How Pibox helps The Merry Beggars deliver 165 episodes per year

Who are The Merry Beggars?

Relevant Radio’s entertainment division, The Merry Beggars, is enjoyed by thousands of Catholic families internationally. Peter Atkinson, Founder and Executive Producer, and Kevin Conroy, Audio Director, both at The Merry Beggars, worked passionately to create wonderful stories like A Christmas Carol and On the Night Train that represent values, morals, and beliefs, bringing beauty into every Catholic home. 


Although The Merry Beggars specializes in audio storytelling resembling vintage radio shows, they are involved in all the essential processes of media production, including scriptwriting, casting, sound design, and post-production. Their content, distributed broadly through radio, aligns with the definition of Broadcast Media Production. 


This case study dives into a journey of challenges and triumphs, illustrating how one company's struggles were transformed by a single strategic decision. Specifically, it highlights how The Merry Beggars managed to reach new heights with the help of Pibox.

Identifying Key Challenges

For The Merry Beggars, productions typically take over nine months from beginning to end, which results in over two thousand pages of scripts and more than forty hours of sound-designed content. Such a massive amount of work could not be done without the involvement of hundreds of specialists: actors, script writers, sound designers, etc. 


Effectively managing processes while prioritizing the creation of a top-quality product is a formidable challenge. A significant hurdle arose when Kevin Conroy, the Audio Director, found himself overwhelmed by the sheer volume of audio files requiring weekly review. This situation resulted in workflow inefficiencies, leading to multiple drafts and an increasing number of episodes not making it in time.


To address this, The Merry Beggars sought a solution that would empower Kevin to simplify the audio review process, identify obvious errors more swiftly, and facilitate remote collaboration. This would enable the team to manage a higher volume of episodes without compromising on quality.

Transforming challenges into opportunities

The remarkable success of The Merry Beggars was made possible by identifying critical bottlenecks in their workflow, which was twofold. Initially, it was inefficient for the Audio Director to expend valuable resources on basic audio reviews in the beginning of each project draft. To resolve this, the company brought in a specialist to do this job.


However, further improvements were still necessary. The second challenge involved the frustrating and time-consuming task of manually typing timestamps. As production levels grew, it became evident that a more efficient method was required for managing audio notes across hundreds of drafts.

How The Merry Beggars uses Pibox

The integration of Pibox has brought substantial benefits to The Merry Beggars team. Each project begins with an audio-visual meeting, followed by the creation of approximately five drafts, each ranging from twelve to twenty minutes in length. This is then followed by an initial round of feedback. 

Thanks to Pibox, the team can now consolidate their audio notes on a single platform, right on a specific track, significantly enhancing efficiency throughout various production phases—all without the need for manually written timestamps.


Furthermore, incorporating Pibox into the company’s workflow has ensured that specialists are aligned on different versions of takes, effectively eliminating miscommunication. With Pibox, The Merry Beggars now has terabytes of audio files organized in one accessible location. The time savings are remarkable, with note-taking estimated to be ten times faster for the note-giver and three times faster for the note-receiver.

The results of integrating Pibox for The Merry Beggars

Pibox manages the workflow, you create

The Merry Beggars crafts more than just beautiful stories; it fosters the vision of a better world. Such a noble mission requires a strong and clear voice to resonate. Pibox empowers the team to concentrate on this vision, leaving frustrating administrative tasks in the background.

More than just an audio management tool, Pibox allows you to make a leap toward achieving seemingly impossible goals. It streamlines complex audio production workflows, enhances collaboration across large teams, and minimizes administrative burdens, allowing for greater focus on creativity. Pibox seamlessly integrates into any existing system.