The Print Room, a Dunedin screen printing and embroidery business, celebrated its 10-year anniversary this month.
From school leaver gear and uniforms to brewery merchandise, the business has clients all around New Zealand.
At the start of the year, the business expanded beyond the ground floor of its Grosvenor St office to lease the first floor.
Now they have put in preparations to move into their fourth, and hopefully final, premises.
They have bought a section of land in Kaikorai Valley with plans to erect a 1200sq m purpose-built factory within the next couple of years, with hopes up to 80% of their operations will be solar-powered.
It would be reassuring to own their own premises, which would allow them to do things you could not do on a lease, he said.
The team had also recently acquired a new laser cutter, one for fabric, and another, for bottles and hard goods, expected to arrive in a few weeks.
Fellow co-owner Jon Thom said hitting the 10-year mark was "quite a milestone".
The pair had practically known each other since birth having both grown up in Clyde and going to primary and high school together, before moving to Dunedin and studying at the University of Otago.
Mr Thom said their growth in recent years had been driven by building a reputation as a reliable partner for other businesses.
It was rewarding to take a client’s rough concepts and then produce and ship it out as a physical product into the world — sometimes within in a single day, he said.
There was no-one ingredient behind their success story but creativity and a love for learning were at the heart of the operation, and it was nice to receive recognition of their skill from print shops around the world.
"We set out to be the best print shop in Dunedin, then it was Otago, then South Island and New Zealand.
Mr Thom said the Covid-19 pandemic was "quite a turning point" for the business, but not in the way you would expect.
The pair pioneered the "Curve Crusher" t-shirt - adorned with a portrait of of Dr Ashley Bloomfield by Dunedin designer The Bold - which was met with viral acclaim.
"We kind of almost overnight blew up, in kind of a household name way."
About 10,000 units of the tee were produced and all proceeds raised were donated to the Women’s Refuge, a total of $145,000.
Mr Thom said they had continued to grow their clientele to include "pretty much everyone" in the craft brewery scene.
Mr Brun said the company’s first and biggest brewery client was Speight’s, who offered to pay them in beer for a couple thousand t-shirts - but they opted for the wiser decision of accepting money.
The team, which at the time was only three people, ran the press nonstop over two weeks and slept on-site in a cupboard between shifts.
Mr Brun said it was initially difficult to grow their "New Zealand-class, if not world-class" production from a local to a national level.
"We were just a couple of guys from Central Otago that found ourselves to be in Dunedin.
"When I first moved here I thought it was such a big city and didn’t know if I’d last here.
"I definitely think there’s that tall poppy syndrome that gets thrown around a bit, but it was about us being confident in ourselves to then go and put ourselves out there."
Dunedin had become a massive part of The Print Room’s identity, he said.
"Whenever we talk with our business mentors, they’re always asking the question would it not make more sense to move north.
"But no, we love Dunedin."
