We make all types of signs including those with digital images, but that's not our main focus. High end projects and dimensional handcrafted work is what we are getting known for and only a handfull of us craftsman type are willing to do the nice stuff. The rest just want to kill each other in the vinyl bidding wars. I just keep raising the prices and the work keeps coming.
There are two people in this small town now with VersaCams knocking heads. Why would I want to get in that game? When they are tired of making a nickel on decals I'll still be laying gold leaf.
We spent quite a bit last year for printing, but still not enough to pay for a unit, materials, software, ink and not to mention just learning to run and babysit the equipment. I would much rather design the image, send it off and go do something creative while waiting for UPS to drop off the decals. Printed, cut, masked and ready to mark up and apply.
The same goes for heavy work such as crane installs. We do a few big jobs each year, but not enough to buy a crane truck, pay insurance and maintenance and an employee to run it. I really don't want to have to run one myself. We use a local sign co. that specializes in that and it works out for everyone.
Maybe there will come a time when I have a bigger shop and maybe an employee who is able to handle that department. Then I would consider having our own equipment. We just had one large sign installed and it cost us $400. You would probably have to do at least 3-4 of those a month just to make the payment and ins. alone.
We are also designing more entry monuments and many have rock or brick work. I don't plan on becoming a stone mason soon. The list goes on...
Focus on great design and then produce it in the most efficient and profitable way you can, even if means "outsourcing".
1. Allows you to offer the best of quality (because you can use the best suppliers with the best equipment)
and 2. Allows you to make more money in less time. You can outsource what you need while doing what you do best. Everything gets done more quickly which means you can move on to the next job.
I outsource many things. I don't have to know how to actually perform the tasks, I just have to know WHO knows how to do them best!
-------------------- Randy Graphic Details Promotional Merchandise Distributor South Glens Falls, NY Posts: 381 | From: South Glens Falls, NY USA | Registered: Mar 2001
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Back when digital printing was just coming over the horizon I drooled over all the various machines at the trade shows and could hardly wait until we had one set up in the studio. In the mean time we began getting other folks to do the printing for us. Sometimes a print would have to be done several times to get it to match the original artwork...all at the printer's expense, of course.
Now, it seems like there is a digital printer on every corner and the prices for finished products keep going down. Just this week we had two prints done at a very reasonable cost and all we had to do was drop off a CD and pick up the print a few days later. We've also had work done out of town and been very satisfied with the results.
One of the local shops just took delivery of a new VersaCamm and will have it up and running within a week, so now we have a source of printing within a half mile of us. Another local shop that had a VersaCamm just went out of business.
Like Mark, I finally realized that installs were not the most pleasant experiences, but I still thought "I can do this myself and save money". After wasting more time and energy than it was worth I finally submitted and let a sign company with a crane take my place. Much easier and a lot more fun.
But...when it came to outsourcing dimensional work, it just wasn't as easy. It was a hassle to try to design something that could be easily explained to the person doing the router work. And there was no one nearby that we could use, so that meant a lot of shipment and time. And since there was not a lot of compeition in that area, the prices charged were still a little more than I wanted to pay.
So, along comes the ShopBot PRTalpha and we no longer have to mess with sandblasting or outsourcing router work. If we had only been doing an occassional dimensional sign it would have been different, but that is our main line of work.
I hear through the grapevine that Mark is shopping for a flat bed router and a new shop to put it in. When that happens I'm sure that the oursourcing picture will change, and we will all see even more spectacular designs from Yearwood.
[ March 24, 2007, 11:17 AM: Message edited by: Raymond Chapman ]
-------------------- Chapman Sign Studio Temple, Texas chapmanstudio@sbcglobal.net Posts: 6306 | From: Temple, Texas, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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I just spent a day cutting, sanding and priming a set of 1" thick HDU logos for an office wall. I really enjoy working on a jig saw and band saw, so that part was enjoyable. At the end of the day, however, I had to question whether it would have been more efficient to outsource to a friend with a router.
Like Mike said, sometimes it's hard to find the right source, but it can be very rewarding when you do. I've been working with a company who does all my channel letters and installation. I have a repeat customer who opens about 3 or 4 new clinics a year and all are cookie cutter designs. With one phone call, I bank about 2 grand a pop.
Outsourcing is NOT a bad word.....
-------------------- www.signcreations.net Sonny Franks Lilburn, GA 770-923-9933 Posts: 4115 | From: Lilburn, GA USA | Registered: Feb 1999
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Sonny, I'm painting today on some small HDU letters for the same purpose as yours. The difference is I had a friend with a CNC cut them for me. There was some sanding involved, and the cost of the service was much less than if I had done them by hand, figuring in my hourly rate.
-------------------- Mike gatlinburg Sign Crafters Posts: 1051 | From: Gatlinburg, TN | Registered: Oct 2005
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I make my living off of small sign companies that outsource their CNC router work to me. They don't have the room or enough demand for routed work to buy a flat bed router. I sub for about 8 small companies, and all together they keep my ShopBot pretty busy. I also do in-ground installs for a few of them that don't like to get their hands dirty or spend time digging holes when they could be out selling more work.
