American And Proud

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No need to be, the Sale on the cutter is until Dec. 31st Call and ask if you can get in on it and do a Lay A Way, break it into 3-4 payments and get busy selling stuff to pay it off. Sale includes the cutter with stand, an Extra Year of Warranty, and in your cart will say 15"x50 Yard roll of White Vinyl and 15"x50yard roll of Black Vinyl plus the Free shipping. I paid off everything this afternoon and then as Donna was putting my order all together for the shipping Dept. she called me back and Asked me, How would you like your FREE $100.00 worth of Vinyl? 24"x10 yard rolls (4 rolls) and what colors would you like them to be? Or 2 rolls of 15"x50 Yard rolls your choice of colors? I said I'll take the standard offer of the 15"x50Yard rolls of Black and White (2rolls) So she offered me my choices before just tossing 2 or 4 rolls in a box. I thought that was real nice service. And Donna is my personal Rep so any questions or problems I call HER Direct each and every time. For both the Graphtec and the Flexi and Future sales I make. Go for it !

I just checked my UPS Tracking and the 4 packages will be HERE on Wednesday Dec. 30th! ;D They were sent the Billing info late this afternoon from Beacon Graphics, everything was picked up by UPS at 7:30 PM and it still will be HERE at my door in TWO DAYS and thats FREE Shipping too! Now THAT IS SERVICE. WAY TO GO BEACON ! ;D

If you are using SBE look in the Library, there are a few .

Oh I don't know, seems like your Ideas get swept up into someone elses pretty Fast around here.

Nice work. A little Tip for you- You should WATERMARK any images you upload so they are not just Taken.

Jeez - This guy Can't seem to catch a break without someone Jumping on any idea he posts here! Looks like his wife is now being cut out of a little extra side money now too. Unprofessional. IMHO

My Graphtec CE5000-60 and FlexiSIGN PRO are now - [move] PAID IN FULL ! [/move] I am just waiting on my email from Beacon Graphics with my UPS Tracking # now. Free Shipping Free 15"x50 yard rolls of Black and White Vinyl and a Free Extra year added to the Warranty too. Thanks Beacon Graphics! They are Great to deal with!

I was able to sign up without it.

Payment has been sent. Thanks.

Cool, Thanks! And tell your Wife Thank you as well. PM me how you want it paid for. USPS Money Order or Paypal or I send you a check and when it clears your bank you can mail it to me, however you want to handle it is fine with me.

I'll buy the corel unleashed as I offered before.

If thats for the CE5000-60 (24") I will take it! Skulls ! She did a very Nice job. I just hung up with Beacon Graphics and paid off my Graphtec and FlexiSign Pro, so I should have them here by UPS is a few days.

I was watching this thread and the First thing I wondered was- How much and what kind of INSURANCE do you have/carry? Are you COVERED? MAKE SURE YOU ARE! I was surprized it didn't come up much sooner in this thread. Did you get any Permits needed? No matter what you do, COVER YOUR AS*. Anything from a roof leak to the sign blowing in the wind ripping off the roof and causing damage Will fall in your lap. Without any and all needed Permits if something goes wrong the city and your Insurance carrier will NOT cover you. City will say no permits were applied for we are Not responsible Your insurance will say No permits no inspection NO COVERAGE. Anyone thinking about taking on a job like this had better do their research very well or you could lose everything you own.

I have been watching my local Craigs List here and see Bucket Trucks or Boom Trucks or Lift Trucks whatever you prefer to call them coming up on a regular basis, 3 in the last week are from Sign shops. Some are old AT&T Trucks. In all sizes shapes and forms from full sized Vans with the lift on the roof, the Pick Up Truck style with the boom lift in the back and the bed is all locking compartments, to full sized Semi truck models. Prices are from $2,200.00 on up, But from what I have seen so far I could get a decent lift truck for signs on the fronts of single story strip malls and single poled signs that arent over say 35 feet high. It looks if I got serious I could easily find one here from $2,500.00 - $3,500.00 that are still in decent shape (Not rotted out Rust Buckets.) High milage yes but these are mainly V-8's so maintenance cost wouldn't be much higher than buying any regular pick up or full sized van with high milage, and an older AT&T truck you know had a regular maintenance schedule the whole time AT&T (Phone Company) owned it. I am wondering how many times you Wished you had one of these trucks while doing a sign job? Did you use a ladder or two and the whole while wishing dang I wish I had a lift truck? Ever turn down jobs because you didn't have one and no access to borrow one? I realize if your content on making Decals and a few Coroplast sighs one of these is not for you, but I want to offer More. Installations of signs that are 4'x8' mounted on 4"x4"'s, refacing electric signs with new vinyl as businesses change in strip malls, changing burned out bulbs, use it for whatever comes my way. I want the Installation part of the Business as well, from sticking white vinyl lettering to storefront windows to sign maintenance. I doubt I will start out with full electric sign installs, those I may avoid doing. I think having one would pay for itself. What are your thoughts on this subject? If you own one please share your thoughts. If you don't own one please share your thoughts. Thanks

lol Nice song and a Merry Christmas to you as well.

