Bryce and Richard Capp’s Milton & King wallpaper business in expansion mode

Two brothers, who started a wallpapering business more than a decade ago, aim to have more of the world covered after a 400 per cent growth surge over the last four years.

A PUNT by two brothers to get into the wallpaper business more than a decade ago has grown into a multi award-winning luxury wallpaper design and manufacturing e-commerce powerhouse.

Bryce and Richard Capp’s Milton & King business sold 40,000 rolls of wallpaper in 2021-22, or 400,000 lineal metres.

And while the farmer’s sons never planned to be in wallpaper, the business is growing rapidly and reaches almost every corner of the globe.

“Nothing transforms space like wallpaper. It has amazing transformative powers. You can’t create that warmth, and texture and depth with paint,” Bryce said.

“We’ve had 400 per cent growth in the last four years and we’re hoping for 20 per cent growth this year. We want to try and hit eight figures in revenue in 2022-23 which is not a huge jump for us.”

Milton & King wallpaper in a bathroom.

Named after the brothers’ parents middle names, Milton and King, the company has eight staff in their Toowoomba factory on Ruthven St, eight at their factory/showroom in Dallas, Texas, where Richard lives, and one working in the UK.

“Since we opened our factory in the US a large portion of production has gone over there. We are 10 times bigger in the US than we are in Australia,” Bryce said.

“Our production in Toowoomba has gone back quite a bit so we have a fair bit of capacity in Australia and we’re looking at how we can ramp it up and get more sales and focus more attention on the wholesale market.”

After growing up on a farm near Moree in northern NSW, Bryce, 41, became a graphic designer and Richard, 42, had a background in sales and finance.

The beginning of their business partnership was in 2008 when Bryce returned to Australia after four years overseas and had the “bold idea” of starting a canvas print business”.

He convinced Richard to team up with him and they borrowed $12,000 from their oldest brother to get the business started.

Unfortunately, it didn’t take off and they decided to expand their offering and they produced a brochure outlining their services and one was making wallpaper.

Bryce said they didn’t know the first thing about the wallpaper business.

“But we got a big response and we thought `hang on maybe there’s something in this’,” he said.

“That was in late 2009 and there was no off-the-shelf print digital wallpapering. So we used the only technology that we had which was an old Cannon printer but it had a heap of issues and so we decided to handspray the rolls. We managed to produce a product for a while and turned over about $9000 in our first year.

“We were single and young enough to move back with Mum and Dad up on the Sunshine Coast and it kind of worked. We dragged them into the business as well. So we were surviving.”

Co-founder and head of product of Milton & King Bryce Capp at Magnolia Interiors in Albion. Picture: Tara Croser.

Luckily, technology caught up with their ambitions and over time the found they could compete with and match the industry standard.

“Rather than coming into the industry and saying this is what we will do, we were always driven to match the industry and produce the same sort of product,” said Bryce who is Milton & King head of product.

“Wallpaper has been around for hundreds of years and you’re competing with international producers who produce millions of rolls a year.

“We use digital technology and once we got production to a point that we were comfortable with we scaled it up and we then went online and became basically a direct-to-customer producer.”

Milton & King do some in-house design but mostly collaborate with artists and brands from around the world and their current product ranges from art deco and modern with elaborate murals of animals, birds and scenes, to shapes and floral wallpaper.

Bryce said their typical customer, especially in the US, would be a female between 25 and 55, generally married, house income of around $US100,000 ($AUD147,000) a year, house proud and prepared to take on a DIY renovation.

However, while the US wallpaper market is tipped to reach $US6bn ($AUD$8.76bn) in a couple of years market Australia is a tougher proposition.

“It comes and goes in Australia which is trend driven while in the US and UK it’s pretty constant,” Bryce said.

“The UK and the US are educated about wallpaper. They’ve been using it forever and it’s a big part of their interiors unlike here. In Australia we’re up against the real estate market who wants a white interior so they can sell the house.

“I think that has a lot to do with our top interior designers and there are only few who take risks. The trend is all white, modern clean lines and clear surfaces. But trends do change.”