{"id":4492,"date":"2026-02-04T05:49:47","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T05:49:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2026\/02\/04\/student-founded-fragrance-brand-the-blueprint-connects-profit-to-social-good\/"},"modified":"2026-02-04T05:49:50","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T05:49:50","slug":"student-founded-fragrance-brand-the-blueprint-connects-profit-to-social-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/2026\/02\/04\/student-founded-fragrance-brand-the-blueprint-connects-profit-to-social-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Student-founded fragrance brand The Blueprint connects profit to social good"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/theblueprintfragrances.com\/\">The Blueprint Fragrances<\/a> \u2014 a luxury, unisex fragrance brand \u2014 was founded by Business seniors Matthew Brown and Alex Zhang in January 2025 with the mission to raise the standards of social governance in high-margin businesses. The startup is actively producing and selling fragrances. Going forward, the founders are focused on improving the efficiency of their production process while producing quality products.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Blueprint <a href=\"https:\/\/theblueprintfragrances.com\/pages\/charity-benefit\">donates<\/a> 30% of profits to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.h4h.org\/?gad_source=1&amp;gad_campaignid=15548580219&amp;gbraid=0AAAAAoJ0jFv9-3-TfA5l-uz1EZnvJED_i&amp;gclid=Cj0KCQiAp-zLBhDkARIsABcYc6vaP6iO0MHr-5YD4hpbRuQG_NqhHF3iA55s0gDKBQipaKpo19Dy2bUaAkx_EALw_wcB\">Habitat for Humanity<\/a>, a global nonprofit organization that builds and repairs affordable housing for low-income families. In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Zhang said the donation model was chosen to ensure the company could grow while still sustaining its charitable mission.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were trying to select a margin that would be quite generous,\u201d Zhang said. \u201cThis is not just a business that we\u2019re doing to make profit \u2014 we truly think that, with these sales, we can help others. The point of the business was to assemble a creative product to test our skills as businessmen, but also to improve the communities around us.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with The Daily, Business senior Daniel Lin, a supporter of The Blueprint, said the startup\u2019s commitment to charity, especially within the luxury industry, makes it unique among other student-founded companies in the Ross School of Business.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-1    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cFocusing on that charitable side and doing good rather than prioritizing profits, while also being a luxury appeal \u2014 I think that really helps them stand out a lot,\u201d Lin said.<\/p>\n<p>In an email to The Daily, Business senior Lucy Gold wrote the startup stood out to her as a creative way to apply what students learn at the Business School.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI heard about it in the beginning and I thought it was an interesting way to creatively formally capitalize on our Ross education,\u201d Gold wrote. \u201cI think it is great and they go beyond saying with their dedication of funds. I think the fact that it is a tangible good with actual money being used for social good makes them stand out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Brown said the business is experimenting with marketing strategies in the broader University of Michigan community, like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fillcon.co.uk\/fragrance-marketing-using-a-b-testing-to-boost-sample-conversion-rates\/#:~:text=A%2FB%20testing%20is%20the,best%20in%20real%2Dworld%20conditions.\">A\/B testing<\/a>, an experiment comparing scent variants for fragrances. The Blueprint aims to expand their brand by performing outreach strategies in other locations frequented by students, such as <a href=\"http:\/\/scorekeepersa2.com\/\">Scorekeepers<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ricksamericancafe.com\/\">Rick\u2019s American Cafe<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve set up a table in the (Shapiro Undergraduate Library) to do A\/B testing for our scents before,\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe\u2019re going to, at some point, hand out little samplers in the lines to Skeeps and Rick\u2019s and test the fragrances.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-2    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>In addition to in-person marketing efforts, Zhang said they are trying to build a digital presence for the brand.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got an Instagram, we\u2019re going to set up a TikTok soon,\u201d Zhang said. \u201cWe\u2019ve also done a photoshoot and set up a website, so we\u2019re really trying to push this e-commerce angle and sell to a wide audience, as well as still figuring out how to paint our brand and showcase it best.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>As the company grows, Zhang said he has both short- and long-term goals, including building the reputation of The Blueprint\u2019s products and expanding the startup\u2019s connection with charities.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn terms of short-term goals, we really want to create a quality product,\u201d Zhang said. \u201cWe want to create formulas that people enjoy, can be passed down and will stand on their own. Long-term, we do ultimately want to help charity and look towards establishing maybe an official partnership with Habitat for Humanity or any other organization. One of our business\u2019s main purposes is to help other people.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Brown said he hopes The Blueprint\u2019s fragrances will eventually compete beyond the student startup space.\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"scaip scaip-3    \">\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cWe don\u2019t want to be just another student startup,\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe want to put out a product that is high enough quality to earnestly compete on its own merits with other products in the market.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><em>Daily Staff Reporter Grace Park can be reached at gracepm@umich.edu.<\/em><\/p>\n<aside>\n\t\t<\/aside>\n<p><h3 class=\"jp-relatedposts-headline\"><em>Related articles<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Blueprint Fragrances \u2014 a luxury, unisex fragrance brand \u2014 was founded by Business seniors Matthew Brown and Alex Zhang in January 2025 with the mission to raise the standards of social governance in high-margin businesses. The startup is actively producing and selling fragrances. Going forward, the founders are focused on improving the efficiency of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4493,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[4235,556,4236,1001,720,4237,1508,4234],"class_list":{"0":"post-4492","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-blueprint","9":"tag-brand","10":"tag-connects","11":"tag-fragrance","12":"tag-good","13":"tag-profit","14":"tag-social","15":"tag-studentfounded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4492"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4494,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4492\/revisions\/4494"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tmbglobal.news\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}