170 YEARS ON AND STILL PION"EAR"ING

Independent hearing specialist Broom Reid & Harris are celebrating their 170^th year in business making them one of the oldest running independent companies in Exeter. Cast your mind back to 1841, the year that BR&H opened their doors on Queen Street as a pharmacy and opticians. Less than a decade earlier the city had suffered an outbreak of cholera and there was a real need for pharmacies to make healthcare of the day readily available.

The pharmacists would wrap prescriptions for ailments like indigestion, influenza, coughs and headaches in a white paper bag and seal it with wax. Many of these were exclusive to BR&H and over 120 recipes can be seen hand written in a book over 100 years old now on display at BR&H's practice in the Guildhall Shopping Centre, along with other artefacts from their 170 year history.

Looking closely at old photographs of BR&H reveals an Aladdin’s cave of items: artificial eyes and knee caps, oxygen, cameras, binoculars and barometers. But it was none of these things that the company would eventually be famed for.

BR&H introduced electric hearing aids in the 1920s. At the time they were considered to be something of a gimmick; a fad. Today over two million people in the UK use hearing aids and another four million would benefit from them. 

In the early days it was the opticians who would fit them, and even they didn't realise just how pioneering they were.  Practice owner Curtis Alcock explains, “They would run upstairs to the glasses workshop to announce the sale of a hearing aid which, I'm told, was greeted by great cheering and hollering! You have to remember that those first hearing aids were so large and cumbersome you would have to set it on the table or wear it on your body; no wonder people thought it would never take off!” 

In the early 1940’s, Ron Silmon joined BR&H, carrying out general work within the pharmacy. He was to eventually develop BR&H's dedicated hearing aid dispensary. The invention of the transistor in the 1950’s meant hearing aids were fast becoming smaller and more discreet, a far cry from the original bulky designs. As demand increased, it was no longer enough for hearing aids just to be a “bolt-on service for opticians”: to do it properly required dedicated experience and expertise, and Ron began laying those foundations, implementing the best practices of the day and sourcing cutting-edge technology to ensure his clients had the best results.

When talks of a new Guildhall Shopping Centre for Exeter meant relocation for BR&H from their premises on Queen Street, plans were made to merge the optical and photographic side with other businesses. BR&H was now free to focus on hearing aids. Ron moved the practice into the Guildhall Shopping Centre, where it remains to this day “tucked away discreetly” on the Higher Market Gallery. 

Ron has long since retired, but his commitment to providing unrivalled private hearing care in Devon continues today through Curtis Alcock, who now owns BR&H with his wife. After 170 years, it's reassuring to know that not only is Exeter home to possibly the longest established hearing care practices in the country, but BR&H is still a name synonymous with personal service, traditional values and pioneering cutting-edge technology.