-related discomfort.

Together, the products established a broader vision for Smoode: maternal care that begins with recovery but continues throughout motherhood.

03. A simplified offer

As the product line developed, I recognized that launching several disconnected items would create unnecessary complexity.

The strategy shifted toward one primary offer: the Smoode Mom Kit.

The complete kit combines nine products—including the hospital gown, postpartum recovery essentials, reusable breast packs and Mom Mode eye patches—for $149.99.

This created:

• One clear hero product
• One primary SKU to market
• Simpler inventory planning
• More predictable unit economics
• A stronger gifting proposition
• A more complete customer experience
• An easier wholesale story

The decision made the business easier to explain, sell and scale.

04. Story-led marketing

Smoode’s marketing was built around honest motherhood rather than polished perfection.

Instead of relying only on traditional product advertising, I created content around:

• Twin motherhood
• Postpartum recovery
• Exclusive pumping
• Maternal identity
• The invisible work mothers perform
• Humor, exhaustion and everyday “mom mode”
• Building a company while raising three children under three

This approach helped connect the company to a larger personal platform and community.

Across social channels, the content generated millions of views, with individual videos reaching more than one million people and overall content generating approximately 14 million views within 90 days.

The audience grew to include more than 18,000 TikTok followers and approximately 15,000 Instagram followers, with a predominantly female audience between the ages of 25 and 44.

The community validated something important: mothers responded when they felt accurately represented.

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05. The path to market

I developed a launch strategy that allowed Smoode to build awareness while product development and manufacturing were still underway.

The go-to-market plan included:

• Direct-to-consumer sales
• Preorders and limited initial production
• Founder-led content
• Email marketing through Klaviyo
• Creator and brand collaborations
• Live product activations
• Partnerships with maternal-health professionals
• Wholesale outreach to birth centers and premium maternity clinics
• Houston-focused community growth
• Event and gifting opportunities

This created several ways for customers to discover Smoode without requiring a large traditional advertising budget at launch.

The outcome

From personal insight to a launch-ready maternal-care company

Smoode evolved from an early product idea into a complete consumer brand with:

• A clearly defined customer and market position
• A distinctive maternal-care identity
• A nine-item hero product
• Custom-designed products and packaging
• A direct-to-consumer launch strategy
• A wholesale strategy for clinics and birth centers
• A growing social community
• Millions of organic content views
• A product roadmap extending beyond postpartum recovery
• A brand platform capable of supporting future maternal and family products

Smoode is an ongoing case study in building publicly, listening closely and strengthening the business as the vision becomes clearer.

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