Brandon Hulcoop, 24, said the 16-month period where he found himself unemployed was the “absolute deepest, darkest hell.”
Brandon, from Plymouth, is blind and applied for a thousand jobs but was never successful – something that prompted him to start his own business.
After studying at the Royal National College for the Blind and earning several qualifications, including an extended business diploma, level three Braille, and an A-level in English Literature, Brandon got a job at a mental health agency in 2021, but felt they were discriminatory towards him because of his disability.
He said: “They didn’t understand I needed help sometimes. My screen reader [a device to help blind or visually impaired people] has certain things it can’t always pick up and certain things it can’t do, and I would ask for help. There were periods where I was sat there for quite long periods of time not doing anything at all.”
Brandon said he was told by his bosses that they could terminate his contract with a week’s notice and that he wasn’t doing his job properly.
He left that job in April 2022 after it had a poor impact on his mental health and describes being depressed during that time.
“After that, I must have applied for at least 1,000 jobs. I was spending 9 to 5 every day looking for jobs for 16 months.
“I found the whole experience depressing because everybody else was either at school or work and I was at home by myself, applying for jobs and getting rejection after rejection. I felt like I was in a black hole,” he said.
Brandon’s story highlights the struggles many young people are currently facing after a report from former health and social care minister Alan Milburn found more than a million young people are not in education, employment or training – the highest level in more than 12 years.
Feelings of exclusion
Out of the thousand jobs Brandon applied for, he got only about 50 interviews, with the rest of the employers ignoring or rejecting him for a lack of experience.
He said: “I went to one job interview, and they asked me how I would deal with Excel, Microsoft Word and PowerPoint. I explained that with the help of my screen reader, I can do exactly the same as a sighted person and I explained the processes.
“Two days later, I got a rejection email saying: ‘We don’t feel you could do this job due to your sight loss’.”
Brandon said he had received a fair few emails from employers alluding to the fact that they didn’t think he would be able to do the job or use the programs.
After months of rejection, Brandon decided he would set up his own business if no one would hire him. His firm, All Things Dotty, was launched in April 2023.
“I woke up one morning and thought if nobody else is going to give me the chance, I’ll give myself a chance, and I’ll ask for help.
“The King’s Trust enabled me to set up my business and assigned me a great mentor. We won the King’s Trust Enterprise Award last year and I met His Majesty King Charles in Buckingham Palace at a reception the day before the awards ceremony, so it’s been a fantastic journey,” Brandon said.
All Things Dotty provides accessibility services for the visually impaired, including Braille, large print, and audio.
It currently has three people on work experience – two from the local job centre and one intern from City College Plymouth, who is blind and who the firm has helped get into the Royal National College.Brandon said: “If you’ve got anything you want in an accessible format, we can do it.
“We also do accessibility audits for businesses; we do Braille and large print menus. We’re currently doing bus timetables in audio and signage for bus stops in Hereford, in Braille. The business is going strong.”
He felt employers in the UK were letting blind young people down and there needs to be more willingness to take them on.
“Employers are just letting us down. They’re saying we haven’t got the experience. Or they don’t feel we can do this job because we can’t see. They’re actually putting barriers in the way.”
He has set up the UK Sight Collective, which is a group made up of visually impaired people, to try and tackle issues they are currently facing.
They released their first position paper, which found that only one in four visually impaired people are in employment.
Brandon said: “I’m trying to raise awareness. That’s why, as a collective, we are trying to do as much as we can around the whole country, alongside other sight loss charities, to make that difference.”
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