The strange case of A-Style

The history of A-Style started in 1999 when Marco Bruns, a young graphic design student, invented a logo consisting of an A and two points on the left of the letter. The apparently harmless graphic hid actually an erotic reference, and that's maybe why Bruns's friends enjoyed it some much. Bruns decides to turn it into a series of stickers to spread across Milan, sticking it on the traffic lights of the city. 

Soon, those yellow and black stickers invade the city and begin to multiply in the rest of Europe, drawing the interest of the press. From La Repubblica to GQ, from Max to Il Corriere della Sera, everyone asks themselves the sense of the mysterious "A". The hype around that goliardic game between friends who love surfing and snowboarding continues to grow so much that someone suggests Bruns turn it into a brand. The Milanese creative first produced some T-shirts, which were sold in a shop in the city centre, but the demand was so high that, thanks to a partnership with Simone Sidoti, the owner of the company Fin.esse, the project evolved into a proper streetwear collection. 

In the end, creativity is the key to success. Also in communication. Last year, for example, I read that the Tour de France cycling race is the most popular sporting event in the world after the Olympics. So, I went near a stage of the Tour and, at night, I drew my logo in maxi version on the asphalt of the hairpin bends. The "A" with the two dots the next day was shot on TV all over the world and even the cyclist Lance Armstrong was photographed next to the giant logo.

The ":A" as a brand, a rather uncommon example, was born long before it was related to any product. The spread through stickers dates back several years ago and the brand became known by turning stuck to cars, vans, traffic lights, etc.. without any economic purpose. Until a few months ago I didn't know what guerrilla marketing was and, to be honest, I didn't even intend to make a product with that simple but powerful ":A". No strategies, no marketing plans, no budget, but a lot of ideas. I'm not saying that I was the first to put stickers on traffic lights but maybe I'm among the few to have put under the eyes of many a brand representing naked and raw sex without offending and annoying anyone.

Even in the years of the boom, Bruns preferred to talk about "artistic movement" or "street art", as we read in a 2002 post:

The strength of A-style, I think, lies in the brand itself, in the movement and in the freedom it communicates. Those who, aware, know these things, trust in A-style and identify with it. I'm satisfied with how I proposed my ":A" and how it was accepted; the next step, the creation of A-style clothing, was a natural evolution of the brand's diffusion. Don't talk to me about the exploitation of street art or whatever. A-style does not exploit anyone because it was born in the street, more precisely in Milan, more precisely at the traffic light under my house and even more precisely by my own hand.

As happened to other Italian brands at the height of their popularity in the early 2000s, popularity gained as fast as it was then lost, from Sweet Years to Guru, the appeal of A-style has gradually vanished. As a result of the change in the aesthetic taste of the new generation, the items with the ":A" have been forgotten, left in the forgotten pages of Amazon.