The last 5 years have been a blast, we wanted to celebrate by taking a look back at where it all began.

2012-13

Firstly a bit of background. In 2012, Alex and Elliott left our Sixth Form college’s and joined the same Creative Arts Foundation course at North Warwickshire & Hinckley College. We both wanted to pursue a career in Graphic Design so spent the year exploring our craft. We didn’t know each other before our college course, but we quickly made friends and the rest is history.

Towards the end of 2013, we had a decision to make. Should we go off to University and get a degree or stay at college and complete a HND course. Thankfully we both went for the later. In 2013 we both started the HND in Graphic Design. we started to work together more on joint projects and our working relationship was great, we both had the same design style and ambitions and our brains just clicked. 

2014-15

The first big project we had the opportunity to work on was thanks to our tutor Andy Ainslow! He had chosen us to design the college’s end of year exhibition branding, we decided to call it ‘Spectrum’. This opportunity was massive for us, mainly because it involved working with a real life client. This involved working with the colleges in house marketing team, at the time this was very daunting for us. We fondly remember the first time we met with marketing manager Susanne and her team. We turned up dressed in our best shirts all nervous and anxious! But we had nothing to worry about, they were a great team. we liked them so much that we ended up staying but that’s a story for later on! 

Over the next few months we spent one day a week working with the marketing department developing the end of year exhibition branding. We loved it, everything about working for a real life client from responding to the challenges of sticking to a brief to keeping within a budget. It was definitely something that resonated with us both. Towards the end of the first year of our HND course the Marketing Team gave us the best opportunity we could have ever wished for! We spent the summer working with the team doing everything from designing, prospectuses, leaflets, flyers and social media artwork. You name it, we did it. 

“We can’t thank Susanne, Jade and Mandy enough for giving us this opportunity because it provided us with the skills that we still use today! We enjoyed working with the team so much that we stayed on into our second year of HND. So yes we were basically the full time graphic designers for the college as well as undertaking a HND course! Mad right? But we wouldn’t have changed it for the world.”

So it’s 2014, 20th November to be precise. We were sat in a Contextual studies seminar bored of doing research for our sketchbooks (sorry Mark). We had started working for a few clients on the side and knew we needed an identity. After a long brainstorming session we settled with the name ‘Brio’. The word is Italian and means style, vigour and performance. We thought it was perfect, it summed up everything we were about! 

And there you have it Brio was born. From that moment on we started working for clients including Bedworth Drama Company, Hinckley BID and upon completing our HND continued to work with the college’s marketing department for 3 more years! We were even working for the marketing department when we graduated and spent the night controlling the audio and visuals as well as periodically appearing on stage. It was a bit of a nightmare but we wouldn’t have had it any other way.

2015-16

As the business began to grow we needed space to work from, for a very short time we worked from Elliott’s bedroom but it just wasn’t working out. With not a massive amount of money in the bank we decided to trade work for an office. We rebranded a local restaurant who offered us an office on the third floor. When we say office it was more like a cupboard but we can’t complain it did the job.

2016-17

With more business coming in and a definite need for a bigger office we went on a very impulsive hunt for a new office. We came across Graphic House a restored former hosiery factory, out of sheer luck the landlord (Mick) had one office for rent, and it was perfect. We have never looked back and will not be moving anytime soon.

Brio Studio 2017

Over the years the Brio website has seen many refreshes and updates the biggest being the over hall in March 2017. Not only did this see the website move to a new platform but it also saw the launch of Brio Store an online shop for prints and gifts. Although we have struggled to find the time to grow the store it will be coming back at some point. At the same time we were also picked as SBS (Small Business Sunday) winners by Theo Paphitis. This lead to them meeting the man himself in February 2018 and has allowed them to be part of a growing community of small UK businesses.

Bot Robot Enamel Pin Badge
Brio Media with Theo Paphitis

Present Day

It’s been a crazy ride and we’re pretty sure we could write a novel about the things we’ve been through over the years but hey maybe we’ll publish that when we reach our 10th anniversary! 

Now it’s 2019, and we’re proud to still be working with Hinckley BID and other long standing clients such as local charity KeepTheBeat. The relationships with the marketing team at NWHC has really paid off as team members left and moved on to more exciting jobs they have provided Brio with more work and we now work with Susanne at the National College for Advanced Transport and Infrastructure. We’ve also just recently won a contract with Birmingham City University, Maybe its time we got some staff.

This post can’t end without saying a massive thank you to all of the people that have helped us over the years! 

To all of our tutors at college, Andy, Tony, Neal, John, Carrie-Anne as well as the great college marketing department, Susanne, Joan, Jade U, Mandy, Lisa, Lucy, Jade D not forgetting all of our clients past and present and so many more to mention…you’ve all helped us make this happen! So thank you! (And most importantly to our families who have supported us every step of the way).

Heres to the future

Alex & Elliott

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