Better Sign Shop Podcast

Learn how to build a better sign and
print shop from a few crusty sign

guys who've made more mistakes than
they care to admit conversations

and advice on pricing, sales,
marketing, workflow, growth, and more.

You're listening to the better sign shop
podcast with your hosts, Peter Kourounis,

Michael Reilly, and Bryant Gillespie.

Before we jump into the episode,
I'd like to give a shout out to

our sponsor, GCI digital printing,
grand format printer to the trade.

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To hear more about their approach
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archives to episode 9, where the
guys and I interview owner TJ Bedak

about top tier customer experience.

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com.

Hi guys, and welcome to the next
edition of the Better Sign Shop podcast.

As always, I've got my co
host, the Sign Shop Yoda, Mr.

Pete Karunas.

Happy to be here.

Happy to be back.

That's right.

It's been a while.

Yeah.

I forgot how to do this.

Uh, I forgot how to use my microphone,
forgot how to use my camera, made

sure all the settings still worked.

You know, this is, I think I got a couple
of new cool features where if I go like

this, like it'll, Hey, and I get some
really nice fireworks and stuff like that,

but I've disabled all of that for today.

Oh, well, I'm sad.

We're not going to get to see that.

I talked with Michael.

He is in the middle of a
terrible sinus infection.

So we're not going to have him today,
but we do have a special guest.

I'm a little raspy because my daughters
like to cough in my face all week.

So we'll just have to contend with it.

Super excited to be back.

Oh, there's the fireworks.

There you go.

Love it.

Yeah.

For, for all the listeners out there,
we did receive all the emails of, okay.

Are you guys saying, Hey,
when is the next episode?

Did we just kind of took a
nice little summer break that

extended a little past summer?

Yeah.

I mean, it's, it's been
a great summer for me.

You know, I've been, I've met some really
new people, some new clients, some new

sign shop owners around the country.

I'm, I've had some time to get
over, you know, my, my baseball

team, not making the playoffs.

This year now, I'm at the hockey season,
so I'm, I'm enjoying the start of

something new to take up my personal
time, but, you know, like, look, it's

been, it was great to take the summer off.

We're like, this is a new podcast.

We don't, we didn't want to leave
everybody, but we did want to enjoy.

Our summer here, uh, probably not
going to enjoy next summer because

we'll probably be doing a lot
more podcasts through the summer.

But Brian, what you've been working
on, man, what you've been doing

since the last time we spoke,

too much to recount.

Like, I've got a lot of cool things
coming out soon that I will share.

We've made some updates to our platform,
which are are really nice, but I

don't want to keep our guests waiting.

Too much longer.

So what do you think?

All right, I've been

well, let's bring them on.

Let's let's get this going
All right, transition.

All right guys, welcome

back.

We have our very special guests Adam
Wald from creative sign design Designs,

I'm sorry Adam is super nice to have you
this has been many months in the making.

Yeah for sure Yeah, I want to apologize
first and foremost for getting you on

but we're excited to have you here.

And yeah, I make Oh, I'm excited.

I'm excited.

I'm excited to be on the show, uh, after
a long hiatus, uh, and excited to, to

share with you, uh, some of, some of
the background that I have and some

of the tips and tricks that I can, uh,
benefit the, uh, the listeners with.

Yeah.

So before we dive into the topic at hand,
which is going to be managing and running

an efficient art department, why don't you
give us a little backstory on you and the

company?

Yeah.

So my background, I've been in the,
uh, sign industry for 23 years now.

It's pretty much the first, uh,
job that I got out of high school.

You know, my friends and I, I was kind
of around the fast and the furious

times, if a lot of you can remember that.

And, uh, you know, me and my friends
had some fancy cars and, uh, there

was a small speaker shop, um, and
a, and a small guy that had a very

small closet that was doing vehicle
graphics at the time and, uh,

developed a good relationship with him.

And, uh, he said, Hey, go
to the sign company up.

you know, up the street and learn
how to, you know, weed and tape

vinyl and lay vinyl and then come
back to me and I'll give you a job.

Um, and, uh, you know, I, I ended up
staying at that place for about, uh,

five years, um, and, uh, learned a lot.

And that was kind of my first
foray into the sign industry.

I, I started without knowing a
single thing or even having a

clue about how signs are made or,
or that there was companies that

actually did that for a living.

And, uh, it was a small,
it was a fast signs.

And, uh, uh, I really like working at that
Fastlines because you get a plethora of

different experiences, you know, from,
from, from production, installation, the

customer service aspect of things, design
kind of in that small, uh, group setting.

Um, and, uh, so for probably the first
two years, I just simply laid vinyl and

things of that nature and how I got into
the design arena is we had a designer

on staff and, uh, that designer was
probably sick of me doing the same thing,

but I was also sick of waiting on that.

Designer to do recuts for
vinyl and things like that.

And so I was like, Hey,
I'm pretty tech savvy.

Um, you know, technology is
kind of a passion of mine.

Uh, why don't you sit down with me
and show me how you're doing it?

Right.

And, uh, we had a separate, uh,
machine and, um, he showed me how

to do the recuts of the vinyl.

And, uh, that's kind of just
where I started in the industry

as far as design is concerned.

I, I took a passion to that, uh,
learning how to do the recuts.

And then I was doing my own design work.

And, uh, you know, before, before, you
know, it, uh, within three years, I was

a designer for that particular center.

Um, and then, uh, uh, from there,
I kind of, branched out and did a

plethora of different things just kind
of exploring my, uh, the industry,

uh, within that particular franchise.

I did some customer service work, some
outside sales and was trying to identify

like, what would be my career path here?

Sales definitely was not it.

Uh, I could tell you that right now.

Um, and, uh, uh, did a number of years as
a project manager, I'm sorry, as a, as a

production manager at a small franchise.

And, uh, realizing that there was only
so, so far you could go at a franchise

and, uh, moved on to my first commercial
sign shop, uh, was a local commercial

sign shop that did national accounts.

And, uh, that is what really kind of
opened my eyes to what a sign company

could be, um, you know, things like pan
form faces that a pan from face oven, you

know, giant paint booths, you know, people
actually physically manufacturing and

building the signs from, you know, uh, you
know, angle and tube and things like that.

Thank you.

My background when I
started working there.

I was just kind of a
lowly vinyl applicator.

Um, and, uh, uh, those of you that
are work in that franchise, uh,

world know that the turn times
are much more aggressive than

more of a commercial sign shop.

So, you know, I was running laps around
everybody in the, in the vinyl shop

and literally getting all the work done
for the whole day for vinyl by noon.

Um, and, you know, uh, had the opportunity
from that point forward kind of twiddling

my thumbs for the rest of the day.

