How Graff Workshop Came To Be

Hi...

For all those who are interested, here is how Graff Workshop came to be, it is pretty much by accident.

It started out with me in college age 18. I painted graffiti on a pair of shoes using some adicolor pens I had recently got with my adicolor shoes. This was when Adidas was giving a nice pack of MEGA permanent pens with each of their pairs of shoes, you could literally write on anything and it would never come off, so they were perfect for any type of shoes. I think in some places they offered the choice between a pack of pens and a pack of really small spray paints by Montana and Adidas.

So anyway i was doing a graphics project and painted these shoes and brought them in to hand in. My best mate looked at them and immediately asked ifhe could buy them from me, after a bit of haggling he bought them for £35 or something (they were Lonsdales I had bought for £19). So I had to do another pair, which, when I brought them in, another friend bought. After selling a few pairs and handing in my project late I realised I had something I could make into a business.

So I bought some web space and got a friend to design me a basic website called Sixth Design (I was in sixth form, very clever name i know, horrible to say as well). Anyway I thought having a website would mean making sales, which it didn't, I think the website itself made one sale, (and the guy lived round the corner from me so I ended up walking the shoes to his house). I sold a few more pairs from word of mouth and eventually they tailed off. I had caught the business bug and at the last minute before going to Uni I changed my course from Graphic Design to Entrepreneurship. I went to London Met, it was rubbish, I dropped out, note to self, visit Uni and have a look whats on the course before applying.

After moving back home and getting a rubbish job i realised I needed to go back to uni so applied but still had another year at home till I could go back. Whilst walking around town I noticed some graffiti boards inside a dis used shop, I nearly walked past but ended up turning round and going to have a look what was going on. I talked to the guy inside (Rodney Dee) and he said they were doing a graffiti workshop in a few days and I should come by and help out. I went down and had a go, met the artist and started working with the company who were running the workshop (Stuart Taylors Workshop company). He started giving me lots of jobs and I knew this is what I wanted to do.

I still to this day work with Rodney Dee and Stuart Taylor and they are a big part of why Graff Workshop has been such a success.

Today 30% of our business is from either Word of Mouth or Repeat custom, which is hugely confidence inspiring for me, Especially considering the amout of new business that is coming in every day.

Thanks to Stuart Taylor for keeping me from packing it in when business was going slow at the beginning, and to all the repeat customers, especially Rodney Dee and Carlie Higton who have secured and recommended so much work to me over the last year.

Keep supporting Graff Workshop

Tom