Are you looking for the next step in your career? Is now the time to work for yourself rather than contributing to someone else’s bottom line? Are you looking for a positive work-life balance whilst running your own business?
Our current resales include:
- Signs Express (Exeter)
- Signs Express (Huddersfield)
- Signs Express (Liverpool & Wirral)
- Signs Express (Harlow)
Being your own boss isn’t a career choice, it’s a lifestyle choice… So, turn your career into a lifestyle today with Signs Express:
- Become part of the UK’s largest signs and graphics network
- Creative, high profit industry with 20% EBITDA potential
- Be your own boss and operate in your own territory
- Opportunity to achieve £750,000 turnover and beyond
- Monday – Friday working hours
- Full training and support provided
- Established, respected brand with over 35 years of experience
- Expansion potential
- UK wide network support and UK based Franchise Support Centre
- Innovative industry where no two days are the same
Why Choose Signs Express?
Offering bespoke signage and graphics solutions to customers large and small we offer room for creativity and innovation working with a consultative approach, offering anything from exterior building graphics, illuminated signage, digital signage, vehicle graphics, exhibition and displays, window graphics, bespoke wallpaper, health and safety signage, eco-products and much more.
Established for 35 years, Signs Express is dedicated to delivering our customers' innovative signs and graphics solutions. We interpret our customers visions and advise on the best visual solutions to bring their brands to life. In an ever-growing industry, our forward-thinking strategy combined with our national coverage and local approach allows us to offer our clients the most effective solutions.
Each and every business needs signage or graphics whether it's to attract customers, engage or inspire employees, health and safety notices or to simply inform, we’re here to support our clients bring their brands to life. Due to the variety of industries we service and the huge range we offer, the signage industry can be viewed as recession proof as every situation presents opportunities.
Extensive Training Programme: Setting you up for Success
With a commitment to help you grow your business and achieve your goals, we offer extensive training and support to our franchisees to ensure you are set up for success. Throughout your Signs Express career, we offer:
- Comprehensive onboarding programme for all new franchisees including classroom learning and hands-on training
- Business Coaching and Mentoring
- Ongoing training for existing franchisees and their teams via our custom-built Learning Management Platform
- Live training sessions from our company owned flagship centre in Twickenham
- Business Health Checks ensuring best practice
- Dedicated Franchise Support Centre and centre visits, offering support and training to our network across all disciplines including finance, IT, local and national marketing, operational, recruitment, business planning and sales
- Social media training
- Exit planning and realising your resale value
- Sharing of best practice from fellow franchisees and from our supplier partners
Hear from our Franchisees:
Kris Bell, Signs Express (Aylesbury): Catching up with Kris after 12 months of ownership:
“The last year has been a whirlwind. Being quite a risk averse individual, I usually spend a lot of time weighing things up, however after the busiest 12 months of my career, I’ve definitely had to adapt the way I work, along with my overall business approach and I’ve learnt a lot about myself for sure, along with help and support from the Franchise Support Centre offering guidance and support each step of the way.
I’ve loved every minute of it (despite the challenges) and I’ve met some fantastic individuals in local businesses and built some great relationships with our customers along the way. I’m really pleased with where the business has been heading and the progress we’ve made as a team, so I felt ready for the next step in my Signs Express journey by venturing into the new hub and spoke model.”
Matt Rutlidge, Signs Express (Central Lancashire): Speaking with Matt as he moves into ownership:
“After 14 years with Signs Express and working as Centre Manager for the past four years, I am thrilled to announce that I am now the proud owner of Signs Express (Central Lancashire), serving the local areas of Preston, Blackpool and Blackburn. I’m fortunate enough to have fantastic relationships with the majority of our customers and suppliers already, however I’m excited to spend the coming weeks and months reaching out and speaking with many more local businesses to see how we can work together.
I’m extremely passionate about what I do and with a dedicated, experienced team around me, we’re excited to see where we can take the business and continue to explore and push the boundaries of what we can create for our local communities and beyond.”
Roy Heeley and John McEntee, Signs Express (Liverpool & Wirral): Discuss what they enjoy most about working in the signage industry:
“Having started the business from scratch many years ago, we are still learning 20 years later! We thrive when working in a creative environment offering a varied and diverse approach to our customers means every day is different. We’re both sociable individuals and enjoy getting out and about meeting new customers. Building relationships is key to the success of the business, leading to repeat business, a solid reputation and word of mouth recommendations. Many of our good friends started off as customers and it’s great that they’ve been on the journey with us.
Work life balance is also essential, our Monday-Friday working days have allowed us to spend time with our friends and family whilst enjoying the benefits of running our own business. Undoubtedly the support from our fellow franchisees along with support from the franchise support centre has been integral to our success.”