Uh, to experience things like,
uh, going out on installs and,

um, and, uh, you know, doing
service work and things like that.

Uh, but ultimately it kind of
got to a point where that company

just couldn't keep me busy in
the way that I wanted to be busy.

And, um, I went off and joined a cust
a company as in a design role doing

rebranding for petroleum gas stations.

Okay, and this is really where I started
to kind of really understand efficiency

as far as design is concerned and how to
kind of better your workflow day to day.

You know, whenever I first started
working there, a majority of petroleum

gas station work are components based,
meaning you kind of have a brand standard

and you're going to have, you know,
multiple different sizes of different

signs or different graphics, depending
on the existing site conditions or

even the new build site conditions.

But, uh, for the most part, your
parts are kind of interchangeable.

Um, you know, maybe the only thing
that might change is maybe the,

the, the width, the linear length,
or something along those lines.

And, uh, so whenever I first
started working there, we

had a two person design team.

And, uh, uh, it would take us
anywhere between six to eight hours

to design a, a, uh, a petroleum
gas station start to finish.

And what I mean by that, it would be the
pylon signs, all the canopy graphics,

all of the pump graphics, any sort
of, uh, Graphics that might be around

the area and those types of things,
we would develop that from scratch

and I worked there for about 6 years.

And by the end of the by, by the time
what we would do during that time

period is every time we would do a 1
off, we would save it as a template.

So a unique pump.

A unique gas canopy size.

You know, a unique pylon
sign, things like that.

We would save it as a template
and there would be chances

that we may never use it again.

But there are that 1 off chance
that we did use it again.

We already had.

We've already done the design work, right?

We can essentially just kind of pull it.

Verify that the information is correct
and put it in our drawing and we're

kind of done so by the time that I
left there six years later, we could

turn full sites worth of design
work within 30 minutes to an hour.

So, so it was in more than half.

So it was like eight hours.

Yes.

To start with and down to
like 30 minutes or less.

Correct.

Correct.

Obviously all of that's pending
on good survey information and

things like that and assuming
that the information is correct.

So that particular business, um, much
like a lot of national account businesses

kind of put all their eggs in one basket
or a couple baskets, um, and, uh, um,

had a couple accounts Go south on them.

And, uh, basically, I saw kind of the
writing on the wall that this company

isn't going to survive and in the way
that I felt comfortable sticking around.

And, uh, you know, eventually, uh, that
business ended up, uh, kind of closing

and I moved on to creative sign designs.

Um, uh, I've been with creative
sign designs for 11 years.

I started as a project coordinator at the
time and which was essentially kind of

a beginner project manager and quickly
within the first two years moved into a

leadership role and I managed our project
management team and from there I moved

into managing our product management team
and our estimating team and And basically,

for the last 6 years, I have been managing
our design team at the organization

and my background has been in design.

My passion's kind of been in design.

You know, I've always kind of
wanted to be in this position.

And, you know, 6 years ago,
there was a need at the time.

I was actually managing estimating and
design and those of you that kind of

Work in the industry, kind of understand
how those two can really kind of

collaborate and produce something rather
efficient if they're communicating

and collaborating on a daily basis.

Um, so that was kind of
the thought process there.

Um, and then we just grew in a way that,
um, I couldn't handle the estimating

team, uh, myself, and I had some growth.

Uh, ideas for the design team, and,
uh, in 2018, we, uh, developed, uh,

environmental graphic design studio, uh,
within our organization also, uh, which

is basically our fee for service business.

So you're, you're, you're a developer.

You're an end user.

Um, you don't really know what you want.

All you simply have is marketing and
branding ideas of architectural renderings

of your building, your interior design
renderings, and we will basically

come up with everything for you start
to finish both interior and exterior

graphics, all the location planning,
message scheduling, you know, and some

ancillary items, things like master sign
plans, retail, tenant criteria and things

like that, uh, creative sign designs.

Um, we, uh, we are, we are on track to
do roughly 28 million dollars this year.

Um, we do, uh, our primary business
is architectural custom, uh,

interior and exterior signage.

Gotcha.

What set, what sets us apart is
we're, we're a turnkey organization.

Uh, a lot of larger companies
either do exterior signs or interior

signs, um, and, uh, we do it all.

We manufacture in-house.

Um, we manufacture all of our own,
own interior signs in house, and

we do, uh, the vast majority of
all of our design work as well.

Wow.

The quintessential one-stop shop.

Yes.

All right.

Oh, I think it's a lot more than that.

So let's kind of hit pause on that.

Thank you so much for giving us
that really nice introduction

here into the eyes of what our
listeners are listening to.

Here's what creative designs is all about.

I want to get into your role,
though, for a little bit.

You said you're, you know,
okay, so you're well rounded.

Started as a vinyl applicator, you
know, you know, that, you know, that

business, you know, that side, you're
not a business owner, but correct.

I want to 1st, I want to 1st kind of
get, I want to 1st ask this question

and then I want you to kind of get
into it a little bit, but why with

so much experience with so much, um.

Experience in multiple,
multiple different departments.

You've mentioned it just before
estimating design project management.

You know, I'm sure you've you
can handle all departments.

Why not get into owning your own

place?

You know, the ownership team
at creative sign designs.

Um, allows me to develop my personal skill
sets and the skill sets of the people on

my team and allows me to develop processes
and procedures outside of just not only

my design team, but across the rest of
the organization will help financially

back that if I want to play a little
bit for lack of a better term, um, and,

and experiment a little bit, you know.

Jamie Harden is the owner of our company
and his lovely wife, Melanie, is our is

our vice president of human resources, and
they both allow me with the relationship

that we've developed over the past 11
years and some of the sex successes

that we've seen together to develop.

Different aspects of the business
and create processes and procedures

that help things run efficiently
and things of that nature.

And that's provided comfort for
me from an income standpoint and

from a, a job safety standpoint.

And that's, what's important
to me and my family.

You know what I mean?

Um, so it's

Sounds like it sounds like, you know,
you're comfortable putting on your, your

director hat, your manager hat, having a
voice and really being able to collaborate

with such a wonderful ownership team that
allow you the freedom to kind of branch

off and explore other opportunities,
which, you know, as an owner, you might

not actually have those benefits, right?

You might be, you might, uh, not get
those times to, to play around in a, in

a sandbox and explore different things.

New technologies, and we'll
get to that here in the future.

So, but I want to bring us back here
for a moment now that we kind of have a

little bit of a baseline to what you do.

You mentioned your team,
your team, your team.

I want to kind of talk about your
team here for a quick second.

I'm very interested as a graphic
designer as, and Brian as well.

We love design, right?

Recovering, recovering
designer, recovering designer.

Yeah, sure.

