The Heinz 57 Wall won Sign of the Times the title of 'Best Overall Sign of the Year' at the British Sign Awards 2014
Having won Best Overall Sign of the Year 2014 at the British Sign Awards and continuously growing their client base, Sign of the Times are going from strength-to-strength. Specialising in sign, display and point-of-sale services, the team get involved in everything from the initial design stages to installation. They work with multi-national brands as well as local companies, and it is clear that great pride is taken in producing quality products for every client.
Managing director Darren Roughton runs Sign of the Times with his very capable team of more than 30 staff, all offering a unique skillset and high level of experience. With an impressive turnover of 2.2m last year and a new website launching soon, Roughton has come a long way since starting out as a sign-writing apprentice.
I think it was quite good having all that experience. You would think they were vinyls now as they were that good, all those years ago”
It was during his apprenticeship in Northampton that Roughton gained the experience he needed to start the business at the impressive age of just 20. He says: “I did my apprenticeship with an exceptional company and we had some fabulous accounts. It was before vinyl cutters came in so we used to do literally everything by hand. I think it was quite good having all that experience. You would think they were vinyls now as they were that good, all those years ago.”
“We’ve been going for over 30 years now and it's amazing what you do pick up and what we do create now,” says Darren Roughton
It was the back of a shop in Kettering that provided Roughton with a base for the next 18 months of his career before moving to Telford Way, where he bought his first unit. Roughton acknowledges this as the moment he ‘got his foot on the ladder’. Shortly after this, his newly formed company ‘Sign of the Times’ bought its first Zund flatbed cutter and since this initial small beginning, the company has built up an impressive list of multinational clients including Nationwide Building Society, Heinz, McLaren, Centre Parcs, Costa Coffee and Premier football teams such as West Ham.
The Nationwide Building Society is a major customer for Sign of the Times, which has carried out major roll outs of signage and branding for the company
Roughton continues: “We were gradually building up and taking more people on. At the time there was just twelve of us and then the work increased with Nationwide Building Society, as we were looking after all their marketing logisitics such as internal branding, signage, and graphics. This work enabled us to increase our work force even further, moving to larger premises, investing in more machinery, and building a fleet of installation teams.
Sign of the Times does work for high-end fashion stores such as Ballantyne, producing a full range of large-format graphics, sign lettering, and interior signage for the retailer
“This also stated opening doors to the sport sponsorship side of the business such as national team contracts. This included England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland—along with the football leagues—since then we really haven’t looked back.”
No corners cut
Now with more than 30 staff, Rough-ton puts the company’s success down to an extremely high standard of customer service. He explains: “Originally when I left school, I worked for Volvo Trucks. Everything was done properly. The service levels were exceptional and everything was good quality. I think that’s the same philosophy that we adhere to now. We pride ourselves on doing everything correctly and simply don’t cut any corners.
We are all about providing excellent service and solutions at competitive prices ”
“At the end of the day, it’s easy to do a shabby job, but spending that little bit more time always ultimately makes a difference. We are all about providing excellent service and solutions at competitive prices. We’ve invested a lot of money in our premises and the new machinery to ensure we are offering cutting-edge technology with-in the industry. It’s all state of the art, as indeed it should be for us to offer our clients a top-level service.”
Roughton continues: “We also look after the equipment we invest in very carefully.”
It’s all state of the art, as indeed it should be for us to offer our clients a top-level service”
Among their equipment is the latest 4.2m G3 Zund, a 3 x 2.5m Arizona flatbed printer, EFI Vutek H1625 LED printer, two of the latest HP latex machines, Seiko 64S, Summa cutters, two 5m Rolls Roller flatbed laminators, Seal roll laminators, and a fully equipped acrylic fabricated workshop with the latest machinery including two large format CNC cutters.
Capable of carrying out colour changes and digitally printed vehicle wraps, Signs of the Times has a full roster of modern products and services
Although the team at Sign of the Times has expanded over the years, many familiar faces remain.
“Most of the people who work for Sign of the Times are all 20 year plus, so they’ve been here a long time. We don’t have a massive turnaround of staff, which I feel is a credit to the environment they work in and the projects they work on. We have got a really good team of people who take pride in what they do, with a very high skillset.”
Big brands
Sign of the Times have a plethora of projects to their name, many of which were carried out with London based design agency, Acrylicize, who they also collaborated with on the award winning Heinz 57 Wall.
Roughton explains the relationship: “They did all the research, all the design work and they were project managing. We worked closely with them on the project management and then took over for the manufacturing and installation of the display.
“For the Heinz 57 Wall, every box within the display tells a story so it takes you right back to when Mr Heinz first started off, and then it takes you all the way through to the present day. We used a combination of materials including Acrylic, Foamex, Dibond aluminium composite panels, MDF, and glass. The glass had one-way film so you can only see the TV’s within that section when they are actually turned on. We painted sections that actually used the different sauces like ketchup and salad cream, all mixed with the paint. We also built up another section with tomato seeds, set in resin on a board, which we then printed Mr Heinz’s face onto using our Flatbed printer. There were multiple techniques and unique approaches involved in that project.”
West Ham United, aka ‘The Hammers’, had its evocative coat of arms rendered into a bas-relief style motif using techniques used for creating built-up letters
Off the back of the Heinz job came another project working alongside Acrylicize, this time at the new Volkswagen Financial Services building.
“That was a massive project with wallpapers, acrylic fabrication, a lot of installation work, and we even had an acrylic chandelier made with cogs from all the brands such as Audi, VW, Lamborghini and other companies that they own,” says Roughton.
Sign of the Times even wrapped the Great Britain car for McLaren GT. With precision being key at McLaren, Roughton enjoys this type of challenging work: “We do specialise in lots of usual and sometimes difficult projects, however this type of work keeps you on your toes.’’
Quality first
The next step for Sign of the Times, says Roughton, is, “putting different systems in place to move things forward and make things flow better.” With several Mac computers and 27 new PCs complete with Clarity soft-ware, their office is equipped with all the tools it need, though new machinery in flatbed digital printing and 3D printing is something they may look at in the future.
For now, keeping the job and the client in mind is essential for Roughton, as he concludes: “We’re quite happy at the size we are and will increase in size, however this will be a gradual process. We want to maintain that level of quality work and customer service. We’ve been going for over 30 years now and it’s amazing what you do pick up and what we do create now.”
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