Arthur Albert Connor

Ken machining

The Airbrush Company has a 60-year family history in airbrushes. Established in 1947, the company was then known as Connor Patents Ltd, when the revolutionary Conograph airbrush was launched. In 1952 the company changed its name to Conopois Instruments Ltd when artist, engineer and inventor Arthur Albert Connor designed the Conopois airbrush, which had a unique ergonomic dual-action top lever. All the airbrushes were hand-made by Arthur so the waiting list became quite long as word of mouth got around amongst graphic artists and ceramics restorers that the performance of the airbrush was so good.

Rosemary in Conopois brochure

Arthur's daughter Rosemary started to help her father making parts for the airbrush from the age of 10. In her late teens Rosemary studied art at college and then worked as a graphic artist and illustrator for a research institute for about five years before having children. In 1978 she went back to work for her father, making the finest parts such as the nozzles, hand-turning these on a watch lathe.

When Aurthur Connor died in 1978, his daughter and son-in-law, Ken and Rosemary Medwell, took up the baton. Ken gave up his career as a quantity surveyor and turned his manual skills and technical aptitude to learning the manufacturing processes. Between them they continued to hand-manufacture the Conopois airbrush to satisfy the demand from elite artists. Ken became an extremely experienced airbrush technician whilst also managing and expanding the business.

In the early eighties Ken and Rosemary moved Conopois Instruments Ltd to new premises, a shop which they named The Airbrush & Spray Centre in Worthing. There they started to sell other art and graphics materials, such as brushes and paint, also introducing a choice of airbrushes to their customers by selling Badger airbrushes. In the mid-eighties they started importing Iwata airbrushes, followed by Paasche airbrushes in 1987. They also serviced and repaired most major brands of airbrush, a service that to this day is still not rivalled by any competitors. Thus the company became known in certain markets as the experts when it comes to airbrushes.

The Airbrush & Spray Centre, Worthing

The Conopois airbrush gained such a reputation in the graphics world, that when the German graphics products company Rotring decided to get into airbrushes, they sought to buy the manufacturing rights to the Conopois airbrush. In 1988 the Conopois airbrush became mass-produced by Rotring, Ken became a Products Manager for Rotring and Rosemary decided to take a career break.

By the mid-nineties demand for airbrushes for graphics was diminishing dramatically due to increasing use of computer graphics. Rotring were heavily into the graphics market and did not venture into the beauty and scale modelling markets as The Airbrush Company does today. So sadly Rotring decided to get out of airbrushes and discontinue manufacturing the unique Conopois airbrush in 1994.

Ken and Rosemary bought back the shop premises from Rotring in 1992, forming The Airbrush and Spray Centre Ltd. Rotring had continued selling the Iwata and Paasche airbrushes after buying Conopois Instruments Ltd, so as Rotring came out of airbrushes completely, The Airbrush & Spray Centre picked up distribution for those brands again, also reintroducing Badger to the range. The Airbrush Company still sell all three of those popular brands today.

The Airbrush Company, Lancing Business Park

Airbrushes.com website

Co-owner Rosemary Medwell returned to work for the company in 1999. In 2001 the company simply changed its name concisely to The Airbrush Company Ltd and in 2003 moved to an industrial unit to cope with the growth of the company getting into new markets, such as beauty (nails, body art and tanning). The company has a history of employing family members, who have all contributed to the successful running and growth of the company. Ken and Rosemary's daughter Rachael has worked for the company and also their son-in-law, Rick Smith, who introduced Iwata airbrushes to UK nail art and tanning markets. Rachael and Rick left The Airbrush Company in 2003, Rick setting up his own company manufacturing spray-tanning booths for top brand of tanning products, St.Tropez, which he is still successfully doing today.

Airbrush Co. warehouse, Lancing

The Training Room

Ken and Rosemary's son, Alex Medwell joined the company in 2003 after finally getting bored and frustrated with his eight-year career in I.T. and taking voluntary redundancy from IBM. Having undertaken most roles at some time within his time at The Airbrush Company, proceduralising and streamlining many of the company's processes, expanding the product range, launching the company's top-Google-ranked website Airbrushes.com, Alex's main responsibilities now are purchasing and marketing. Alex says, " I never thought I would end up working with my parents (or indeed be able to cope with it!), but working in a small company with so many roles to fulfil and so many varied markets makes it the most enjoyable and interesting job I have ever had. Now I regret I didn't do this earlier, but I'm pleased to have had my own career first and other experience and skills that I was then able to bring to the company."