Everybody makes $$$ and everybody's happy. They don't have to buy a CNC router, and I don't have to deal with Joe Public.
We tried to put off the getting the large format printer. We outsourced. We ruined prints, had to call for more, customer waiting for his truck...not good.
If you are doing small trailer wraps and vehicles, you need the printer in the shop. The customer doesn't have time and will not tolerate a two day extra wait while you reorder prints.
You also have to deal with quality issues if you outsource, issues you could control right then and there. Our printer does not run every day, but the one day it runs during the week pays the whloe monthly payment and then some.....the other days it runs generates shop rent, and utility bill money and more. And, we screw around with it printing neat stuff for our house and gifts for others. Its fun!
As you know, we build EIFS monument signs for other sign shops. Outsourcing this work makes more sense because this type job comes along once a year for a few sign shops, and almost never for the majority of signs shops. Taking the training, learning the plastering trade skills and buying all the necessary tools does not justify a one sign a year scenario.
So, yes I agree that outsourcing has a big place in the sign shop. So does owning your own equipment for speedy production and quality control.
We work with over 350 sign shops currently. (most have never even had us bid on a monument sign because they just don't get the orders) And each of those signs shops are unique as to what they do and the markets they work in.
Each shop has to determine for themselves what needs to be outsourced and what equipment they need to in the shop, because as I have found out, you can't lump them all into one category.
[ March 24, 2007, 02:32 PM: Message edited by: Dave Draper ]
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I agree with Dave in what he was saying.. Each shop is unique and so are their needs.. We purchased a shop a year ago that did mainly vinyl signs.. If he couldnt do it in vinyl he usually just had them go elsewhere. We decided 3 months into owning the shop it was in our best interest to purchase a versacamm. For us it was a good move. It has never failed to generate income over and way above its purchase price and materials cost. Along with the uses for our regular customers..we have been wholesaleing to a few shops that dont have printers, and are fast becoming pretty well known for the quality we produce.. We have a major sign designer who lives about 250 miles from us.. that will now only use us for his printing.. as we check, double check.. color match.. and turn out a product that is premium quality. .. and He has told us we charge him 2 times what some local to him charge, but they dont get it right.. We even double check His spelling as everyone is human.. and have saved him once from having the cost of reprinting it.. when we found a spelling error.
We outsource big installs, neon and any routed type jobs as we dont have the space, time or knowledge to do many of them.
-------------------- sue brown american instant signs pasadena, calif Posts: 90 | From: southern california | Registered: Jul 2006
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A few years ago, this "all paint guy" took on a job with a lot of subtext and decided to sub it out. Not what he'd have considered in the past, but it seemed the better way to go for this particular job. Cost effective and not too complicated, just a small part of the whole job. There was only one "all vinyl guy" around town back then he'd known for years and he called him a few times, leaving messages. The all vinyl guy didn't call back and the due date was coming up for the sign.
It was tedious, but the paint guy got through the job. As a result of this failure to get a subcontractor, he started shopping around for a vinyl cutter of his own. He tripped over a good deal on a small, used one. Nothing spectacular, but it did what he needed it to along side his paint work. A couple of weeks after, the "all vinyl guy" returned his calls asking what was needed. The "all paint guy" explained that he'd gotten his own plotter and was all set.
While shopping around on the internet for vinyl, the paint guy tripped over Letterville. He soon was going to meets, learning not only better painting skills, but how improve his vinyl work as well. Since then, he's done well enough upgrade his equipment, not only for cutting vinyl, but for airbrushing and hand painting as well. He's even done a few hand carved and sandblasted signs since then. He's no longer known as the "all paint guy" around town, but more as a "sign guy" who still uses paint.
So what happened to the "all vinyl" guy? He closed his doors a while ago, as have a few other "all vinyl" shops since then.
What's the former "all paint guy" working on lately? . . . . . . I'll tell ya when I'm done with it. Rapid
-------------------- Ray Rheaume Rapidfire Design 543 Brushwood Road North Haverhill, NH 03774 rapidfiredesign@hotmail.com 603-787-6803
I like my paint shaken, not stirred. Posts: 5648 | From: North Haverhill, New Hampshire | Registered: Apr 2003
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I agree with Dave and Sue. As I was mentioning on Monte's thread, it wasn't until I had my printer here that I could really figure out how to get satisfactory results from it. It wasn't the supplier's fault it was mine. I am a tweaker.
Yes, Hi, my name is Deri and I am a tweaker. I think I've been a tweaker since I started my business. A little more red, a shade darker...... I'm not a closet tweaker, but a tweaker none the less.
-------------------- Deri Russell Wildwood Signs Hanover, Ontario
You're just jealous 'cause the little voices only talk to me. Posts: 1904 | From: Hanover, Ontario, Canada | Registered: Dec 1998
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