Who are we looking for?
Full support and training is provided throughout your Signs Express career, therefore no industry experience is required.
We are looking for two types of franchisees:
- Business savvy, hands-on managers with no industry experience but have the desire, drive and ambition to take a business to the next level.
- Career driven sign makers and production managers that are experienced in the industry with ambitions to own and grow their own business with our support.
Our ideal franchisee will be extremely personable with the ability to build relationships, act consultatively to help build solutions, they will be driven, ambitious, a good all-rounder, creative and not afraid of hard work.
‘A Day in the Life of a Franchisee’
As a centre owner no two days will be the same, you’ll be the key relationship manager for your customers, you’ll be the face of the business, the driving force for innovation, you’ll work in a consultative manner and be the voice of authority in your field, offering bespoke solutions to your customers, all delivered with outstanding customer care.
Investment and Funding:
- Franchise Fee of £8,500 for a resale purchase or £25,000 for a start-up opportunity
- Investment levels vary for our resale opportunities depending on the size of the business. Current opportunities range from £99,950 to £250,000.
- A total investment of £215,000 is required for a start-up opportunity.
- At Signs Express we can support you with funding via our 3rd party financial partners such as HSBC.
- Typically, 30% of the asking price is required in liquid capital, however we will work with you to look at different funding approaches if required.
Please get in touch today to find out more!
- Franchise Fee: £25,000
- Minimum Investment: £215,000
- Minimum Liquid Capital: £65,000
Tackling Tomorrow Together: 2024 Convention Round-Up
It was fantastic to see such a great turn out, with over 80% of our network in attendance, over twenty suppliers from across the industry, a range of expert speakers, plus our Franchise Support Centre team, so it was safe to say we had a full house!
Events like Convention offer a fantastic opportunity to bring everyone together and allows us to reflect on the many accomplishments and milestones we have all achieved. It enables us to formally recognise the immense talent within our network through our Sign and Franchise Awards and gives us another chance at the Franchise Support Centre to say a heartfelt thank-you to our franchisees for their amazing contributions to Signs Express and the creative industry sector we are in.
On the flip side, it is also a terrific opportunity to look at what 2024 has to offer and focuses us on our plans and critical development areas for the year ahead.
With a packed-out schedule, our agenda looked something like this:
- Business Update and 2024 plans from Managing Director Jonathan Bean and Network Development Director Aaron Davis
- An insight into the ever-changing face of digital marketing from Marketing Consultant Mark Harvey
- xhibitions, demos and competitions from our industry leading suppliers
- Recruitment Seminar tackling best practice from Genesis Recruitment Director Jo Torrie
- Digital Marketing Seminar discussing the changing landscape and what this means for our franchisees, delivered by Senior Marketing Manager Damien Berry and digital expert Paul Edwards from web agency Shorthose Russel
- An introduction to our new game-changing software, delivered by software CEO and founder Shaun CoreBridge
- Plus, our black-tie gala dinner and our eagerly anticipated 2023 Sign and Franchise Awards recognising the best in our network!
We have made exceptional progress as a network throughout 2023 and we are confident this is set to continue.
Whilst the economy has created its own challenges, we remain committed, focused and driven to stand out in a competitive industry sector with ambitions to become the dominant player in the signs and graphics space and be recognised as the most powerful brand in the market, known and respected for our bespoke, high-quality solutions and outstanding customer care.
By ‘tackling tomorrow together’ we are excited to be on the journey alongside our network as we look to help support our franchisees to increase sales and improve profitability through best practice, new operational systems and expansion opportunities.
Reflecting on such a fantastic day, it was incredible to see so many there, bringing a huge amount of energy and collaboration to the event.
A big thank you to all of our franchisees, their teams, our suppliers and industry partners who took the time out of their busy schedules to come along and be part of such a fantastic event.
If you would like to be part of our award-winning network and be a part of our 2025 Convention, why not get in touch and discuss our franchising opportunities?
With a network of over 60 locations, 30+ years’ experience and a forward-thinking strategy, we offer the perfect franchise opportunity in a creative and high profit sector.
We offer the opportunity to join our network via our selected resale opportunities offering you the chance to take on an already established business, rebrand your existing signage company to become part of our market-leading brand, or choose a location that suits you and start-up your own Signs Express
centre allowing you to shape your business from the ground up.
I would definitely recommend franchising to those who wish to own a business with large potential. It’s been a fantastic way to grow my opportunities whilst knowing I have all the support, guidance and reassurance just a phone call away.
Signs Express’ dedicated support team ensure I look at the facts and figures giving me advice on the next steps to take. It’s important to keep looking at the bigger picture in order to keep on track with the growth I want for the business. I have a very exciting future ahead of me.
Signs Express Master Franchise Opportunity
