New Guy Beginner sign guy from Port Coquitlam, BC, Canada (Moving soon)

[SignEST]

Hello, this forum is a really good resource for a variety of information. I figured I might as well sign up and stop lurking.

I have worked in the sign industry only 3 years but it was in a relatively small shop with more work than it could realistically handle. The big upside of the job was being able to do the whole thing from start to finish.
It's also a huge city I live in so there was a lot to see.New places and people, got to shake a lot of hands.

My problem arose from never being involved in the design and print part of the job, big part of my reason for quitting. It wasn't a matter of me not being able to take it on but rather it being the cushy job and why would anyone want to do all the dirty work.
I did get to set up the files for CNC routing and run the machine, that was fun , got to do all the laminating, trimming, application. I didn't mind doing because it was a much easier job compared to my usual day to day. It's also the reason why I'm keen on joining the community. Have to learn from somewhere.
I can do most of the fabrication, painting and installations but never had the chance to use the printers.

I'm going to be starting a small business to offer signage and lettering in Europe, Estonia to be specific.
I'm interested in purchasing a printer, laminator, plotter(preferably with contour). I thought about looking into printer/plotter combo but it would be too slow for bigger production runs if they ever come to my shop. Would it be too difficult of a hurdle to learn how to use a printer and a plotter? How big of a learning curve am I looking at ?
Here are some pictures from when I was still working https://goo.gl/photos/8DSTUbnyp7ybevSV9 . Nothing great.
It's getting really late, probably wrote a bunch of politician style mumbo jumbo in there somewhere, hopefully I fit in.

 

[The Big Squeegee]

2 from OK USA

 

[ikarasu]

Used to live in poco... Now I'm in Langley!

It took me 2 days to learn the basics of printing and cutting .another week or so to learn it properly. And it's been 2-3 years, and im still learning.

Don't get me wrong... You can learn in a few days how to use it. A little longer to learn what materials to use for what job, etc... But there will always be something new to learn.

Designing is different. That takes a lot of experience, and you have to learn illustrator/Photoshop or their equivalent. It takes a long time to get good at.

Its also pretty expensive. And not a good idea to buy stuff without knowing how saturated your market is. Living in poco, you probably know there's 50 shops in poco, 50 in Langley, 50 in Burnaby, 50 in Abbotsford, 100 in Vancouver, 100 in Surrey... etc. I'd never open my own business here by purchasing all the equipment first, without having some long term customers. You'd go bankrupt in a year.


My suggestion is to find a sign company in Europe wherever your moving, and outsource to them .you can practice your own design work, then just get stuff printed / fabricated by outsourcing.

Machines are expensive - you mentioned CNC, they range from 20k for the cheap ones, to 100k for decent ones. Printers go from 10-60k, plotters around 6k, laminators 6k... Etc. Its not a cheap field to get into, and I'm sure Europe is more costly than Canada .

Start slow, and work your way up. Heck, I'd try to get a Europe job in a sign shop for awhile first.

Things are different there than here - they're on a healthy environment kick. A lot of the vinyls and stuff they use over there, is way different than what they use here.

 

[SignEST]

Used to live in poco... Now I'm in Langley!

It took me 2 days to learn the basics of printing and cutting .another week or so to learn it properly. And it's been 2-3 years, and im still learning.

Don't get me wrong... You can learn in a few days how to use it. A little longer to learn what materials to use for what job, etc... But there will always be something new to learn.

Designing is different. That takes a lot of experience, and you have to learn illustrator/Photoshop or their equivalent. It takes a long time to get good at.

Its also pretty expensive. And not a good idea to buy stuff without knowing how saturated your market is. Living in poco, you probably know there's 50 shops in poco, 50 in Langley, 50 in Burnaby, 50 in Abbotsford, 100 in Vancouver, 100 in Surrey... etc. I'd never open my own business here by purchasing all the equipment first, without having some long term customers. You'd go bankrupt in a year.


My suggestion is to find a sign company in Europe wherever your moving, and outsource to them .you can practice your own design work, then just get stuff printed / fabricated by outsourcing.

Machines are expensive - you mentioned CNC, they range from 20k for the cheap ones, to 100k for decent ones. Printers go from 10-60k, plotters around 6k, laminators 6k... Etc. Its not a cheap field to get into, and I'm sure Europe is more costly than Canada .

Start slow, and work your way up. Heck, I'd try to get a Europe job in a sign shop for awhile first.

Things are different there than here - they're on a healthy environment kick. A lot of the vinyls and stuff they use over there, is way different than what they use here.

Starting a new print shop in BC is generally a really bad idea, if I was doing that then I would rather buy a pre-existing business. I think there's like 3 print shops per block. The best paying jobs were the acrylic wall/door signs. Cost per sign is peanuts for the shop and installation is easy with minimally trained temp staff. There's barely any money from manufacturing is what I have been told by every sign shop around. The money is made by installing the signage but funnily enough, there's a big shortage of people who fabricate the boxes and do all the electrical. Table saw, chop saw,welder and some space is all you need to make them but it's also not a very clean and enjoyable job to the vast majority of workers.

I sadly don't have a spare 2 million dollars laying around to fund that venture for years until it can support itself, the overhead would eat me right up with other starting costs. Buying a house and a property big enough and close enough to civilization is also not going to happen unless I'm working 9-5 for the next 10 years and put my plans on hold for that long. It sucks being at a point where you either sell your home and start a business while living in the ghetto or keep living in a decent home and bust ass 9-5 or 9-9 depending on the day working for someone else. Not too worried about finding work in general, I am a fabricator and an installer. Signs or not I will make enough to buy myself half slice of bread a day hopefully.
The plan was to outsource all the parts of the job I can't do in-house. Outsourcing generally bites into the profits on the job so I would like to avoid that as much as possible. Most likely set up a small anodizing station and get a big enough of an oven to bake powder-coat onto 10" letters.

As far as the designing goes, I'm proficient in Rhinoceros and I can get my better half to do the colors and small tweaks in illustrator. I know about different types of vinyl and their properties and what they're good for. I was literally kept away from the printers and plotters due to the son of the owners wanting to do that job and it was the last thing I had not done in the business. Maybe they were scared that I would steal their business or something. It wasn't like I didn't see them go or set up, I even loaded the material and started the prints/cuts depending on the day. That doesn't really help with the actual setting up part on the computer for the prints but I know my way around the machines.

I don't think getting raw materials such as vinyls, acrylics , polycarbonate and non-ferrous metals would be overly difficult in Europe. Chances are majority of that stuff would come through Russia which would come into Russia from China, it's the exact same thing here without Russia in the middle. A lot of the materials don't really meet any of the environmental standards , the sticker on it makes all the problems go away. Like when you get equipment or parts from the states with the big old 'MADE IN USA' text on it, every piece of hardware is for some reason metric. Almost like it was Made in the PRC(Formerly China) and packaged in the states.

I'm not sure how profitable it is to make 3D lettering or prints in Europe , my starting plan for signage would be to sell letters/simple vinyl decals via mail. Then see how the market is in terms of wanting printed stuff before I pull the trigger on an expensive piece of machinery that I'm unfamiliar with. For sure I can't afford top of the line equipment but I have to start somewhere.