posted
A few days ago there was a great thread here on the BB about installation of digital prints that helped me out alot just as I was about to do my first big job (at least big for me) - both sides of a 7' x 16' delivery van with rivits and seams, plus roll up door in back and front over the cab.
It was a great learning curve experience (meaning that it just about drove me crazy) but it is now done and out of my hair. The prints were done by someone else and shipped to me. I applied transfer tape and installed the rascals. What a new world!
Now, my questions is: do you have a sq. ft. charge for these things or do you figure on a time/material basis, or do you just pray a lot? As it turned out, it took a lot more time than I had estimated, but towards the end the panels were going up much more quickly. This was my learning experience, but I've learned just about all I want to about installing digital prints - now I want to be able to make some money. My price came out to about $3 a sq. ft.
Your comments are appreciated.
------------------ Chapman Sign Studio Temple, Texas rchapman@vvm.com
Posts: 6306 | From: Temple, Texas, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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posted
I bet you can make a rivet look in record time now!
I hope the $3 per sf was for install only. If so thats not too bad. I can get a side done in about three hours with a full print on Controltac.
If I am installing vinyl the customer supplies I always bid it out by the hour with a rough estimate given. This covers your rear when you get someones prints that have been sitting around for years and its a real pain in the ars to install. I had a guy give me some big prints that were on intermediate jumky vinyl that he wanted wrapped on his van - took forever and the vinyl shrank and popped out of the the channels within a week, cant say he wasnt warned...
I only wish that the learning curve for me to do the kind of work you do would be as easy as you learning to wrap a truck!
------------------ Brian Stoddard Expressions Signs 2621 244th Ave NE Sammamish WA 98074
While I was doing all those rivets I kept thinking what a terrible life it would be to have to get up every morning and having only that to look forward to. It was a fun project, but not fun enough to want to do it all the time. Now I have more admiration for those who do such a great job on those body wraps - it is not nearly as easy as it looks.
Brian - thanks for the nice words. And, the price was just for putting on the prints. This was for a local outlet of a chain store and the printing was done by someone else. It took me a lot longer than three hours to do one side. I think I'll go back to designing, where I don't have to run up and down a ladder.
------------------ Chapman Sign Studio Temple, Texas rchapman@vvm.com
[This message has been edited by Raymond Chapman (edited August 03, 2001).]
Posts: 6306 | From: Temple, Texas, USA | Registered: Nov 1998
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