Uh, one might say that.

Uh, this is the foundational brick that
this entire industry is built upon.

Sure.

Now there, there is sales,
there's customer service, right?

There's the survey, there's the
production, the fabrication,

the install, the service, etc.

But all of this is built on the
foundation of design, right?

That's the element that you
can build a business off of.

If you remove that, you know, it kind
of like, it's like a house of cards.

Everything kind of falls.

Around it, right?

So I want to talk about your team.

I want to talk about your team.

We're all we're all
interested in design here.

Tell me a little bit about your team.

How many members are there?

Give me a lay of the land of
how many designs you guys pump

out for 28 million dollars.

I'm expecting that
number to be quite high.

So go ahead and take it from there.

So, um, we have seven people on our,
uh, what, what I would consider kind

of our architectural design team.

That is kind of our day to day,
uh, uh, Q design process for

various different projects.

It could be bid spec work.

It could be designed
build work from scratch.

Um, it could be national account work.

And then, uh, we have two designers
on our environmental graphic design

studio, and those are the more
consultative design professionals.

Um, those are the people that are
consulting and interacting with clients

directly on a daily basis, interacting
with municipalities to find out

what's possible and things like that.

Our, our EGD team would probably do
anywhere, roughly 50 projects a year.

Uh, start to finish.

Um, but on our architectural side of
things, uh, we are on track this year to,

uh, and, and, and Brian, I know when we
talked about this last time, I gave you

some data from last year, but we are on
track to do over 5700 design requests.

And what I mean by a design request
is it could be something as simple

as a 5 minute revision, but it
could be something as elaborate.

Um, and I have a couple of people
on my team right now working

on projects that they've been
working on for 2 straight months.

Right.

Just because the scale at which that
we're trying, uh, the scale at which

of the, which the projects we're doing
right now, the complexity, the, the, uh,

the coordination with our senior project
management team, the coordination with

our estimating team requires that much
detail to be put on the job, you know, on

the drawings to be able to be successful
with the installation team and, or when

we're shipping it out to an end user.

So.

So

you said over 5,

000, is that what you said?

700, over 5,

700.

Over 5, 700.

Okay.

I'm going to do the

calculations here.

I'm trying to do the calculations.

And

that is 814 design requests per designer.

You have seven designers, 5, 700 requests.

Correct.

Over 800.

That's a pretty prolific,

efficient.

Yeah, let's break that down.

Let's break that down even more.

How, what is that breaking down per day?

So, per

design, what is it like
251 working days a year?

Right?

Bear with me.

I'm just going to, I'm going
to pull up some statistics.

I can't give you, I can't give you
necessarily broken down by day, but the

way that we, uh, the way that we, um.

Yeah, The process associated with
how we design thing as we use on

architectural design nomenclature.

So we'll we'll do schematic conceptual
designs and then we will move into

design development and then we'll move
into fabrication level drawings between

those different larger kind of phases.

We have, you know, customer revisions and
things along things along those lines.

But just to kind of put it.

Uh, some items into perspective for you.

Let me just and I apologize.

I didn't know we were going to get too
far into the numbers, but I do have

the numbers, which is a little bit odd
for a more creative person to have.

So bear with me for just a second.

That's true.

That's fine.

Well, you're pulling that up.

I'm fascinated with 5700.

Requests.

I mean, I understand what that means.

That's new requests.

That's revisions.

That's it is, you know, that,
that, that's, uh, that there's

two different avenues for that.

Right?

So, uh, I'd like to know if you have,
um, and just for our viewers and our

listeners out there to give a little bit
of a context here, seven designers, right?

I mean, not a lot of our shops
have, or owners have seven

designers, let alone two designers.

Um, You have some that are allocated to
certain specific types of designs, and

then you have others that maybe handle a
wider range gambit of of design requests

right now, we'll be through that for a
2nd before we get into the number per

day, which to me kind of sounds like
you're doing like 3 or 4 requests per.

Day per designer, at least
that's what it sounds like to me

at a minimum.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Um,

so without really getting into
the numbers, I mean, let's agree.

It's like, for design
requests per designer per day.

So.

You know, some that that's a lot, that's

crazy a lot.

All right.

That's like, that's like uber crazy to me.

Okay.

So seeing a business like yours
and having that department

handle that kind of bandwidth.

Uh, I, I want to first ask you
a little bit more detail about

your team and their talents.

So are you hiring the type of designer
that's, uh, Experienced, are they

design like, do you have rap specialist?

Do you have architectural specialists?

Do you have a graphic designer
straight out of college high school?

Tell me a little bit
about your recruiting.

Great question, Pete.

Yeah.

A little bit about your recruiting.

Tell me about how you hire.

Tell me about the type
of person you look for.

Go.

So I primarily hire people with,
uh, a large amount of architectural

design experience, uh, specifically
signed design experience.

Um, We, I have been lucky in the
sense that there's enough candidates

available to the market that I haven't
had to train somebody that's new.

Most of the people that I hire have
this architectural signage design

background, meaning they either come
from a background where they've designed.

You know, uh, smaller or large scale
interior sign packages, but have a basic

understanding number one of curl draw,
which is the primary software that we use

number to understand basic things like,
uh, 80 a code requirements, building,

you know, building code requirements
and just a very general understanding

of way finding theory in general.

So how to navigate a place and and and.

How to think about how to navigate
a place and put that on a sign.

The other side of it is people with
this longstanding knowledge of how

to build a sign and have been in the
industry from quite for quite some time,

working in various different areas.

Maybe they came from a fabrication
fabricator at one point and had

a desire to move into to, um.

Uh, design.

Um, and so they kind of already have
this manufacturing background and

they're able to apply that on paper.

I have, uh, you know, the age, uh,
span of the people on my team ranges

from, you know, lower 20s up into I
have somebody that's, uh, in their

mid 60s, you know, and, uh, but their
backgrounds range from having, uh, you

know, different backgrounds, um, but I'm
not hiring at this point in time, uh,

people who do not have those experience.

I have enough people kind of in the
bandwidth and in the hopper to hire

people with the experience needed.

Okay.

Thank you.

To go down that route.

And, uh, as far as recruiting is
concerned, I do, um, almost all

of my own, uh, recruiting myself.

Um, it's a combination of, you
know, uh, finding resumes and people

that are interested in on deed.

And just literally simply asking
people, what I do is I go on LinkedIn

and I find the people that have the
background requirements of what I'm

looking for, and sometimes they're
available to the industry and sometimes

they're not, but, uh, worst case
scenario, they can say no, uh, best

case scenario, they're interested in
talking, uh, and we kind of go from there.

Quick follow up for me really quick just
on the type of candidate type of designer.

Are you doing any outsourcing
remote designers in your business?

