Woodford F&B
Launch storytelling and communications that helped a new Woodfords Corner restaurant build a loyal local following and earn national attention.
Woodford F&B is an 85-seat restaurant in the Woodfords Corner neighborhood of Portland, Maine. Owners Fayth Preyer and Birch Shambaugh renovated the former Valle's Steakhouse building on Forest Avenue, keeping its mid-century modern character and drawing on restaurants they loved, most notably The Odeon in New York City.
Woodfords Corner was a busy part of town for much of the twentieth century, but by the time Woodford F&B opened it had lost its reputation as a town center. Most of Portland's dining attention stayed on the peninsula.
The owners needed people to see an off-peninsula neighborhood as a place worth going, and they needed the restaurant's story told well before the doors opened.
We started working with the owners before the dining room was even built, and stayed on as strategic partners through the restaurant's critical first years.
- Story first. We worked with the owners to put into words the heart of the business: the why behind what F&B does every day.
- Authentic communications. We built messaging and press materials around that story rather than around hype, so coverage reflected the real restaurant.
- Local before national. We focused early communications on the neighborhood, since a loyal local clientele was the owners' first goal.
Within months of opening, Woodford F&B had the deeply loyal, majority-local clientele the owners set out to build. It quickly became the place people in the neighborhood couldn't imagine living without.
The restaurant also earned regional and national recognition, including a feature story in The Boston Globe and coverage from The Travel Channel, Brit + Co and Wine Enthusiast.
With the lights back on in the old Valle's building, Woodfords Corner began to change. Restaurateurs, business owners and neighbors started looking beyond the peninsula for dining, entertainment and commerce.
A clear, honest story drew attention to an unpretentious restaurant in an off-the-beaten-path neighborhood, and helped make it an early anchor in the area's revival.
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