Welcome to our third-annual spotlight of the young sign makers (thirty-five years old or younger) who we feel are making their mark in the industry—whether through sales, fabrication, management, or community involvement.
Each profile begins with a bio about the selected young sign professional and then their views of the industry in their own words. To read our other entries, click here, here, here, here, and here.
They will discuss a variety of topics ranging from the biggest challenges they’ve found since joining the industry, things they’ve learned about the art of sign making, their opinions on why the sign industry is an attractive career for younger people (and how shops can recruit them), and their outlook on how they’d like to see the industry evolve over the next few years.
Kyle Edmonds
Kyle Edmonds is Co-Owner/Vice President of Sales at full-service Mitchell Signs in Meridian, Mississippi. Kyle has worked at Mitchell Signs for just over fourteen years now—starting out as project manager then moving into sales to become sales manager and then growing into vice president of sales and (four years ago) part owner of the company. He was selected as an ISA Elite member in 2016 and is very active with the World Sign Associates (WSA). Kyle’s main focus remains on growing the sales and managing the outside sales reps and project managers.
Mitchell Signs is a member of the Mid-South South Sign Association and operates out of an 80,000-square-foot-facility complete with a “wonder family” of sixty employees with an average tenure of over 14 years. Kyle says that he is “only a piece of the puzzle” at Mitchell Signs, however he feels that their success at taking the company to the next level (2019 topped 2018 in sales) is truly a team effort. He has been married to his wife, Mary Grace, for thirteen years now and has two children—their daughter Lane (seven years old) and son Pierce (five years old).
I am a “sign guy” to the core. My favorite thing is seeing a sign come to life from a concept on paper to an actual structure that brings a smile to our client’s face when they see it. This is what makes me love what I do and eager to get to Mitchell Signs every day.
I am very proud to work with an amazing sales team and very talented project managers. I love the creative side of the sign design and fabrication and am very grateful for many wonderful relationships with clients, vendors, and other sign companies across the nation. The sign industry for me is more than a job—it has brought me many great personal friends and mentors that have fueled my personal growth.
I feel that today’s workforce is looking for a place they can solve problems through imaginative thinking and original ideas, and this is a benefit offered in the sign industry that needs to be made known. I truly believe one must incorporate faith, fun, play and family into one’s life along with our work. Having fun has a major effect on the output of a person and a company; play is the core of creativity. While I am not implying that work is all play, I am saying that the way we approach problems we face should be with a creative and open mind.
The sign industry is an open door for this outlook. We face challenges every single day; however we need the younger people to know and understand that, in our industry, the creative minds will excel. Signs seem to just appear on a site or a building, yet the fact is a lot of inventive and innovative work when into creating the sign; this work is what makes our industry so much fun!
I love the sign business for a number of reasons, but the main reason is the satisfaction that comes with completing a project. Our team at Mitchell Signs considers all projects to be unique. We have recently worked to complete projects that took us to Aruba and Curacao, managed multiple bank conversion managing, fabricating, and installing over 700 bank locations and have been involved with sign projects for a large number of Professional and Collegiate sports teams (such as the New Orleans Saints).
As a football fanatic, I especially enjoy brining a football team’s brand to life and promoting school spirit with innovative signage. I was especially excited to have seen a number of the signs we produced at Mitchell Signs on ESPN’s Saturday morning College Game Day Show along with the College Baseball World Series!
At Mitchell Signs, my goal is for our employees to learn to be a person of value finding ways to create, design, build then install the customer’s vision in a sign. That comes with challenges and in order to excel as an employee and a sign company you have to be willing to work hard while always doing the right thing that will generate a win-win outcome for any situation.
I’ve learned that by doing just a little more than you are expected, you will be ahead of the majority. Over time, those small extras add up and while others are doing just enough to get by you will rise head and shoulders above the rest!
I’ve always said that if you do just a little more than you are expected, you will be ahead of the majority. Over time, those little extras will add up while others remain “just getting by” and over time you will be head and shoulders above the rest!
