Question Struggling to find designers with FlexiSign experience - looking for advice

[HBwraps]

My dad owns a wrap shop, and he has been having a hard time finding designers who can work confidently in FlexiSign. Most people we get are Adobe-only, and very few have ever used Flexi or worked in a sign/wrap production environment.

We’re not married to the idea that someone must know Flexi on day one we can train the right person. The bigger issue has been finding someone with solid design fundamentals and production awareness so the training time is actually worth it.

Our workflow is built around Flexi + Production Manager with a Mutoh printer, mainly because it work together.

A few questions for those who’ve been in the industry longer:

• Is Flexi becoming less common among designers overall?
• Do most shops hire Illustrator/Photoshop designers and handle the Flexi/RIP side in-house?
• Where do you usually find designers who understand vehicle graphics and sign production?
• Are there job boards, forums, or communities where experienced wrap/sign designers hang out?

Even without Flexi experience, it’s easy to see who has a solid grasp of vehicle graphics and who doesn’t.

Any direction or advice would be appreciated.

 

[myront]

We use Production Manager as our RIP too. Designs are primarily done in CorelDraw. We use corel as it's easier to set up nesting and cut parameters at each workstation instead of having our print tech set it up from the one station that has Flexi. Flexi is too expensive to have on multiple workstations. You can get corel as a standalone i.e. non-prescription. We've been using X7 for 8 years or so.

 

[Solventinkjet]

Most people with the training in the design fundamentals you're looking for are trained using Illustrator or Corel. Flexi has always been more niche to the sign world. If it's in your budget, find the designer you like and then get the software they like to use. You can use Production Manger with any design software, it doesn't have to be Flexi.

 

[SGC]

This is a little confusing. You can provide production manager PDF’s like any other rip, why are you married to the idea that the person needs to build designs in flexi?

Picking up someone who’s proficient in illustrator, the industry standard for design and sign design, and having them go backwards and learn a simplified software with less features is just going to net you a frustrated employee.

 

[stickerhed]

You can also make Flexi look just like Adobe products or Corel draw

 

[dlndesign]

I’m a graphic designer, trained in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. I learned Flexi at my first job over 25 years ago now. The thing is you need to find someone who just enjoys learning and who can be excited about seeing something they helped make in the real world. Find those things together and your set. Where to find them.. Id start by finding a local community college or trade school that teaches design. Ask to do a presentation and get some younger designers interested. Also, open your shop for a tour. Do this enough and im sure you bound to snag a few that would be interested and you’ll be able to vet who’s worth the investment in training. My two cents!

 

[kcollinsdesign]

There are two aspects to designing wraps.

The first is coming up with creative and effective ideas. That usually involves understanding the clients business and how advertising works. Vehicle advertising has its own set of strengths and best practices; experience comes in handy here. A good graphic designer can be invaluable, but it is a skill that has become less marketable due to the ease with which anybody can produce professional looking results with a few mouse clicks or voice prompts. A talented designer using AI can produce remarkable results, but in the hands of an amateur they can easily become tired cliches and ineffective. Back in the day, a graphic designer had to know their craft and good graphic designers were in demand (untrained people simply could not do it). Young people are not entering the trade because the opportunity to use their skills has been greatly diminished and the pay (for all but the very best) is low. I see this trend continuing in the future as the perceived need for these skills continues to decline. This is a problem; we'll see what the future holds.

The second aspect is knowing how to create production ready files. This requires familiarity with how printers, cutters, and materials work and how surfaces with compound curves inform the creation of two dimensional graphics that will be applied to three dimensional surfaces. Seams and overlaps need to be accounted for, along with the ease with which the installers can apply the graphics to obtain professional results. Even the best graphic designers today struggle with this as most of them only have experience designing for flat surfaces such as monitors (including phone screens), electronic media (TV, games, video content, films, etc.) and print.

There are some wrap schools out there. I suggest starting there. Whether a new designer learns from experience (there will be many failures), or you send them off for training, it will be an investment. Unlike college or trade schools, the investment is usually made by the shop owner, and they run the risk of spending a small fortune getting a new employee up to speed only to lose them to a competitor or when they decide to open up their own wrap business (it doesn't cost that much to buy a printer, laminator, and cutter and work out of a garage or a rented space).

In the end I guess I have no real advice. You have to do what's best for you.

Note: What software you use is not really an issue. Most designers prefer Adobe products, but all the major options will get the job done. This should not be a hurdle. Use what ever works.

