General Sign Co. has nationwide reach

Largest exterior sign manufacturer in the state

By Jim Obert

Business Today

In its 64-year history, General Sign Co. of Cape Girardeau has helped countless businesses advertise their existence. Since its inception in 1939 as a partnership between Charles Hadfield and Lon Maxey, General Sign has gone from small painted signs to immense illuminated signage.

By the late 1980s, General Sign had done work for Montgomery Ward, Harley-Davidson, Dairy Queen, IGA Foods, McDonnel Douglass, Pizza Inn, Sears, Centerre and Mercantile banks, Continental Bank of Chicago, Payless Shoes, Taco John and more.

The company is the largest exterior sign manufacturer in the state, and one of the largest in the Midwest.

In recent years, General Sign has built illuminated signs for Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, St. Charles Arena in St. Charles, St. John's Mercy Hospital in St. Louis and the Sheraton Hotel in downtown St. Louis.

In the Cape Girardeau area, the company has left its mark at Commerce Bank, Union Planters Bank, Lion's Choice, Wehrenberg Theaters' Cape West 14 Cine, Westfield Shoppingtown West Park Mall, the businesses in Town Plaza Shopping Center and more.

The company, which employs about 75 workers, installs its own signage within a 75-mile radius of Cape and within a 75-mile radius of St. Louis. Signage installation in other parts of the country are done by 750 licensed and bonded subcontractors.

"Our market tends to be on the high quality side," said Lenn Scheibal, president and CEO. "One of our strengths are the experienced craftsmen here. They average 16 or 17 years with the company, and some employees have been here more than 30 years."

Scheibal, who has an engineering degree from the University of Missouri-Rolla and an MBA from the University of Wisconsin, has years of corporate experience. He worked for Kohler Co. for 11 years, and he spent 13 years at Kaiser-Aluminum. He joined General Sign Co. in 1998.

Scheibal says the company has many national accounts that constitute about 45 percent of its business. Another 45 percent of its business is generated by retail firms such as Buffalo Wild Wings in Cape. Of the retail business, more than half is done in the St. Louis area.

"We also have a wholesale business that accounts for about 10 percent of our revenue," said Scheibal. "We build signs for smaller sign shops that don't have the capability. We do graphics and extrusions for them."

General Sign Co. makes channel letters, wall signs, box signs, neon signs, pylon signs and monument signs. Pylon signs are often found at shopping plazas and strip malls. They are generally large, mounted on poles -- or pylons -- and contain the names of two or more businesses. Monument signs are large and are placed on the grounds of a business. Two local examples are Saint Francis Medical Center and Commerce Bank.

The majority of the company's signage is for exterior use, although a small amount of interior signage is done as a service for a client.

Scheibal said two artists, one of whom has won an international award for commercial signage, are on staff to work with customers. The artists and graphic designers create a concept for the customer. Once approved, the concept becomes reality when engineers complete the structural and mechanical design by using engineering software.

General Sign Co. is a union shop. Employees are members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and the Painters District Council 2.

The company is currently doing the signage for a new parking garage at Lambert Airport in St. Louis. It does ongoing nationwide work with Purina and American General corporations.

A major upcoming project will be signage work for Los Angeles-based Regal Theater Group. The theater chain owns 750 theaters nationwide, and the group will open their first theater in Missouri in St. Louis this fall.

General Sign Co. is located in a 100,000-square-foot building in Nash Road Industrial Park. Its first location was in a small shop above the former Shaul Feed and Supply Store on South Spanish Street.