If you are paying $50.00 (shipping included?)for the A frame you need to Mark Up that cost to the customer. If you were doing just a Coroplast 18"x24" sign for example, you buy them by bulk at say a $1.00 each, well you have a Mark Up on that Coroplast of say 50-80% added on to the customer. So that 18"x24" that you paid $1.00 for you mark it Up to $1.50- $1.80 for a Single Sign. Same goes for the supplied "H" wire Stepstake add a 50-80% Mark Up on that too. So if your A Frame at $50.00 Includes the shipping and or gas/time to go get it locally you should be charging say a 50% Mark Up on the A Frame alone, so $75.00 for it is pretty standard retail mark up. Now if you find you can buy 5-10 A Frames at one time for Less then $50.00, your mark up is based on your cost for buying several at one time. Saving both you and your customer. A Coke for Example at a fast food place the BIG one costs them about 7 Cents, you pay at least a Buck or more. Mens Clothing- they have a 100% Mark Up, The store buys that shirt at $10.00 and sells it to you for $20.00. Womans Clothing has a 200-300% Mark Up. So even when they are having a blow out Sale, all they are losing is a larger Profit Margin. And they Must have these annual sales to get the left over older stock OUT the door to make Room for the new stock coming in. Clothing stores buy a year in advance. Same with the Sign Shop you buy this stuff in bulk, at a discount, wholesale, and store it until needed, you sell them at a Profit , Not at your cost. No matter what retail store you go into EVERYTHING in it thats for sale has a Mark Up cost, thats the only way you can stay in business. Even places like SAMS club has a Mark Up, they buy in Bulk, Wholesale, and pass the Bulk Retail, pricing onto you, Not their Wholesale price. A Frame -$50.00 18"x24" Coroplast -$1.00 Your Cost so far= $51.00 Now Add the cost of the Vinyl, PLUS its Mark Up, and the cost of your Labor, do you have a Shop labor cost per hour figured out? at $99.00 bucks your charging $48.00 You did not mention it but are you doing BOTH sides? If so now your getting even Less. $24.00 per sign not counting the other coroplast. Break your Estimates down to include everything A Frame=$75.00- $100.00 2- 18"x24" Coroplast Blanks $1.50 Each = $3.00 Design Time @ Shop Rate of_ _ = ? Materials Used Vinyl- ? Labor Rate= Break it all down and the customer can see what is costing what, and not just a total and see that the actual sign in not the total cost. I found this doing a search for a vinyl sign estimating sheet to show a breakdown sheet but couldn't find one posted. This is from 2006. So it is already 4 years OLD. It may help to see it tho. See how your pricing compares. http://www.signsbygeorge.com/estimatesheet.pdf Another thing you can do is Call 2-3 local sign shops and ask for a quote, tell them you want an A Frame and with what you need on it even down to the fonts you plan on using. And see how you compare. I have a Book on order How to Estimate & Price Signs I hope it is helpful and I keep reading up on actual sign shop pricing to educate myself.

I am sure I will love them. Thanks. As Planned, I still have the whole winter left to just practice with everything here. And then I may have to keep on practicing for awhile after that. Until a legal case pending is resolved I can't do much else. But buy the equipment and practice, save up some cash for a few months after the Holidays and I will be buying a bucket lift truck, then after all is settled I will buy a wide format printer. I bought a few Books from Amazon this week- Mastering Layout: On the Art of Eye Appeal, By: Mike Stevens Logo Design for Small Business, By: Dan Antonelli And, How to Estimate & Price Signs , By: Dan Hale Should be helpful reading.

