From Turn of the Century to Cellular

ST has a new associate editor, Robin Donovan. On her first day (appropriately, St. Patrick’s Day, given her surname), I outlined Signage 101 – how the sign industry is categorized and characterized. I explained electric and commercial signs, handcrafted and CAS signs, franchises and independents, custom and quantity signs. For the latter distinction, I explained that quantity-sign manufacturers are the biggest sign companies.

Usually.

I received an emailed article in January from a PR representative for a sign company. It was one of those rather generic treatises, written for a general audience, with nothing specific enough to interest a sign-industry audience. I glance at such things, but don’t pursue.

Usually.

But I was intrigued, and, as I investigated, I discovered a century-old sign company that’s created an interesting niche. The chronology and current strategy bear repeating, as explained by company president Robert Laurencelle and VP of business development Mark Burack.

The niche
Shiner Signs, the parent company, sells custom signs in New England. The $2 million company has never left its Meriden, CT roots. The Signage US subsidiary (which received its own name two years ago) only caters to national companies. It primarily manufactures quantity channel letters; cellular-phone companies are targeted, with approximately 15% of the stores in malls.

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With $7 million in annual sales, 90% is for chains, and 80% comes from five top customers. Signage US handles all of Verizon’s 400+ U.S. stores. It serves T-Mobile on the East Coast from Maine to Virginia.
Each of the 20+ employees is cross trained. To entice customers, Signage US offers bumper-to-bumper, three-year warranties and strives to provide optimum customer service.

“Signs from traditional quantity-sign companies may take 2-3 weeks to ship, but we can do it in 2-3 days,” Mark said. “We’ll offer free engineering analysis to any new cus-tomers. We have them ship us the drawings and an actual sign. We find that 80% of the signs involve some type of shortcut – cheaper materials, not UL listed – and we’ve even found some that were 4% smaller then spec’d.” (The company website, www.signageus.com, depicts an example, up close and personal.)

Additionally, because convincing chains to switch vendors is difficult, Signage US will provide signage for the first store free of charge.

The employees
The Signage US labor philosophy is simple: cross training. It’s not optional. “Workers on the floor can do project management,” Robert says. Over a 1½-year period, a new employee’s typical education moves from vinyl application, to digital printing, to CNC routing and then to sheetmetal. Robert figures, overall, cross training has boosted productivity 600%. With 12 people on the floor, he claims to be able to produce $1 million in signage monthly.

Robert explains, “Each person we hire must have a mechanical or artistic skill set, common sense, and the passion and eagerness to learn new tasks.”

Brian Russo, a 10-year employee, “has been cross-trained to do spray-coating application, channel-letter fabrication, vinyl graphics, goldleaf application, welding, wiring, crating and shipping, and production management.”

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Shawn Rafmuessen was hired as a tubebender two years ago, but no new neon is being produced. Today, Shawn can repair existing neon signs, but he also “fabricates channel letters, assembles plastic trim cap, applies spray coating and can do anything in our vinyl-graphics department and, of course, crating and shipping.”

Six-year employee Troy Huscher began in vinyl graphics “with a talent for creative sign drawings.” He’s subsequently been cross-trained for project management and sign-program logistics.

Raymond Castro, the inside salesman with seven years on staff, “operates all of our Multicam CNC routers, the HP 9000 digital printers and the lamination and application of printed materials. He can fabricate channel letters, install signage, and crate and ship.”

The equipment
Without it, Signage US couldn’t compete. Period. Robert explains, “Without channel-letter fabrication equipment – including CNC routers [MultiCam], channel-letter bending machines [Computerized Cutter’s Accu-Bend] and channel-letter fastening machines – it would be impossible for us to do the volume of work within the tight time frame we have.

“CNC routers alone have increased our volume 10-fold over the speed of a hand-cut letter. Each channel-letter bending machine increases capacity by five times the speed of hand bending letters. Channel-letter fastening machines increase our volume six times the speed of conventional pop-riveting of channel-letter returns.

“The combination of highly skilled, cross-trained workers who mesh well, and automated, sign-production equipment, has increased our capacity 600%. With the same number of employees, what we used to produce in a year can now be manufactured in eight weeks.”

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As an example, Signage US rebranded 395 T-Mobile stores in Connecticut, New York and New Jersey – from site surveys to installation – in five weeks.

Illumination
Robert said neon “is fading into the background,” due to damage in shipping and energy savings other lightsources offer. On the Shiner Signs website, www.shinersigns.com, a page called “A Green Company” outlines energy savings achieved through newer technologies:
•Replacing neon sign lighting with LEDs = energy savings of 75% to 90%, with less maintenance and longer life, all while eliminating mercury content
•Replacing neon with fluorescent lamps = energy savings of 23% to 50%
•Replacing T-12 fluorescent lamps with T-8 or T-5 fluorescent lamps = energy savings of 12% to 27%
•Replacing fluorescent lamps with LEDs = energy savings of 12% to 38%

(Ed. note: These figures were shown to a lighting consultant, who disputed them. However, when Robert was shown the consultant’s comments, he stood by his figures and added, “The LEDs we use require 75% less electricity than the same sign illuminated with neon. LEDs are the future in every aspect of lighting and, unfortunately for us, neon is a dying art form.”)

The history
Henry S. Shiner founded Shiner Signs in 1904. His son, Wayne Shiner, sold the company to Larry Laurencelle (Robert’s father) in 1959. The company became incorporated in 1970. Larry retired in 1982, and Robert has served as owner/president since then.

The company traditionally handled mostly statewide work which, in a state the size of Connecticut, essentially means local work. Robert said the internet really changed the company, because, through a company website, he then began selling out of state in 1997. His first big job entailed more than 400 end-cap displays for a Comp USA (remember it?) rollout.

What Signage US doesn’t do
What a company does is paramount, but it’s also important to decide which tasks are best left to other entities. Simultaneously carving a niche and trying to appeal to a wide swath can be incompatible.

For example, Signage US doesn’t build any high-rise signs, except for shippable, 20-ft.-tall pylon signs. Nor does it handle any installation inhouse. Consequently, Gulf and Irving Oil are its only oil-company clients.

Signage US keeps a list of 700 sign installers, and it will use approximately 500 of them on an annual basis. Roughly 300 are considered to be on the “A” list. Because the permit process can be a gigantic bottleneck for a company that prides itself on turnaround time, Signage US sometimes hires “expediters” to procure permits in pay-to-play cities like Boston, Philadelphia and NYC.

“In New York, this can reduce the turnaround time from a year to a month,” Robert said. At times, the company has even paid people to stand in permit lines.

The bottom line
The strategy seems to be working because Signage US sales haven’t dropped at all in the past two tumultuous years. Two new people were hired in February. Its belief in state-of-the-art equipment and materials hasn’t wavered since having been a beta site for the Gerber Signmaker IVB. It’s identified damage in shipping as a recurring problem, so it now creates its own crating with at least a half inch of insulation around the entire sign. It buys its materials in bulk on a quarterly basis to receive better prices. To enable better communication, Signage US maintains its office and factory on the same floor.