We do not currently, um, we
entertain that from time to time.

We are in this transitionary
period from an organization.

Um, you know, when you kind of
get to this scale, uh, really the

next step is to start developing
more of a design engineering team.

Who's kind of on the backend
and that production area.

And those people are really
using things like AutoCAD and

solid works and things like that.

It's kind of going beyond just the
general, uh, limitations of, of Corel

draw, you know, those pieces of software.

Um, uh, so.

At some point in the future, we're
going to shift in that direction.

You know, once we get to that, from an
efficiency standpoint, there's a lot of

efficiencies as far as, uh, fabrication
is concerned, but when you start going

down those, uh, uh, paths of AutoCAD and
SolidWorks, the efficiency from a design

standpoint starts to trail off a little
bit because something that you could put

together in a matter of a couple hours
in CorelDRAW, Could take you a week

or two to put together in solid works.

And now your fabricators are going to
love you because they have cut, you have

cut sizes, they have all the angle, you
know, they have a full bill of materials

and things like that, but, uh, you
know, we have to turn and burn with the

volume of work that we do right now.

Well, I love it that you
are a CorelDRAW firm.

That's right.

Everybody that's listening, that's
viewing out there that has watched my

video on CorelDRAW versus Illustrator
versus Photoshop, whatever you want to do.

It may not work for you, but this
software is very powerful for the type

of shop that you want, you may want to
become when it comes to sign design.

The software that I believe in,
I design everything in CorelDRAW.

So I could, I could apply for a position
with your firm and know and jump right in.

To your environment and not skip a beat.

So if he would have you
Pete, if he would have you,

if you would graciously accept my resume,
yes, I would be your base designer.

Mike's

a, Mike's a CorelDRAW guy too.

And unfortunately, Adam, he couldn't,
he couldn't make it today because

he's got a terrible sinus infection.

That's fine.

I think one of the things that stood out
to me of what you just said, and like,

how many times have you heard this, Pete?

It's hard to find good people.

I can't find good people

to work in my shop.

Every Tuesday and Thursday.

Every Tuesday and Thursday.

Every Tuesday and Thursday.

Yes, approximately at 8 30 in the morning.

Yeah.

I mean, what I would say to those people
personally is you're not looking for them.

You're waiting for them to come to you.

That's yeah, that was

gonna be my point.

Exactly right.

I just heard you say you're going
out and hunting these people.

Yeah, I don't put an ad.

I don't put an ad out
or anything like that.

I go and I prospect the exact person
based on their background that I want.

And then I and then I go from there.

And that's that's that's
what I tell everybody.

I'm hunting after that person.

Wow.

I am finding the skill set that I need on
my team and then I go after that person.

That's a very unique approach.

Definitely something that a lot
of our viewers and listeners here

can take, uh, take away from.

If you're a shop that you're looking
for a graphic designer, if you're,

if you just fired a graphic designer
and you need somebody to replace that

person, it's so easy to get sucked.

To the remote designer, you
know, outsourcing your work.

It's so it's so easy to go
down that rabbit hole, but you

need somebody in your shop.

You need a player.

You need a voice.

You need somebody that can be your
guiding light in this in this business

that we call the sign industry and.

There might be a different way
about going after that person.

And just like you said here, Adam,
it's more of a, I want you approach.

You're the type of person
that I want working for me.

Instead of putting an ad out and, and
fielding and farming resumes, you're going

after a specific type of person based off.

I'm assuming you're using LinkedIn
for something like, Yeah, it's, it's,

it's, it's between LinkedIn and,
um, you know, there's a pay tier

of Indeed, you know, where you can.

Be quite a bit more specific
about your search criteria.

And, and then I essentially, once
I find the person's name, I do some

research on LinkedIn and I'll typically
reach out to them on LinkedIn instead.

Um, and that's kind of my process.

Um, and it's worth the very minimal
cost, uh, for Indeed to, to at least

explore it for a month and, and see what
kind of net benefit you get from being

more aggressive and trying to reach out
to those people that you want on your

team, rather than, you know, put out
an ad and get, and field a bunch of.

People that may never actually
be qualified to do the job.

All

right.

Well, that's a huge takeaway.

That's a huge takeaway
for our, our listeners.

So Brian, go ahead.

What's,

what's the average turnover
for you and your art

department?

It's pretty low.

Um, you know, I, I am, I am going
through, I have one person leaving

me right now, but, uh, as far as
across the organization, um, it

is probably the lowest turnover
outside of our current sales

team.

Amazing.

Low turnover, a very specific type
of hunting recruiting strategy for

a 28 million operation that has a
seven designer design soon to be eight

designers on your team, on their team.

Amazing.

Amazing.

So tell me a little bit
more about your prophecies.

I let's dive into that side of
this coin here a little bit.

Tell me, tell our listeners how.

Inquiries come in.

Walk us through your workflow.

You're so involved.

You were involved in the sale
side, and I'm sure you understand

how that side of that coin works.

So kind of walk us through the
beginning and the front end of

your workflow for your business

or you.

Yeah.

So, so, um, the way our current
company works is it kind of depends

on the type of business that we're
getting in at any given moment in

time, where I'll kind of lead the
conversation is more on our design build.

So our customer doesn't
really have anything right?

They might have some brand assets.

It's.

They might have some architectural
renderings of a building that might

have some existing photos of a building
or existing photos of some signs

that they might want to, to revamp.

We have a fairly elaborate process,
a fairly elaborate process,

but it's lean at the same time,
because if it's too elaborate,

people aren't going to follow it.

Right?

And a lot of the processes and
procedures that I'm going to describe

to you today don't work without
buy in from the whole organization.

Right?

I can't just be creating and developing
design team processes without

interaction from the other departments
that have to interact with that team.

Right?

So a lot of what I'm going to describe
to you has been thoroughly discussed

with our sales, our director of sales,
our director of project management, our

production teams and even installation
teams to develop a process that we feel

like works best for our organization.

So as far as going through the
process, we, we, uh, from start

to finish, we use smart sheets.

Um, for a queuing system.

Um, and, uh, I have developed
a, a simple way to queue our

tasks, uh, for the entire team.

It also lets me develop metrics for
individuals and for by different

phases that I described earlier on
in, in, uh, our conversation, uh, but

essentially our account management team
and our project management team have

a digital form that they can fill out.

Um, and as they submit that
digital form, it basically goes

into our design teams queue.

Some different, uh, uh, uh, criteria that
are on those forms is, you know, the,

the, the customer name, the address, the,
uh, the, uh, a very brief description

of the scope of work, because that's
not really where we're describing

what the designer needs to do to do
the value potential of the project

or a budget that might be in mind.