Since Alex joined the company, The Airbrush Company has expanded its range of airbrush-related offerings, such as several brands of paints, instructional DVDs, accessories and masking and cutting tools. The company has grown significantly in another of the company's oldest markets, the scale model market, promoting Iwata airbrushes to the many modellers who increasingly seek the best equipment available for achieving the prefect finish to their models. The Airbrush Company training programme, with tuition contributed by some of their most expert dealers and other customers, is the only programme in the UK to offer customers classes on nearly every application of airbrushing across the main markets, such as art and graphics, custom automotive, scale models, fingernail art, textiles, cakes and crafts.

The Airbrush Company staff 2008 (from left to right): Rosemary Medwell, Ruth Odd, Ken Medwell, Ian Upton, Alex Medwell, Stuart Forster, Lisa Munro, Mike Vose Hover your mouse pointer over faces to dislay names or click faces for more personal information!

Name: Michael Vose Service: 9 years Current job: Technical support, Repair service Previous job: Print Finisher Age: 40-something Interests: Art, computer graphics, weight-training, martial arts What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: I enjoy helping customers, especially seeing customers delighted with how their airbrush or compressor is performing after I have serviced it.

As the family-run Airbrush Company continues to grow it now employs more non-family members. Mike Vose is a long-serving member of the team. Having worked for Ken under Rotring for a number of years previously, Mike returned to The Airbrush Company in 2002. Mike is the company's full-time technician, with thousands of hours experience of servicing and repairing airbrushes and compressors for customers every working day of the week and giving advice on the technical helpline. The company's commitment to technical backup and service is fundamental to The Airbrush Company's reputation for excellent service and expert knowledge. Few competitors offer any service close to this, so Mike is kept constantly busy servicing airbrushes. And when Mike is on holiday, Ken's 30-year experience of making and repairing airbrushes is there to cover urgent requests.

Name: Ruth Odd Service: 5 years Current job: Order processing, Admin Previous job: Senior Personal Secretary Age: Never you mind! Interests: Badminton, reading, Scrabble, crosswords, sudoku What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: The friendly atmosphere and good team work.

Ruth Odd joined the Airbrush Company in 2003 and, with her extensive traditional secretarial experience, she soon learned the company's processes and invoicing software and became the driving force of the order processing team, relentlessly and diligently making sure all orders are processed as quickly as possible to contribute to a high level of customer satisfaction. In 2005, Ian Upton's life-long career as a storeman brought him to a vacancy at an Airbrush Company in need of a hard-working new team member to cope with the increasing workload on dispatch, goods-inwards, and stock control of the expanding range of airbrush related products filling the warehouse. Ian's thorough approach has elevated the Airbrush Company's standards of packing to an even higher level, reducing damages of goods to a minimum.

Name: Lisa Munro Service: 2 years Current job: Marketing, Sales, Training Coordinator Previous job: Manageress of picture framing & art shop Age: 24 Interests: Art, airbrushing, painting, playing saxophone, dancing, clubbing, yoga, swimming, comics, camping What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: Working at The Airbrush Company means I can combine my daily job with my love of art. Challenges one day become solutions the next with the help of the friendly and efficient team here.

Recognising the potential for more growth in some markets and stretching Ken's payroll budget as far as possible, Alex continued to recruit more people to work on sales and marketing, plus cover for vacations on all other roles. Lisa Munro joined in 2006. Lisa, the youngest member of the team, studied art and textiles at school and college. She has a personal interest in art and took to airbrushing easily, so she found working at The Airbrush Company to be very intrinsically rewarding. Lisa has been an invaluable assistant to Alex on marketing projects, promotional literature and maintaining the website, expanding her skill-set all the time. Her enthusiasm and perseverance make Lisa an asset to the company, and her natural telephone manner make her a pleasure for customers to deal with. Lisa has also taken over the role of Training Coordinator, setting class dates, taking bookings and making sure that everything is in place for the smooth running of each class.

Name: Stuart Forster Service: 9 months Current job: Sales, Technical support, Order processing Previous job: Lawyer Age: 29 (going on 17) Interests: Custom painting, fine art, drumming, martial arts, bikes, tattooing, magic, more painting What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: No two days are the same!

