Graffiti4hire – An unlikely business?

When people think of graffiti they probably think of urban crime; more so than a successful, growing business.

When Victor TX left his role as Senior Designer three years ago after becoming fed up with his job; his vision was to package his graffiti talents – teamed up with a couple of colleagues; and turn it into a business. Their first commission was spraying a caricature of a pizza shop owner on some shutters in West Bromwich. His services were called upon; Graffiti4hire was born; it’s based in the Custard Factory.

“We asked some business people about Graffiti4hire at the start, and they wouldn’t give it a future. They saw it as one guy just making a bit of money; they didn’t think it could be a viable business. But I believe they thought that because they’d never seen it before; which is the biggest mistake.” Says Victor.

Graffiti4hire has seen exponential growth in turnover: more than doubling takings year-on-year. Their C.V. now sports an impressive list of big commercial names: Facebook, Google, Orange, JCB, Yahoo!, Sony, Selfridges and many others.

“We do quite a lot of international jobs. We’ve been painting cruise-liners in Italy, France, Los Angeles, we are working on some new graffiti videos for a client in the US but it’s all a bit ‘hush hush’ at the moment, also painting a 30 metre tower in Digbeth and many blue chip offices around the UK are getting the G4H treatment, which is really popular.”

Standing in Graffiti4hire offices with its messily sprayed walls and the clutter of a busy functioning business; it’s easy to see why they’re expanding their base. They’re staying in the Custard Factory but doubling the size of their premises and looking to add two more full-time staff to the already six-strong team.

“We have been in the Custard Factory for three years now and everything about it is great, the people and the surroundings, very friendly community and the biggest creative hub in Europe!” Says Victor.

“In 2013 we are going to paint our fourth cruise line ship, it’s in Germany and it’s going to be the biggest job by far.”

A recent job they’ve done for a private client was painting their indoor swimming pool. This is large-scale work and using the rare and distinctive skill of photorealistic graffiti. Watching it done live is incredible: layers building gradually at a surprisingly fast pace. It’s like observing a modern day Michelangelo clad with a gas mask and a spray can.

“It was hard work, two artists over ten days nonstop painting, and a couple of days looking for references and designing to get the right look, it was worth the effort and the client was more than happy with the result.”

The sky is almost real and the figures are standing off the walls. It’s far removed from most people’s idea of the potential in a spray can. This is art-fresco; it’s almost unbelievable.

Their variety of work is what makes Graffiti4hire fascinating. They brand themselves as a design agency that revolves around graffiti aesthetics, which is a clever way to draw on Victor’s skills and experience.

“There has always been a demand for it. Me and many artists have always been doing odd jobs in our spare time. But there was always difficulty to find graffiti artists’ people can trust because it’s a bit of an obscure scene. The idea was that if you make it available for people to trust easily then there should be a market for it.” Says Victor.

You get the impression there’s a big future for this Birmingham-based company, and when pushed for an answer: “the future is bright blue.” Says Victor.

It’s very likely this attitude that brought Graffiti4hire to where it is now. It’s hard to imagine anything but continued success for this company based in the Custard Factory, who now has a subsidiary in Spain; and working on one in Hong Kong. It’s a long way away from urban crime.

*This article was written for Scene Magazine