For that particular project, and then
we have the account manager involved

and then who might who might request
because it could be an account manager,

or it could be a project manager.

That's requesting that particular design.

Uh, task to be done, so I guess
people are asking, well, why do

you need all that information?

Well, this is where some of the automation
as far as a smart sheet comes into play.

So, basically, as a designer,
as as a task is assigned to, you

will get a notification via email.

You'll also be in the queue day-to-day.

And you could sort by your particular
job, and you also get updates if I decide

to change the date or there's updated
information, you'll get a notification

regarding what that, that what information
changed during that time period.

Uh, but also on the backend as
we complete that particular task.

Uh, anybody that is in that requested
field on that Smartsheet will then be

notified that the job is complete also.

So, and it's all real time too.

Any questions on that so far?

No, I like smart sheets.

I'm familiar with it.

Yeah.

I haven't dove into it very deeply,
but I know some people who have.

Yeah.

I mean, we, we, we decided on
smart sheets as an asset because

it creates a lot of flexibility
for us to do what we want to do.

Right.

Now, does the, the whole organization
use Smartsheet as well, or

just your department?

So as of right now, our, our project
management team, our permitting

team and our production team
all use Smartsheets currently.

Uh, we are Gotcha in the process
of looking at some other solutions.

Uh, but that is what we all currently use.

And it's primarily just
because of the customizability.

Uh, we are a very report driven
organization, very metric driven

organization, and allows us to do all that
stuff in an automated way on the back end.

So, you know, like I said, I can, I
can break down the quantity of those.

Uh, different design requests
by individual, uh, uh, design

phase, and then break that down by
individual designer by design phase.

Also, I just set that all up at the
beginning and now it just kind of does

the work for me in the background.

Um, so that's kind of the
initial kind of request process.

Now, this is where.

From an organization standpoint, we start
to get into, um, and a lot of, a lot of

people can kind of relate to this is okay.

Well, how do you manage the quality
of the information that's coming in?

Right?

I think it's very important for
anybody in the role that I have at

an organization, or even smaller
organizations that just have an

individual designer to you to understand.

review the information
as it's coming in, right?

So, uh, uh, I am reviewing every
single design request as it comes in.

What I'm trying to do is I'm trying
to set that designer up for success

when they actually get to it.

So there's various different
things that I'm doing.

I am reviewing the quality of the
request and making sure it makes sense.

Because what good is a design request
if you can't even understand what

you're supposed to do there, right?

And what I'll do is I will connect
with the person that requested it, get

clarification, and either have them
rewrite the design request so that it

does make sense, or I will rewrite it in
a way that I feel like is going to make

the most sense to my designer, right?

I'm also reviewing any assets that might
be submitted during that design request.

Pieces of artwork, You know, making
sure that if there's custom fonts

that might need to be used that I'm
downloading them, or at least providing

a description of where that designer
might be able to access them via Adobe

fonts or one of those types of things.

And then, uh, if it does happen
to need vector artwork, we handle

that a multitude of different ways.

If it's something rather simple,
we'll recreate it ourselves.

If it's a more corporate brand,
and I know that they probably have

the logo somewhere, I'll kind of
push back on the requester to go

get the actual vector artwork.

Um, and then if it's something elaborate
and our customer just can't do anything

with it, and I feel like it's going to
take our team, you know, anywhere between

an hour or two hours to recreate, I
basically outsource the vectorization.

I like to think of my design team
in the same way a lot of sales teams

think of their salespeople, as what
can they generate per revenue hour.

And, uh, you know, if I think of a
designer that could produce 5 million

worth of designs in one year, that's
an X amount of a value per hour to me.

And if our client isn't paying that
amount to do that vectorization, then

it's better off that a vectorization
company does it for the minimal

cost that they can do it for.

So, um, don't tie

up your team on stuff.

That's not right.

Right.

Right.

Right.

Um.

So once I've basically identified that
the information is either of a quality

nature, um, and or in or provided assets
required to successfully do that, I

will then go ahead and schedule it.

And I aggressively schedule my team.

I push them every single day.

Obviously, with the volume of
work that we do, I have to.

And a lot of what you have to do is
you have to learn your strengths and

weaknesses of the people on your team.

What are they good at?

What are they quick at?

And then assign the work
according to that, right?

Um, so like, for the most part,
um, I can, I can schedule my team

within the hour kind of thing.

So if, if I have a designer that I'm
like, okay, I think this particular job

is going to take them roughly six hours.

They're working eight hours a day.

There's two other jobs that I know I can
squeeze in that are going to take them

anywhere between 30 minutes and an hour.

I'm going to go ahead and schedule
those jobs for that, for that same day.

Right?

Um, so that's how we start to be very
aggressive with our turn times too.

You know, the vast majority of our
work is turned around within two, two

business days from a design standpoint.

There are, there's obviously different
circumstances where the project is

larger, uh, but across the different, um,
uh, uh, phases of design that we do, we

turn most jobs around within two days.

Uh, and that could be a fabrication
level drawing, a conceptual

drawing, or what might be.

So as a designer, as you're getting that
notification and now you're starting

to work, how do you work efficiently
when you get that information?

Well, we've created a lot of
assets at us as an organization.

You know, we do, like I said, we
do interior and exterior signage.

We have developed a lot of
sales, um, tools that also help

the estimating, uh, process.

Um, because a lot of what I, what
we find is a lot of the time while

customers are very involved in
what their signage looks like.

People just want to get to a
number so they know how much

they're going to have to spend.

So, so, so we've developed a lot of assets
and tools to help get to that number.

And, uh, it's in the form
of basically templates.

So we have interior signage templates.

It might not be exactly what the client
wants, but we've done enough interior

sign jobs to be able to, to, to develop,
you know, some full design packages

of all the sign types that might be
required for different market segments.

And, um, And, uh, they have materials
sizes on them, things like that.

So our sales team could sell that number.

And then what it does is it puts
guardrails from a design standpoint on the

types of materials, the sizes, things like
that, that they have to design with them.

Right.

So that's one of the tools that we
use to help kind of the sales process

be a little bit more efficient and
then provide us essentially kind of an

outline scope of work as far as materials
and sizes that we can design within.

And then, uh.

Just collective creative assets.

Everybody's been in that scenario
where you're kind of burnt down.

You're like, Oh, my gosh, I got
to do one more option for this.

And I just I just can't
think of anything right.

Um, what we do or what we try and
do is we try and collect assets

that weren't used in the past.

So.

For the most part, most of our
conceptual design schematic designs

are, um, we do three options, one
selected, and then those other two

just kind of go by the wayside, right?

So what we try and do is we try and
collect those options and potentially

utilize them on other jobs that might
be applicable and using different

finishes and things like that.