Well I spent like a wildman on Christmas again this year for the kids, what the heck, it's only once a year and to see their Happy Smiling Faces Christmas morning makes it all worth while. Left me a touch short to pay off the Graphtec and FlexiSIGN PRO until Monday Dec. 28th, I was Hoping I had it by Christmas. I did talk to Donna this morning and sent $1,000.00 to Beacon. That leaves me at $400.00 to pay it off on Monday. I did manage to get a few more Extras tossed into my original deal. I had put this on Lay-A-Way with Beacon, and since then the Graphtec CE5000 - 60 went on Sale by itself. So as I was paying today I asked Donna IF I pay this off Before Dec. 31st do I get the same offer on the Graphtec as you are now offering until Dec. 31st? ($1,495.00, Free Ship, 15"x50 yrd roll white vinyl, 15"x50yrd roll black vinyl, Additional 1 year warranty) She looked up our original deal and said yes I can include the Promo offer going on on the Graphtec IF it's paid off by Dec. 31st. So I now get FREE Shipping (Saved me the $44.00 that was added to my invoice before), Plus $100.00 worth of Vinyl, (VECTOR PRO-V5 GLOSS WHITE UNP 15"X50 YD and VECTOR PRO-V5 GLOSS BLACK UNP 15"X50 YD) And- BEACON ADD'L 1-YR CUTTER WARRANTY. So that gives a 3 year warranty on the cutter. Nice. I could have paid it off Today, but I don't like to deplete my Cash account under a certain amount for Emergencies so Monday will be soon enought to pay it off. Can't wait to get it here tho and start using them.

Did you try looking at Brands Of The World for it?

Even easier is if you took the time to do a little research. Click on wall letters, type the word "Home" then click CONTINUE, click on each font they offer, and you get a PREVIEW, of the wall lettering youd be ordering and you would find out it is called "Passions". A Quick and EASY Google Search for "Passions font" and you get This> http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/typesetit/passions-conflict/ SIMPLE and EASY. Search a little further and you may find it free.

Did you try what the font?

Thanks Fader, I think it's a common sense approach to esimating and pricing. I hope everyone looks at this post I made as well, when things go Wrong, you'll be glad to priced correctly. http://forum.uscutter.com/index.php/topic,24426.msg193688.html#msg193688 Another thought I did not mention here is- NEVER NEVER NEVER EVER, NEVER (I did say NEVER) Listen to that old BS line of- "Hey if you cut me a Deal on this first job I will send more work your way." That is the oldest Bull Sh*t line in the book. They want you to do it for them as Cheaply as possible while lieing to you that more work will be sent your way. This is done in ALL trades you get these people, and 99.9% you Never see nor hear from them again. They are on to the next vulnerable business that falls for that old suckers line. Here is how I have handled these types in the past -As soon as they say that line of crap, I say to them, Heres the deal, this IS my price to do this job for you, it is already a completely Fair price and one I think you will find hard to beat for the quality work and materials I will provide for you. IF After you have sent me say 5-10 More jobs, then and Only then can we even begin to start talking about a loyal retuning customer discount. All the while looking them straight in the eyes as you tell them. Projects Confidence and lets them know, YOU are in charge of Your business, and not a one time potential customer wanting some kind of a major pricing Deal on Imaginary false promises of future work. That, by the way, IF, and thats a Major IF, they did send you another job they again will want it CHEAP and you can bet they will say but you did the first one for this much, I thought you could do this one even Cheaper now. Trust me you are gonna hear this line of crap from potential customers over and over again. If you fall for it, they get your work cheap and walk away saying "SUCKER!" NEVER fall for it and have a response like I have presented at the ready, be polite but Firm that No discounts will begin until you (they) are an Established Returning Regular Customer. PERIOD.

Thanks Dan, Mind posting some pics of it?

Typo's happen Mader. I was only kidding, heck I type with One finger on one hand just huntin and a peckin away here. I can actually type that way pretty Fast, but dont ask me to look away from the keys as I am typing. LOL Talking to a friend for a few years long distance in chat rooms gave me my one fingered speed. lol Thanks for the nice replies, I kind of thought I would catch a bunch of slack about this, I know it can get to be a touchy subject. I just want to let people know it is OK to make a Profit, if your at home and your work is Good and up to par with any shop than you Should be paid as well. Of course if you suck at this you won't be. lol This is for people starting out and don't really know what the Value of this is to Businesses. There is No shame in making a decent living. An Honest wage. My hope is anyone that reads these posts will see that they don't and should not just give their Work away, because one day it just may be your Only source of Bread & Butter. Using a Simple to use basically Free estimate guide (Donate a few bones their way if you use it to keep it Free) can help guide you to sencible estimating that you can rely on that one banner comes up a certain price, then 5 months lather you are making the equivalent banner and it will be the same price. Consistancy. Thanks for reading. And Happy Bidding!