By John Deaton
Posted on Friday, July 8th, 2022
One of my customers who had bought an auto repair garage stopped by to say he wanted the front window lettered. He told me what he wanted it to say and also said that he wanted something nice looking—not just one-color basic stuff.
I always enjoy the job more if the customer leaves the layout to me and trusts
Materials:
Oracal 751 vinyl: $36
Application tape: $12
Total materials: $48
Labor:
Create layout: 40 minutes
Cut, weed and tape: 1 hour 20 minutes
Apply vinyl to window: 45 minutes
Total labor: 2 hours 45 minutes
my judgment. It allows me to put a little more into it. I also thought this would be a good job to use one of the cartoon cars from my Vehicles Vector Art CD to give it more eye appeal. Time to head to the computer…
Create the layout: 40 minutes
I always do my layouts in Adobe Illustrator, and import for cutting into VinylMaster Pro software. I did the design based on the dimensions of the window to be lettered.
Cut, weed and tape the layered vinyl: 1 hour 20 minutes
Everything was cut from Oracal 751 vinyl film. This part goes pretty quickly, except for the car, which I layered in the shop to be applied at the site. I sometimes use digital prints for a graphic like this, but this was a little bit of a rush job, so I used vinyl.
Apply the vinyl lettering and graphics: 45 minutes
I first cleaned the window with Rapid Prep cleaner, then used Rapid Tac application fluid to apply it. It was a chilly day, but the vinyl went on without a hitch.
All done!
The customer was really pleased with the job, and I was, too. I like using graphics in layouts, especially cartoons. I think the car in this one gave it that extra “oooommmph!”
John Deaton’s shop, Deaton Design, is in Harlan, Kentucky. You can see more on Facebook as Deaton Design.
This appeared in the January/February 2008 issue of SignCraft.
Prices have been adjusted for inflation.
