Stay Home Club was founded in 2012 by Montreal-based designer Olivia Mew. From its humble beginnings operating out of Mew’s basement apartment, the brand has grown to inspire a huge online following. 

Now, it operates out of Mew’s studio in Montreal’s St.Henri neighborhood, selling products online and in retailers all over the world. Mew describes Stay Home Club as a lifestyle brand for people with no life. 

Any merchant looking to foster a strong brand identity can look to Stay Home Club for website design inspiration. Stay Home Club’s target demographic, as you might have guessed from the name, is people who prefer to stay home. 

If your idea of a fun night involves not leaving, you’re part of the club. If you’ve grown tired of cliche portrayals of an imagined, extravagant nightlife, Stay Home Club might just be your kind of brand. 

Stay Home Clubs’ target audience may be narrowly-defined, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have broad appeal. In a world where so many brands try to sell their products with appeals to luxury and social status, Stay Home Club’s refusal sticks out.  

Sometimes, doing the unexpected can be a great way for a brand to get people’s attention. Mew got the idea from the brand from her own experience growing up. 

In high school, she often felt pressured to “go out”. Nothing was considered “cool” about wanting to stay at home and hang with your cats. Suspecting she might not be alone in feeling alienated,  she started developing a brand around this idea. 

It started with the company logo. Designed by Mew, it depicts an illustrated version of herself, surrounded by four, regal-looking cats. The logo has the composition of a traditional coat-of-arms, but the style of art is distinctly modern. 

When Mew first posted the logo on her Tumblr, she didn’t expect her followers to have such a positive reaction. It turns out Mew wasn’t alone in the way she felt. Discovering this led her to develop a lifestyle brand uniquely fine-tuned to an often undepicted lifestyle. 

From the beginning, Stay Home Club stood-out. With so much advertising built around the idea that a person needs to go out and live an extravagant lifestyle, Stay Home Club flipped this narrative, and made it cool to stay-in.