We also have a lot, have a lot of,
uh, inspirational, uh, assets, um, for

interior signs, exterior signs, and things
like that to help, uh, inspire the design

team to create something unique based on,
uh, what other, um, you know, uh, other

inspirational images, things like that.

I like the fact that you are like
constraining the design process,

because that's really like, Hey,
when I look at design, like that's a

challenge in signage, is it like you're.

You're only limited to what you can
build, basically, and unless you

like design is like, it works best
when you're constrained to something.

So, like, when I was in the print
shop, like designing a T shirt

take me like 20 minutes, right?

Because it's like, Hey, I've
got a 10 by 14 area and it's

got to be 1 to 8 colors, right?

But with signage and especially the type
of work that you guys do where it's.

Everything interior, everything
exterior, like there's a lot of decisions

that have to be made there just for

every sign.

Yep.

Yeah.

Well, essentially what I'm trying to do
from managing the team is I'm trying to

take the scenario where a designer is
sitting there trying to figure out what

they need to design and they can actually
spend the time designing it, right?

Um, so they have all the assets.

They have all the inspirational, uh, uh,
uh, imagery or, uh, you know, interior

design, mood boards, finishes, things
like that, that they need to, to, to be

able to just go in and start designing
rather than sitting there and, and,

and really trying to figure out what
they need to design to begin with.

And, and that's kind of been
my motivator of, of, of.

Developing a more efficient team by
reviewing those documents ahead of

time to prepare them for success and
knowing that they can open up the design

requests, all the assets are going
to be exactly what they're expecting.

And they can just move right into design.

Gotcha.

Now, like some of these
templates that you've developed,

like, are you including that?

When you schedule that request or
they're like going and hunting that down.

Like

we have, we basically have it as a,
a, a global template that everybody

kind of knows about our sales team
is using it when they're doing their

account take us on the very, on
the very front end of the project.

Um, and, uh, and then our design
team will essentially know that it's.

The available asset that was used
during that time period and to

design within those constraints.

Right.

Gotcha.

Gotcha.

So like, what does the, what's
the day to day look like for

you guys within the department?

Like, is it, I

mean, it's pretty chaotic
as you can imagine.

Um, you know, it, it is, um, it is,
uh, lots of manipulating the schedule.

Um, I am, I am.

In the schedule all day, every single day.

Um, and I, I basically have some, uh,
conditional formatting that allows me

to visualize things as they come in.

And, uh, you know, depending on the scale
of what the request is, you know, as

of right now, and really kind of since
March, I've been basically designing

all day, every single day, just because
of the volume of work we have going on.

But, uh.

If, if it's something rather simple and
I can keep the rest of my designers out

of it and have them working on the more
elaborate, longer scale, longer term

projects, then I'm going to do it myself.

So I, as that information comes
in, I'm immediately reviewing it.

If the assets.

Or the information isn't clear.

I'm immediately getting with
the person that requested it.

So I can attack it right away, right?

We attack our design
queue on a daily basis.

And, uh, you know, if you spoke to the
people on my team, sometimes, you know,

it's, it's a little overwhelming for
them, uh, but, uh, they do a great job of

staying ahead and, and, uh, in my opinion,
from a creative standpoint, if you can

stay ahead and you don't have this burden
of just this backlog of design work to do,

you can be your most creative and, and,
and, and produce the best quality product.

And that's what, that's
what we're trying to do.

Yeah.

One question I've got that's came
up a lot for our folks that are,

they do everything like you guys do.

How are you juggling?

Like this, this request is going
to take 20 minutes and I've got 12

of those that need to go out in the
next six hours versus like, Hey,

this project is a longer project.

That's going to take.

A couple of weeks to get all the assets,
but we've got to make progress on it every

single day to make sure that we hit the

timelines.

I think it's, it's, uh, obviously this is
where kind of manipulating the schedule

and having a team that is on board with
potentially doing other people's work.

I think in a perfect world,
everybody wants to be able to

start their same project and.

Um, but, uh, you can imagine with
the volume of work and, and, and the

complexity of custom signage that
that's just not the way that the real

life, you know, the real world works.

So, you know, I have, I have a
particular designer right now.

That's been working on
a 2 month long project.

And it's essentially kind of just, uh, on
call for lack of a better term, waiting

for information from the field to be
able to attack because we have a very.

Tight schedule to get the job
done so I can't put her on

any large project right now.

So she just basically fills in
smaller things from time to time.

Quick revisions, quick schematic
designs and things like that.

As she's kind of waiting on that
larger piece of information and I

have essentially kind of cleared
her schedule and any projects that

I would normally have her work on.

I've basically either delegated to the
rest of the team or I'll knock them out

myself, depending on the complexity of it.

Gotcha.

Yeah.

So having, well, you guys have
seven designers, but essentially

like a, like the six man on a
basketball team or something.

Yeah.

That's

smart.

Um, what's, uh, do you have any other
like tips and tricks that you would like?

Like what, what would your advice
be to somebody who maybe has one or

two or three designers, you know,
they've got a small design team,

which is, I, that's probably the

average.

Yeah.

I mean, I, I per, I personally
think that developing assets

ahead of time is one of the key.

Differentiators, um, for our
particular team to be able to be

successful and efficient, right?

So we have developed, um, design
manufacturing standards for a lot of the

common side types that a lot of people
are using an architectural side edge.

You know, your flat cut out letters.

What are our tolerances?

What kind of thicknesses?

What kind of studs are we
going to put in different

thicknesses and things like that?

Um, channel letters, pile
on signs, monument signs.

Having a standard to start with, in my
opinion, is the best way to Uh, manage

the fabrication level drawing process,
which tends to take a little bit longer

than some of the other processes are
concerned and having buy in from your

manufacturing team or in the cases where
you might be outsourcing fabrication,

developing and coordinating with them.

And I promise you, you're out your
wholesale customers or your wholesale

manufacturers are going to be
interested in that because they're the

net result of what you're producing.

Right?

So if they have their own section views
and things like that, that you could be.

Borrowing from them to
include in your drawings.

It's going to only gonna make
their shop more efficient.

Also, right?

The other thing, um, also is communication
across the whole organization.

Um, like I said, none of the processes
and procedures that I that I'm

describing to you today work unless
you have buy in from the sales team.

The account management team, or even
if it's not a team, if it's just a

sales person in general, you know,
developing a good workflow between

design and sales is a key part of your
process and the growth and development

of your, of your sales team and the
growth and development of your design

team, your design team understands
why sales, you know, the types of.

Assets that a sales team needs to be
successful from a sales standpoint,

then it's kind of perfect harmony
from a, from an efficiency standpoint.