 

[RandyDe]

My dad owns a wrap shop, and he has been having a hard time finding designers who can work confidently in FlexiSign. Most people we get are Adobe-only, and very few have ever used Flexi or worked in a sign/wrap production environment.

We’re not married to the idea that someone must know Flexi on day one we can train the right person. The bigger issue has been finding someone with solid design fundamentals and production awareness so the training time is actually worth it.

Our workflow is built around Flexi + Production Manager with a Mutoh printer, mainly because it work together.

A few questions for those who’ve been in the industry longer:

• Is Flexi becoming less common among designers overall?
• Do most shops hire Illustrator/Photoshop designers and handle the Flexi/RIP side in-house?
• Where do you usually find designers who understand vehicle graphics and sign production?
• Are there job boards, forums, or communities where experienced wrap/sign designers hang out?

Even without Flexi experience, it’s easy to see who has a solid grasp of vehicle graphics and who doesn’t.

Any direction or advice would be appreciated.

HBwraps, as a schooled Graphic Designer I've been working in the industry since 1992. FlexiSign is not a design program that would ever be taught at a design school or course. It's very specific to the wide format industry as you know. I think you best luck to find someone who can run Flexi efficiently is to look for a sign shop technician or wide format technician with some design experience. Advertising for a Graphic Designer will not likely get you good results. We would hire a designer with good communication skills, a keen eye for design in current programs... Adobe Suite, potentially Affinity/Canva (to some extent) and would ideally look for someone who has experience running different RIPS on production equipment (if possible).

 

[Evan Gillette]

I am probably in a similar position as I am a second generation shop owner (general full service sign shop, not specific to vehicle wraps). Our shop has run primarily Flexi/SAi products for decades and are heavily reliant on it. That being said, I have been slowly moving away from it as the only production tool in the last 5 years specifically for these reasons:

1. Lack of development, they constantly deny this but they are wayyyyyyy behind (specifically in text editing)
2. Increasing prices and subscription model, Corel annual subscription on sale is two months of flexi designer or just over 1 month of full Flexi suite.

Overall, they are leveraging their RIP to stay alive and have some good new partnerships with printing manufacturers. Things look better that a few years ago but I still dont want all my eggs in that basket. At our shop we now have (2) flexiDesign subscriptions, (1) FlexiSign and Print 12 Perpetual that about half of our production goes through, (1) Onyx Thrive RIP, (1) Full adobe CC subscription, (1) Corel draw subscription, Affinty (now free).

We use the tools in that order. Flexi is still our primary everyday software for layout and production (especially cut graphics). As we grow, I don't expect it to stay that way. Like you know, there are very little designers who even have heard of flexi unless they have specific sign shop experience. I would suggest looking and training for understanding core concepts and the "nuts and bolts" of design and production, that is what will increase efficiency and drive growth in your business. Think of it as a carpenter learning to use tools, if you hand them a different brand of hammer or saw and they dont know how to use it, it highlights their lack of understanding. All these graphics programs are different means to the same end. Some are better at certain jobs than others. If you hire someone who understands the goal and how to get there they should be able to use multiple tools to get there, I am sure they will have preferences and do your best to accomodate that within reason. This also helps promote an open mindset and early adoption of "new" software that may give you an edge over your competition. The wrap industry specifically is advancing and changing much faster than the sign industry, specifically with software and mockup tools. I am not up to date on current trends and latest tools but I know that as far as creative design goes, Flexi would be like wearing handcuffs when it comes to concept development. Still very useful for production and prepress but even then it has a hard time handling many aspects of files that other software handles easily.

 

[cwstevens]

Having been raised on Flexi since 1991 after doing actual velum drawings by hand with mechanical pencils, scale ruler, (actual pre-computer DRAFTSMAN tools) for about 4 years prior - I too am forced to maintain what I know, which is FlexiSign only, limited foray into Corel in the 90's but our shop is literally built around flexi in regards to production. I can do most everything anybody does in adobe w/ exception to some of the masked transparency bitmaps / effects that Illustrator might handle differently and cause issues when importing. We have a designer that works in Mac/Adobe while we are PC/Flexi. This allows for great presentation renderings but for processing production files, becomes a bit of a burden to essentially redraw/revise the 'design' drawing as imported from illustrator into flexi.

I would agree that most "Designers" outside of the sign trade would inherently prefer Adobe Illustrator and have zero familiarity with Flexi, but I believe a good designer could adapt to using Flexi for the production side of things fairly intuitively, its just realizing things may be achieved by different named processes from one to the other. Getting a Bonafide "Designer" that has any sign experience or familiarity is going to be the more daunting task.