It was on a portrait class, tutored by artist Giorgio Uccellini, where Alex first spotted the talent of Stuart Forster. A lawyer by profession, Stuart had been airbrushing as a hobby for less than a year, and Alex was impressed with how quickly Stuart had learned to master control of the airbrush, producing an amazingly high level of work on the class. Stuart's obvious enthusiasm for the experience of the portrait class, the art of airbrushing, and the products themselves, made it easy for Alex to recruit Stuart. Stuart wished to pursue the demand he was getting for his new painting skills in his spare time for customising vehicles, drum-kits, leather jackets, canvases, anything, but he also wished to hold down a stable career. The Airbrush Company was offering a job so closely aligned to his new chosen part-time career as an artist, where he'd be talking about the products and meeting like-minded artists, that he says it was a "no-brainer" to accept the position and he started working for the company at the beginning of 2008. As part of his new job, Stuart thoroughly enjoyed demonstrating the Iwata airbrushes on The Airbrush Company's stand at the first London International Custom Show 2008, where he won the Gold award in the Pinstriping & Kustom Graphics magazine's Kustom Airbrush Competition.

Name: Ken Medwell Service: 30 years Current job: Managing Director, Accounts, Sales Previous job: Quantity Surveyor Age: 61 Interests: Cooking, Eating, Wine, France What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: I enjoy giving technical advice to customers. Every day is different.

On the subject of where the organisation has reached today, Alex says, "I am now happy that we have a strong team for continuing the success of the company in the future. Ensuring that among our sales, marketing and tech support personnel we have the practical skills of using the products will continue to be our strategy for providing good advice and support to end-customers and our dealers. As a company expert on airbrushes specifically, we have to know a lot about the use of airbrushes generally across many markets. Also as a distributor, we recognise that our specialised dealers can offer more in-depth knowledge of the application of the airbrush in each of their markets that they focus on. So if you buy from one of our authorised dealers you will benefit not just from their knowledge and advice, but also from the technical backup, warranty and advice that we provide."

Name: Rosemary Medwell (née Connor) Service: 26 years Current job: Sales, Order processing Previous job: Graphic Artist Age: 61 Interests: Gardening, singing, art, crafts with grandchildren What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: I'm really pleased that we are carrying on a family tradition in the airbrush business.

When asked about The Airbrush Company's business model and the underlying philosophy, Alex states "Like all our UK competitors who import other brands, we do sell to direct to the public as well as distribute the products. From the earlier forms of the company, dating back to my grandfather Arthur Connor's entrepreneurial 'cottage industry', hand-manufacturing his own unique design of Conopois airbrush, through the days of Ken and Rosemary's first retail art shop in Worthing and to the present day, we have always been a hybrid retailer/distributor. We have seen a need to maintain this for old loyal customers and new customers alike, because they seek the level of advice and support on airbrushes that The Airbrush Company is proud to offer. The main shift is that we no longer manufacture airbrushes, but have continued the technical and repair service for the main brands.

Name: Alexander Medwell Service: 5 years Current job: Purchasing, Marketing, Web Development Previous job: I.T. Age: 36 Interests: Drumming, stereo photography, stategy board games, painting, running What I like about working at the Airbrush Company?: We have so many markets and so many different roles to fulfil between us, it is never boring working at The Airbrush Company. I get to use every one of my skills and both sides of my brain, from the artistic stuff through to the logical stuff.

"With a 60 year history in manufacturing, selling and servicing airbrushes, The Airbrush Company know what makes a good quality airbrush, so we only stock the best brands, such as Iwata airbrushes. Airbrushes are our core business, but when taking on new ranges of products like paints or other tools, we like to make sure these are also the best available in keeping with the quality of our airbrush brands. We have had to evolve and adapt as we grew in newer markets. But our business model of being a hybrid retailer/distributor has remained relatively unchanged throughout the years and our commitment to selling only the top quality airbrushes, and the support that we believe customers should expect with it, remains our overriding philosophy."

About the future of the company, a project he affectionately calls '4G', Alex says "I have started training the 4th generation to use an airbrush: my son from the age of 4 and my daughter from the age of 2. I'm not forcing them - they asked, 'Daddy, can I have an airbrush?'. I am thinking about the future of the family business now, although I'd never pressure them and I'd expect them to want to pursue their own careers before perhaps finally coming back to The Airbrush Company like I did - fingers crossed!"