Words by Bro
Photos By Josh Becker
My name is Aaron but my nickname has been Bro since I was about 14(1984). Hence the name Broprints. Around 1994 my friend Shakey and I were in my garage and I was telling him I wanted to make a screen printing press. He’s a crafty bugger so we tore apart my old record player and turned it into a 2 color press. He said the lazy susan bearing in the turntable would do the trick. I started printing all my art on shirts, posters and stickers and giving them away and selling them. Then bootlegged my favorite cheap beer logos and selling them to friends and trading bartenders for tabs. Had a sweet little garage shop going then picked it up and moved it to Fiji. That’s a whole other story but eventually sold it over there, came back in 1997 and got a job at Consolidated Skateboards. This is where it really got going. Birdo, the owner was super cool about me using the equipment to keep Broprints going and I would print side jobs at night for extra income. Skateworks was one of my first companies I got to print for and now after 15 yrs or so they have moved in to 131(our building here on center st.). It started picking up more and more and I was getting over loaded. I would have some friends come in and help, one of them is still here today. (JRL)
It was kind of funny because I would work for Birdo in the day, then at night he would work for me. He was always buying frivolous purchases and getting into crazy hobbies so it funded his insanity.
This is what I want to do for the rest of my life. Not just print but print at Bro-Prints! Brandon Kahl At the end of 1999 I had saved up enough to rent the space next to Consolidated for about 3 months so he and I decided to partner up. He had the equipment and I had the workload and skills. Turned out great and has been pretty busy ever since. We catered mostly to skateboarding, surfing and punk bands. The word spread and now that’s our industry. We do print for tons of other companies like Pixar, Linked In and even did some stuff for NASA. But the truth is it’s more fun to help the small skate brands and skate companies that need the help to get off the ground. Skating is what we are used to so it is a good fit and we can relate to what they are doing. 53
Now that things are consistently steady we have opened up some space to teach kids and adults how to make their own posters and art. It’s fun to stoke people on printing. Another one of our friends Zarosh has built a nice little skateboard printing zone in the warehouse and now we can offer that too. The ultimate goal was to have a fun place to work, make a living, help people and enjoy life. The goal is to make sure the dudes working here are stoked. They bust their humps for Broprints so we let them print their own stuff after hours. We have always tried to BBQ every friday so the start of each weekend is nice and relaxed. The fridge is usually stocked with Hamms, Olympia or PBR and usually in the summer the keg is flowing. So with all that being said, feel free to stop by anytime you are in the area. We’ll give you the dime store tour and a pile of funny stickers. -Bro
Name: Aaron Clark aka Bro Job: Owner Years: Life Duties: Owner Stuff Name: Birdo Job: Co-Owner Years: Sinse 97 Duties: Co-Owner Stuff Name: Beau Barcus Job: Production Manager Years: 5 + bitches Duties: Graphics, Production managing and art Name: Brandon Kahl aka Mc Colorin Book Job: Press Operator Years: 2 years Duties: Spitting hot fire on the mic at your next house party and press operator Name: Joey Grieb Job: Stickers Years: 11 years Duties: Sticker expert stuff
Name: Pete Saporito aka Pizza Burrito Job: All around awesome Years: 7 months Duties: Photographer and all around awesomeness Name: JRL aka Johnny Rebel Love Job: Prepress Years: 15 years Duties: Printing press and Screen expert Name: Zarosh Eggleston Job: Skate Board Printer, Platipus Skateboard Printing Years: -4 years Duties: Bro-print mascot and Skateboard Printer Name: Jason Graham Job: Mascot #2, in-house construction crew. Years: 6 years Duties: Build stuff with wood and nails.