‘Hey, Honey’: The computer science major juggling code, university, and a growing hive

What began as an impromptu “Hey, Honey” has swiftly evolved into Earls’ Honey’s charming persona. For Sara Hope Earl, a student at Northern Caribbean University, Earls’ Honey, a one-month-old company, stands for much more than just bottled and jarred goods. The business represents not only her lifelong entrepreneurial interests but also the challenges and rewards of a young student’s entrepreneurship, as she tries to strike a balance between consumer orders and academic objectives.

The business emerged not from thin air but from an existing venture her father had started.

“He gives away honey to people and all that, and I’ve always been business-minded. I thought, we can make something out of this. So my aunt and I came together, and we decided we’re going to register it as a business,” she stated.

That “something” is a growing operation, with Sara serving as the bottler, designer, and delivery coordinator, all while managing a full university course load. Her father handles the beekeeping for now, harvesting honey from his apiaries and storing it in large buckets. But Sara hopes to learn that part of the process herself this summer.

The real magic happens in the workshop her father built specifically for their honey production. There, Sara, her mother, and her father put on gloves and masks for protection and work together in focused silence. They carefully pour the sweet liquid into different jar sizes based on each customer’s request, using a valve to control the flow. “The process is very quiet because we’re all so focused on getting the exact amount right,” Sara explains.

Once the jars are filled, Sara and her mother take over the labelling and packaging. She designs the labels herself, ordering them from a local company in Mandeville, while the sleek glass bottles are sourced from the same town. For her more premium line of honey jars, she turns to Amazon to get the specific style she wants. “That’s the fun part, we get to see the honey being branded, and it feels really cool and rewarding to watch something we designed come to life,” she says. “I feel that excitement every single time. It’s all excitement for me.”

After packaging, the family loads up the orders and coordinates with customers to choose the most convenient pickup location. For those outside the Mandeville region, they send orders via Knutsford Express or Tara Courier Services. Sara always checks in with customers afterward to ensure satisfaction. 

Currently, her business sells approximately 10 to 15 bottles and 10 jars per week, a manageable volume that allows her to maintain quality while balancing her studies.

It’s a far cry from her first ventures. As a child, Sara was constantly creating businesses for fun, once even dreaming of opening her own bank called Hopes Investments and Loans Limited. Her parents always supported these discoveries, recognising early on that their daughter’s bossy nature was actually a sign of her goal-orientated personality and drive. Her mother recalls how Sara would sell fruits to workers during the construction of their family home, a sign of the entrepreneurial spirit that would later manifest in her first formal business in Earle’s Honey.

Now, as a business owner, those early lessons and explorations are paying off. Her customers praise her work ethic and the attractiveness of her honey packaging, while her friends have highlighted her compelling combination of professionalism and warmth.

“Sara is extremely dedicated when it comes to handling her business, you can really tell she takes pride in her work,” expressed Kezia Hewitt.

“She also has this positive energy about her that makes her very approachable,” added Marie-Shay Perry.

Instead of pursuing a bachelor’s degree in business, she found a second love, computer science. Before that, Earl had actually wanted to be a medical doctor. But what she describes as a turning point came in her last year of high school in information technology class.

“As soon as we touched programming, I was like, wow. This is me. I want to do this. I want to create things for people. I want to be the one to programme machines that stay in medical centres or businesses.”

Now, being both a second-year computer science major and a business owner, this experience has brought its own set of challenges when it comes to balancing both.

“There was this one day where I just had a good amount of orders to deliver, and I had a sectional the next day. I was so, you know, happy with the orders. People are ordering, we're getting customers that I kind of forgot about the sectional I had the next day,” Earl recounted. “It never happened again, and it won’t.”

She conveyed that even though she has had difficult days, her family keeps her motivated. While laughing, she said that if it were her alone, the business would probably plunge on the first day. But by communicating with them on days she feels overwhelmed, her family is always standing on the side-lines, ready to tap-in when necessary.

With fondness clouding her eyes, she said, “My family would say, ‘we understand, remember, schoolwork first’, and they just jump in and they help. And they just help me with my burden, my honey business burdens. But for sure, my family, they're the most important.”

Even in challenging times, Earl is grateful for this experience, not just because of the monetary gain but for the lessons it has taught her. One of these is patience.

“Yes, we sell honey, but we cannot just take the entire honey up in the bee’s box, it’s their food as well. So I have to be patient. Wait for the season to go and then get some of the honey. I’m also being patient with my customers, being patient with my family members, and being patient with myself.”

When asked what advice she would give to someone who wants to start a business, her face showed a bit of her sweet and helpful nature.

“It's perfectly fine to ask for help. A lot of people, you know, want to, it's beautiful to be an entrepreneur, especially a sole trader, right? I'm not a sole trader, but a sole trader. But we really need people to help things go the way you want them to go. To help you understand what's good, what's bad, you know. Give you advice, persons who are already experienced, persons who are your stakeholders, and persons whom you want to, you know, sell your stuff to. Also, communicate with others. It's lovely to do things by yourself as an independent girl, but it's very important to be dependent on others because that's the only way we're going to grow. I'm dependent on my customers just as they're dependent on me.”