By signcraft
Posted on Friday, March 27th, 2026
In every issue, SignCraft gave a few sign makers an imaginary project. We asked them to do a sketch of the sign they might have produced, and to quote a price for the job. Most of the details were left to the designer’s imagination. The object was to see how different sign makers approach the same project. Here’s the scenario these sign makers were given:
A local livestock hauler contacts you about lettering the doors of his new semi tractor. He’d like a price on the doors, but says he’s seen some rigs with cool graphics and would like to “know what something like that would cost.” He’d like something that would make his rig stand out.
This appeared in the January/February 2016 issue of SignCraft. While the prices have been adjusted for inflation as of 2026, they may not accurately reflect current pricing for such signage.
Price:
Logo design package, includes a disk containing multiple file formats and variations of the logo: $2025
Digitally printed and laminated, high-performance vinyl (including installation): $433
Hand-painted urethane pinstriping: $216
High-performance, one-color vinyl for DOT info and numbers (including installation): $32
Total: $2,706
Joseph Diaz
Diaz Sign Art | Pontiac, Illinois
For the past several years, we’ve been pushing logo design as a service at our shop. If a client doesn’t already have a logo to put on the side of their vehicle, we attempt to sell them on the benefits of owning a logo in addition to just using it on the side of a truck. If they would prefer to not have ownership of a custom-designed logo and just want simple lettering for their truck, we can do that as well.
But for this “Design and Price” exercise we are going to assume that they did hire us to create a new logo. After that we would schedule a day for them to bring the truck to our shop where we would create and apply high-performance, digitally printed graphics and hand pinstripe the truck.
Price:
The price for a job like this is $743 for the lettering, plus the pinstriping and graphics, which usually run $675 to $1080 more.
I have to include a thank you to my good friend Lane Walker [Solo Signs, Reno, Nevada] for helping me become a better sign painter.
Jeff Devey
Jeff’s Graphics, Inc. | Twin Falls, Idaho
This was not an easy layout—a lot of copy for a semi door—so I’m sending several sketches of different layouts. The first thing I did was to prioritize the copy. “Big Lake” is the name, “Transport” is what they do, and “Hay & Livestock” is what they sell and service. “Hauling” is redundant to “Transport” so I would drop “Hauling.”
This is how I would sell the layout to the customer—by showing them how I prioritized the copy:
#1: Big Lake
#2: Hay & Livestock
#3: Transport
#4: City, State
I was happy with the layout and how it reads. The lightest color is ivory with imitation gold airbrushed into it. The outline is black with a dark green “Devey Bevel.” The red glow is not too strong, so it stays in the background.
“Hay & Livestock” is in light orange so that it reads second. “Montana” is in the same light orange which ties the two together. It’s the same for “Rapelje” and “Transport.”
Here’s a closer look at the “Devey Bevel.”
And here are my other sketches:
RT Signs
Steinbach, Manitoba, Canada
We do a fair bit of this type of work, and I approached this like I would with a typical client. Our livestock people aren’t into big and bold as a rule, but they do have pretty clean trucks. This kind of client would probably run a Pete [Peterbilt truck] and prefer something traditional.
We like to do a mockup on a picture of the actual truck. The dark trucks look nice with rich colors, and he will likely be more interested in looks than catchy advertising.
Truck 1 (above): The striping is still in line with his traditional lettering but cranked up just a bit for some contrast. The hauling tag line isn’t critical so we would add it under the bunk stripe. That way it’s doing its job but not in your face.
Since the new design for the name/logo was done for this job we would ask $270 for the drawings.
Print/cut/prep/install: truck doors: $338. This includes bunk numbers, USDOT, etc.
Striping: $473
Total: $1081
Truck 2: We wouldn’t normally do two completely different designs but my son wanted to give this job a try, too, so here is another offering. This one has a logo in more of a retro look. The colors are much the same, with an evergreen tree graphic along the bottom for added interest. Being a Montana truck, this client probably has the outdoor country in mind. (At least we do!)
The pricing would be the same as Truck 1 except that the tree graphics would add another $1215 for a total of $2296.
