It just occurred to me that blue campaigns (and red ones too,) can save tons of money on medium and large size campaign signs by making them themselves. No rule I know of that says the freewayblogger non-patented method of making signs with cardboard, paint and a projector is limited to guerrilla punditry.
In case you’re unfamiliar with how I make signs, here it is. You do not have to be an artist to do this. Process shown is with an overhead projector ($30 or so on e-Bay/Craigslist,) but if anyone in the campaign has a digital projector that makes things even easier. If it looks time consuming, it is — but only for the first three or four signs. After that you can crank them out in ten or fifteen minutes. Check it out.
I use white backgrounds exclusively mostly as a signature but also it allows any tears or imperfections to be covered with white duct tape. You can use any background color you like, but it’ll help if it corresponds to colored duct or painter’s tape. While not quite as light and resilient as coroplast, (the plastic board used for normal campaign signs) painted cardboard is remarkably strong and weatherproof, particularly if you seal the top with duct tape. I’ve had signs stay up over a year looking almost as good as when I posted them.
The primary benefit is of course savings. The cost of a 4’ by 8’ campaign sign is between $35 and $50 each - $20 to $25 if you buy 100. These cost about a nickel and take, seriously, ten to fifteen minutes to make. Another huge advantage is that printed signs have to be identical (without the price skyrocketing) handmade ones can all be different. Although I suggest a certain amount of boilerplate for the sake of expedience: like name across the top, office along the bottom and interchangeable slogans in-between.
Although I don’t have any examples per se - this would be the closest stylistically:
Another bonus is that extra large signs that might cost $150 or $200 or more on coroplast or vinyl, only cost you a few more pennies in paint and a few more minutes to make. All that’s required for making canvases of any size or shape is cardboard, tape and a razor. For painting? Paint, brushes, tray and a roller. For a workspace a two car garage and a couple of card tables will do fine.
Dumpsters behind furniture and appliance stores are a good source of large cardboard. Also auto body and windshield replacement shops, bike shops, motorcycle dealerships, art and hobby, import/export, screen and window, etc. Once you start looking for cardboard you’ll find it everywhere — by the ton.
With Easter almost out of the way dollar stores will be filling with flags and decor for the Fourth of July. Flags look great on signs and the small ones come strung together in banners: you get eight of them for a dollar!
This could be a million dollar idea in that it could collectively save blue candidates literally over a million dollars. Even better than that though is it provides a “legal” gateway to the sort of First Amendment “open carry” work I’ve been doing on the freeways. Once you see just how fast, easy and fun it is to make large signs, maybe a few of you will join me.
(Note: The “Wake Up and Smell the Permafrost” campaign was my attempt to saturate the west coast with the message in 2012. For about a week or so I successfully replaced “ the coffee” on google “Wake Up and Smell” auto-suggest and inspired the title of this song which, although really quite lovely, does not seem to pertain to Arctic amplification or methane release.)
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