Avellanas Soul Surf School
CASE STUDY — TRAVEL & TOURISM · Costa Rica · wix editor
Bringing a surf school's soulful identity to life online with a new logo and website.
avellanas soul · GRAPHIC Design · WEB DESIGN · 2 months
The Result
Within the first three months of launch, Avellanas Soul Surf School saw a direct increase in enquiries and bookings. The founder told me the change came from the website answering frequent questions potential customers always asked about, which cut down time and back and forth between the founder and the customer, making the experience more professional and converting interested customers to paying customers. With more detailed lesson descriptions, visible safety information, and testimonials, enquiries and bookings by form completion increased by 52%.
A business that had been running on word-of-mouth now had a digital presence that was working on its own.
This project covered full brand identity redesign, competitor research, audience segmentation, UX strategy, and web design — all based on real customer enquiry data.
Old Logo
New Logo
Website Before
Website After
Testimonial
I am grateful that I reached out to Trixi for help building a professional website for my tutoring business. Trixi explained the process in detail, provided several drafts during the project, and was extremely kind and patient throughout the whole process. I couldn't have been more happy with the end result and I definitely couldn't have done it without her help. Trixi, will be my go to for any website and graphic design and the one I will be recommending to others. Thank you Trixi!
Michelle — Little Readers Treehouse
The Brief
Avellanas Soul Surf School is a locally-run surf school on the coast of Costa Rica, operating in a competitive tourist market where first impressions happen online before anyone steps on a board. The founder was losing potential bookings to a brand identity that no longer reflected the quality of the experience he was delivering. The logo felt outdated, the website created friction, and there was no trust infrastructure in place for visitors who had never been to Playa Avellanas before or had a surf lesson. He needed more than a visual update. He needed his brand to work harder for his business.
The Problem
The brand had a trust problem. Surf lessons are a high-consideration purchase. Visitors are making safety and trust decisions, not just aesthetic ones. An outdated logo and an unclear website created doubt at exactly the moment confidence needed to be built. The existing site did not explain the services in the detail a customer would need, and it had no social proof, so visitors who did not already know the school had no real reason to stay or get in touch.
Discovery & Research
Before I started re-designing anything, I started with research. I looked at the competitive landscape across surf schools on Costa Rica's Pacific coast, not just how they looked, but how they structured their information, what they led with, and where their websites were creating confusion or friction. This gave me a clear picture of what was common in the category and where there was room to do something better.
The more important work was understanding who was actually coming to the website. Through conversations with the founder and going through the enquiries the business had received, I found that Avellanas Soul was serving a few different groups, each with different needs and different levels of confidence around surfing. The same questions kept coming up: What's included in the price? Is it safe for my kids? I've never surfed before — is that okay? These weren't just FAQs. They were the exact friction points stopping people from making contact. They weren't unsure about whether they wanted to surf. They were unsure whether this was the right place to do it safely.
That became the brief for the whole project: answer every hesitation before it becomes a reason not to book.
The Thinking Behind the Work
The Logo: Built for Longevity
For the logo, the priority was longevity over trend. Surf culture borrows heavily from 90s aesthetics or leans into generic beachy visuals, both of which age quickly. My goal was a mark that would still feel right in ten years (and we are already six years in). I kept the sand dollar as the main element because it had existing brand recognition and connected to the coastal identity, but I stripped away the complexity that made it difficult to use at small sizes. The original font made it hard to read and hard to understand what the business actually did.
The black-and-white execution was both a client preference and a strategic choice: it allows the brand to work on any background, in any context, without losing its integrity. Adding the founding year was a deliberate trust signal; it shows that this school has history and roots in the community. And adding "Surf School" to the logo makes the business immediately clear to someone who has never heard of it before.
The Website: Designing for the Decision,
Not Just the Visit
When I looked at who was coming to the website, the audience split into two clear groups, and each one needed a different experience.
The first and largest group were complete beginners: people who had never surfed, were thinking about safety, and needed enough information and reassurance to move from "I'm not sure" to "I want to book." For this group, the homepage needed to do all the work. Services, what's included, safety, and the atmosphere of the school are all addressed directly, with a clear path to the enquiry form for anyone ready to get in touch.
The second group were intermediate surfers — people who already knew they wanted to surf but weren't sure if the school could work for their level. For them, I added a "Learn More" option for each lesson type, leading to dedicated pages that specifically talked about what a surfer at their level would actually work on in a tailored session. This group didn't need reassurance, they needed specifics.
Trust Across the Site
I placed social proof with intention rather than as an afterthought. On the homepage, I added a set of testimonials underneath the three lesson types. Each one from a different experience level and lesson format (private, group, or kids lessons), so that every visitor could find themselves in someone else's experience.
On the individual lesson pages, I placed a testimonial directly above the booking button, at the exact moment a visitor is deciding whether to take the next step. The positioning was deliberate: it gives that final bit of confidence right at the point where most people hesitate.
The Outcome
Within the first weeks after launch, the founder shared that he was getting more direct enquiries through the website than before. Something he put down to the more detailed descriptions of each lesson type, the clear breakdown of what was included, the mention of safety precautions, and the testimonials, giving new visitors the confidence to reach out.
The founder has told me that what his new customers mention the most about his website and business is that the testimonials helped them make a decision to book the lesson. Proof that testimonials are a crucial part of building trust between the business and customer.
The brand now has a foundation he can grow: consistent, professional, and genuinely reflective of the experience he delivers. It converted a word-of-mouth business into one with a digital presence that works independently.