Um, and then on the backend, if your
production team is collaborating,

providing feedback on specifications that
we're including, uh, or not including,

and, uh, uh, can help us fill in that
gap and create a better standard so

that we don't either keep making the
same mistake, or we're creating a more

streamlined design environment, um, then
it's beneficial for everybody as well.

And then the other thing
that I would say is.

One, one other differentiator for us
is, uh, you know, Jamie and Melanie

have allowed our design team to
purchase things like stock photo

subscriptions and things like that.

And, uh, you know, those are just kind
of the, the, the, the spicier ways

to, to, to enhance and embellish, you
know, your, your kind of basic boring

interior sign, uh, project that, that
most people are just doing kind of one

color backgrounds, you know, one color
tactile copy on, you know, we have

the ability to go in and out of these.

You know, uh, stock
photo websites and get.

You know, textures and different
vector art, stock vector artwork and

things like that, and apply them to
our designs to really embellish them.

Um, and we've, I've created a couple of
assets to, to really show our design team,

how, you know, here's how we were doing
things in the past, you know, in the past

with just kind of basic solid colors,
and here's how you can really transform

a design using some of these very basic
embellishments that we are able to pull

from these, uh, different assets that we
can, that we have unlimited access to.

Yeah.

Nice.

Um, I think, I think we
actually had, what was the.

Was it communication breakdown, Pete?

Like, one of those episodes that we
had, like, the biggest drop is usually

the handoff between departments, and it
seems like you guys have mastered it.

Like, what are the specific things
that you guys are doing to facilitate

that communication across departments?

So,

um...

We do we do a number of different things.

Number one.

I basically coach my team that regardless
of how simplistic the design request

that's been written to you is I want
you to call the person and verify that

that's exactly what they want, right?

Um, so that helps break down
some of the initial assumptions,

regardless of how simple it is.

And, uh, you know, we're talking
on a regular basis with the people

that are requesting these designs.

Um, and I don't know if I
share this with you, but yeah.

The vast majority of our design team
is remote, and so we are interacting

with our sales team and our product
management team, you know, through

teams calls and on a regular basis.

I mean, I make 40 or 50 calls a day
to people to get clarification, just

make sure I'm on the right track from
a design standpoint, because we are

reading and interpreting something that's
something that somebody else Throat.

Right.

Um, and it could be something as simple,
you know, I, I had a conversation on

just a very basic 18 inch by 24 inch
aluminum sign on a post and panel

sign this morning, and I was like.

Are you sure this is how
you want this to look?

And I could share my screen
and get feedback in real time

from that particular person.

And, you know, got the confirmation that
yes, that's exactly what I'm looking for.

Now I can close out the design request
and send them the proof and I'm done.

Right?

So that's 1 aspect of it.

The other aspect of it is when we get
into some of the larger projects or some

of the more complex projects, we have a
project kickoff meeting and that's where

we have an opportunity for our project
management team or a project manager

that's been assigned to the project.

Representatives from the production
facility that might be involved in

the manufacturing of that, uh, the
estimator that estimated the project

and then the assigned designer to
basically sit down together and say,

how do we want to accomplish this?

Right?

And, uh, it could be in the form of here
are the value engineered options that

were offered during the estimating period.

Um, or here are some technical
difficulties that we might

experience during this process.

And we need to we need to work
together to develop solutions to

make this actually successful.

Um, and we've started to do that
quite a bit more on on the vast

majority of our larger projects.

And we've seen a lot of success.

Um, it gives production an opportunity to
communicate how they might want to build

something that might be different than how
a designer might want to build something.

Uh, so they get a say in
the process and then it.

Furthermore, it's creating buy in when
that job actually hits the shop floor.

They're not blindsided, but some wild
manufacturing method that they've

never heard about before, right?

It also gives an opportunity to identify
materials and or manufacturing methods

that we want to proceed with, but we
don't have the capabilities internally

to do and decide where we want that
capability to go to from, you know, from

an out plant standpoint, uh, to outsource
that particular manufacturing method.

So I think those two areas for
us is one of the key for us.

Parts of trying to prevent
news communication.

Um, but I would say just the key takeaway
in general is just the collaboration of

the person that might be requesting that.

And in those cases where you don't
have that kind of buffer zone of

somebody requesting that getting on a
team's call or a zoom meeting with the

client and just saying, hey, look, I.

I want to make sure that we're on
the same page or, you know, just a

simple email of like a, of a, of a
screenshot of the proof or whatever,

uh, just to make sure you're on the
same, the right path with the client

before you kind of finish that thing.

I think you might've mentioned
the remote thing to me previously.

I forgot to include that in my notes, but
is that part of the reason why you can

like go out and hunt these specific people

as well?

It is.

So, you know, like I said,
Melanie and Jamie have been.

Very trusting in my, uh, methodology
as far as recruiting is concerned.

Um, we've had a lot of
success for, with it.

And, uh, while where I live, which is in
the Tampa market, uh, the Tampa, Florida

area, there is a ton of sign shops.

I think, I think the last time we
looked, it was probably, it's probably

well over 200, 200 sign shops.

Uh, there's a plethora of different
people to, uh, choose from, but not

with the very niche type of business
that we're involved with right now.

You know what I mean?

I can find, uh, you know, a plethora of
different people to do, um, you know,

vehicle wraps and things like that.

But, um, the, the, it starts to
get a little bit nichier when you

need somebody to build a monument,
uh, signed from scratch, uh,

on, on, uh, you know, in Corel.

Sure.

Absolutely.

So as we try to bring this one to
an end and I feel like we could

probably talk for hours, man.

Oh, for sure.

Just like a fountain of knowledge
about the, the industry.

But you know, like I, I've been watching
AI over like the last six months and like

things are like starting to go at a way
faster rate than what I thought they were.

Are you guys leveraging any like AI
day to day or anything like that?

Do you have plans to like?

So, so I, I mean, for the first time
with some of these new features, um,

and I was on the beta for, for Photoshop
and Illustrator where they started to

integrate some of the generative AI.

Um, I found like actual
useful purposes for the AI.

Um, and that is essentially, you know,
when you're doing like wall graphics

or something like that, and your client
is providing you like kind of a low

resolution JPEG and you want to blow
that up to the best of your ability.

Number one, to, to try and.

You know, create a vector version of that
to clean it up a little bit, but just

kind of fill in that gap of area that
you're trying to, to, to, to fill in.

Right.

Um, and also when you're trying
to edit photos and things like

that, and you're trying to get
very complex objects out of it.

Um, I've found the generative AI tools
to be absolutely mind blowing for

their ability to do stuff like that.

And I know Illustrator has just started to
dabble in it, and uh, I haven't personally

had any, uh, useful success with it.

