Columbus, Ohio · Work trucks, vans, fleets
We letter one van first.
You drive it for two weeks.
Vehicle graphics for Columbus work trucks: lettering, decals, partial graphics, window perf. If you run six vans, the worst thing we can do is put the same mistake on all six on the same Tuesday.
Three ways to put your name on it
Most people call asking for a wrap when what they want is lettering. The difference is thousands of dollars, so here it is straight.
| Level | What it is | Plan on | When it’s the right call |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cut vinyl lettering | Your name, number and web address cut out of solid-colour vinyl and squeegeed straight onto the paint. No background, no print. | Half a day | Your truck is already white or black and your logo is one or two flat colours. Cheapest thing on this page by a long way, and it does most of the job. |
| Partial graphics | Lettering plus printed panels — a colour block down the side, a shape over the rear quarter, doors done properly, hood and roof left alone. | Most of a day | You want people to see the truck before they read it, and you don't want to pay for panels nobody ever looks at. |
| Full wrap | Every panel. Printed, laminated, seams tucked, handles off, edges into the jambs. | Two to three days | The truck is a colour you don't want, or the art has photos and gradients that can't be cut out of solid vinyl. |
Plan-on times, not a promise. A corrugated box truck with a roll-up door is not a Transit.
Why there’s no price here
A number for “a van” is a number for nothing. A high-roof Sprinter is three times the vinyl of a Transit Connect, and rivets, corrugation and roll-up doors cost hours that a flat panel doesn’t. Call the shop with your year, make, model and roof height and Ameer will price the truck you actually own. He answers the phone.
The thing a wrap shop won’t tell you
If someone quotes you a full wrap on a white van before they have seen your logo, they are selling vinyl, not advertising. A white van with clean lettering reads better at a red light than a busy full wrap does. Spend the difference on the second truck.
What we need from your designer
Send the file your designer built, not the picture off your Facebook page. If the picture is all that’s left, we can still work with it — just say so first.
- Vector artAI, EPS, PDF or SVG, with the fonts outlined. That is the file your designer already has.
- Not a JPEG off your websiteA 600-pixel logo blown up to four feet is a blurry logo at four feet. If a JPEG is genuinely all you have, say so on the phone — we would rather redraw it than stretch it. Redrawing is real work and we will tell you what it costs before we start.
- Pantone numbersNot “our blue.” PMS numbers, or the swatch off your sign, or the business card. Something we can hold up against the film.
- The number you actually answerCheck it twice, out loud, before we cut. Vinyl does not care that it is wrong.
- Your DOT number, if you run oneTell us the number and which door it goes on. We size it to be read, not to be hidden.
- Photos of the truckBoth sides, from far enough back to see the whole panel. Door handles, body lines and rivets eat letters. We plan around them before we cut, not after.
Straight answer
“Will it match our brand blue on every truck?”
If your colour lives in the cast vinyl book, we cut it — and it is the same colour on truck one and truck six and on the one you buy next year, because the colour is pigment inside the film, not ink sitting on top of it. That is the most repeatable thing in this trade, and it is the reason we push lettering so hard.
“And if it has to be printed?”
Then here’s the part nobody says out loud: no printer matches a Pantone chip exactly. Anyone who promises that hasn’t printed enough. What we promise is that your vans match each other— same printer, same profile, printed in one run — and you hold a printed proof strip in your hand before we commit the fleet. Add a truck two years later and we go back to that same file, not to somebody’s memory of it.
Window perf
Printed on the outside, see-through from the inside. It turns the back glass into a billboard you can still reverse with.
- In-band
Rear window and rear side windows. Ohio puts no darkness limit on those, as long as the vehicle has both outside mirrors.
- Over the legal limit
Front side windows. Ohio requires them to let at least 50%of light through, plus or minus 3. Perf isn’t close. That’s not a grey area, that’s a ticket, and we won’t fit it.
- Ask about this
Perf goes under a clear laminate or it doesn’t survive a car wash. If someone quoted you cheaper, ask whether theirs is laminated. That’s usually the whole difference.
One truck first
We would rather letter one van and lose the other five than hand you six trucks with the phone number too small to read at a light.
- 01Letter one
The van that sits in front of a customer's house longest. Not the cleanest one.
- 02Drive it two weeks
Rain, salt, a car wash, a hot week in a parking lot. Vinyl tells on itself fast if it was laid wrong.
- 03Stand 40 feet back
That's how far your customer is at a red light. Can you read the number, or are you filling it in from memory?
- 04Ask your phone
Did the calls move? If they didn't, don't do the fleet. We'll say that to your face.
After the pilot, nothing about truck two is guesswork. The file is cut, the placement is measured off a real door, and the per-truck cost moves the right direction when we’re running the same artwork six times instead of six different files once. That’s the only reason to do a fleet in a batch — not because we want the whole job on one invoice.
The work
Before you bring it in
Wash it
Vinyl doesn’t stick to road salt. We clean and de-grease every panel again anyway, but we’re not laying film over a winter of 270 grime and calling it warranted.
Tell us about paint
If a panel was repainted, tell us the date. Fresh paint has to gas out before vinyl goes over it — weeks, not days — or the film lifts and takes the paint with it when it comes off.
Indoors, on purpose
Vinyl is a temperature job. It doesn’t lay down in a cold parking lot in February. The guy doing it in a driveway in April is why you’re calling us in May.
Bring us one van.
Tell us the year, make, model and roof height, and send whatever art you have. We’ll tell you which of the three levels your job actually is — even when it’s the cheap one.
5220 Trabue Road, Suite D, Columbus, OH 43228
Trucks come to Trabue Road from Columbus, Hilliard, Dublin, Powell, Plain City, Upper Arlington, Worthington. Ohio tint limits quoted from Ohio Administrative Code 4501-41-03 — see the law page for the whole rule.