But, uh, you know, uh, Illustrator
has come a long way from some of

the initial betas, even when they
had kind of some of the initial

measuring tools and things like that.

So, uh, I'm confident that at some point
they'll have some real practical uses

for it, but currently I haven't found a
particular practical use as far as AI,

at least in what we're doing currently.

Gotcha.

Gotcha.

Yeah.

Like, Hey, what are your thoughts?

Just like, you know, being
a student of design and like

a lifelong lover of design.

Like, what are your, do
you have concerns on AI?

Like,

I don't, um, I think if we were
probably more in the graphics world

and things like that, um, and a good
chunk of our business was more on

kind of that printed graphics world.

I, I, I might be a little bit more
concerned, just more from a design

standpoint, but, uh, with the
complexity of things, I mean, I, I

would, I would, um, Some AI tools to
be able to develop the ability to,

you know, uh, space out angle and a
monument sign and stuff like that.

Like this, I want that right now.

You know what I mean?

Um, so until it gets to that point
or like, you know, you, you get some

of the bigger companies, like, um,
you know, or you get like a bigger

company, like AutoCAD or solid works.

And, you know, one of those
companies starting to integrate some

of that into what they're doing.

Um, so you're not having to build some of
that stuff from scratch, you know, then

we'll probably take a harder look at it.

Yeah, that kind of lines
up with my thought.

Like, you guys are like, so far on
the like, specific, specific, like,

niche scale that it's like, yeah,

he just, he just poked the bear,
you know, he just poked the bear.

He just, he just put everybody, every
1 of those companies on high alert

and said, get your AI shit together.

Yeah.

And, and,

and, and, and, you know, I, while
I love corral, I wish they did

more development in that area.

They, they tend, they tend to.

They tend to not play around as
much as an, you know, as much as

Adobe does, you know what I mean?

You know, uh, but, uh, I, I wish they
would integrate something, you know, a

little bit more futuristic like that,
but I don't foresee that anytime soon.

Yeah.

And for the work that you guys do,
especially like on the fabrication

side, it's like, I wouldn't trust the
AI enough to like, maybe, maybe give

you a concept to like look at and design
off of, but yeah, like it's still too.

Too much of an estimate or a guess on

everything.

Knowing how long it took CorelDRAW
to come up with a Mac version after

saying that they would never have
a Mac version, I'm pretty sure

that that's like 20 years away.

Sure.

So, so the one, one last final thing,
and this is one of the reasons,

Bryant, why, why I reached out
to you from the last automation.

Um, and, and, and we didn't really talk
about automation, although we talked

about AI, but I just want to cover this
piece because I think it's a pretty big

game changer for a lot of organizations.

And, uh, you know, my company would
probably kill me if I told you this, but.

Bear with me for just a second.

So one of the things that you guys
complained about last time, and this

is specific to interior signs is having
to type all the signage out, right?

Yeah.

Manually.

You don't, you're wasting your time.

So most of the time you have some sort
of document, an Excel spreadsheet,

a word doc, something along those
lines that tells you the messaging

for those particular jobs, not
going to tell you the particular.

Um, plugin, but there is a plugin for
Corel that allows you to tie an Excel

spreadsheet to very individual pieces of
your drawing in Corel and have it type

everything out for you automatically.

So you don't have to
typeset anything ever again.

We'll have to look that up and
put it in the show notes, Pete.

Yeah.

So we can't get Adam
killed, obviously, but

so basically you got 1700 signs.

You can basically make Excel spreadsheets
by individual sign type, assign those

specific messages to a type field, um, and
corral draw and then just click a button

and it'll type out everything in the same
font, the same height, the same message.

You can even have a drop down a line
if you want for those sign types that

require a multi line, a drawing set.

Um, so that, that to us has basically
saved a three person hiring, um, for our

design team from an efficiency standpoint.

Yeah.

That's really nice.

I didn't know those tools existed.

And I used to have, um, when I
would do, uh, booklets and things

like that in the print shop.

Uh, we had tools like InDesign and there
was a couple of other like specific

built tools that would do variable data
overall, but I didn't know they were

never available in illustrator, which
is what I was in 90 percent of the time

anyway.

Yeah.

I mean, you're, you're on the right
track, uh, as far as that's concerned.

Um, there's just, there's a particular
plugin suite, um, that, uh, that, um,

is, is I believe fairly well known.

Um, and, uh, there's a particular
tool within that plugin suite

that allows you to do this.

Um, and it's a pretty big game changer.

Sweet.

Adam.

Wow, man.

This has been a great episode.

Um, a good episode for Pete and
I to get back in the saddle.

We appreciate you coming on.

Um, yeah.

What's the future for you guys?

Like, what's the future for you?

What's the future for creative

designs?

Yeah, I mean, so we're sorry.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So we are, we, we continue to grow.

Um, you know, we are, uh, we were
tracking to be 28 percent ahead of

where we were this time last year.

We are, we are, we are growing
our, our national account sides of

the side of the business as well.

And, uh, uh, you know, we continue to, uh,
look to expand outside, you know, we, we

do business all over the United States,
but we continue to, we want to continue to

expand from a shop standpoint outside of,
uh, you know, all over the United States.

And that's kind of where
we're headed right now.

Um, as far as design is concerned,
probably the next steps are, are,

are that more design engineer.

Uh, position that I described earlier in
the business, you know, where somebody

that is doing more detail work, um,
right now, kind of it's spread across

the rest of the whole entire design
team, uh, but having really a department

that's dedicated to doing, you know,
fabrication level detail, um, and details.

Uh, so those people that are on my,
uh, regular design team that are

more creative, don't have to worry
about those types of things anymore.

And, and bit more utilizing
things like AutoCAD and Solid

Works in our shop day to day.

Nice.

Yep.

Love

that.

Pete, any closing questions,
arguments, comments?

You kind of took the
wind from my sails there.

This is a great, this was a great episode
to jump right back on the saddle here.

Adam, uh, I'm, um, I'm submitting
my resume to your shop here today.

Okay.

I look what you guys got going on.

I love that.

You're.

You're involved with some really
interesting tools, smart sheets.

I'm familiar with it.

I think it's a great tool, a collaboration
tool, team communication tool.

Love, love that.

You have some automated in your alerts,
notifications and built in your system.

I wish more and more people would.

Take a page out of that book, but
thank you again for jumping on here

and giving our audience a little bit
of a sneak peek into what their shops

could eventually be by just learning
a little bit about what you have got

going on there at creative design.

So just

want to say, I appreciate
you guys having me on.

Yeah, absolutely.

Excellent.

All right.

That's a wrap.

All right.

All right.

Thanks, guys.

All right.

See ya.

That's the episode.

I hope you enjoyed it.

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