Humble Sign Company is located in Humble (pronounced “Um-bull”), Texas, which is a suburb of Houston. This full-service sign company does pretty much everything—electrical signs, identification and architectural signage, channel letters, LED displays, vehicle wraps, vinyl graphics, etc.
安布勒标识公司位于休斯敦郊区的汉布尔，无论是电子标识、LED发光字，还是汽车包装、乙烯基图形等这家标识公司几乎无所不包。

The company does $5 million annually in business, and they have upgraded their leased facility three times and are in the process of getting ready to move into a brand-new, built-from-scratch 20,000-square-foot facility.
该公司每年的营业额为500万美元，他们已升级了三次租赁设施，并正在准备搬入一个全新的，占地2万平方英尺的厂房。

But what if I told you that seven years ago Humble Sign Company was a struggling two-man vinyl shop located in the attic over a vehicle repair shop?
但如果我告诉你，七年前，它是一家两人经营的标识店，并且坐落在一家汽车修理店的阁楼上，你会相信吗？

It took the vision (and timing) of one man to make this gigantic leap into the sign stratosphere and become one of the biggest sign manufacturers in Houston. His story is not only an inspiration for his employees but possibly you too.
他们的远见还有恰当的时机致使他们进入了标识领域，逐渐成为休斯顿最大的标识制造商之一。他的故事不仅激励了他的员工，也激励着休斯顿的每一个人。

Bart Peterschick grew up in the boating business. He started out as a mechanic and then moved into management and sales. “However the boating industry took a hefty blow during the financial crisis of 2010,” he says. “I found myself under-employed, and no one was hiring. I was desperately running out of money.”
巴特·彼得希克在划船行业长大。他最初是一名机械师，后来进入管理和销售部门。他说：“划船业在2010年金融危机期间遭受了前所未有的打击。我没有工人，也没有人来应聘。我的资金快用完了。”

Seven years ago, with no other options around, Peterschick saw that the struggling Humble Sign Company banner printing shop was for sale. He had no prior sign experience whatsoever, but he also had nowhere else to turn. Driving down the road, he saw the sign—lots of them. “There were signs everywhere,” he says. “I figured this would be a recession-proof industry, since as long as someone was working, there would be a need for signs.”
七年前，在没有其他选择的情况下，彼得希克看到了安布勒标识公司的横幅印刷店正在出售。他没有任何的签约经历，但他也无处可去。他开车时，看到了路边摆放着很多标识。“到处都是标识。”他说，“我认为，这会是一个抗衰退的行业，因为只要有人的地方，就需要标识。”

With Peterschick’s forward-thinking and the universal sales and management skills he brought over from the boating industry, they grew from just two employees to the over thirty they have now.
凭借彼得希克的前瞻思维以及他从船舶行业带来的销售和管理技能，他们从两名员工发展到现在的三十多名。

“We went from no install trucks to four Elliott cranes and two service trucks,” says Jason Pollard, a sign-lifer and installations manager at Humble Sign Company. “We wentfrom slinging plain magnetics and coroplast signs to several national accounts and one of the biggest ship-in installers in the area.”
安布勒标识公司的安装经理詹森•波拉德说:“我们从没有安装卡车，变成了4台埃利奥特起重机和两辆服务卡车。我们从为小商家安装最简单的标识到为地区最大的船舶公司服务，事业从休斯顿发展到整个世界。”

One of the reasons for Peterschick’s success is that he finds the right people to do the right job and then just gets out of their way. “I always felt like I would do better if my employer just set me up and then got out of the way,” he says.
彼得希克成功的原因之一是他找到了合适的人去做合适的工作，并且让他们学会自由发挥。他表示:“我一直觉得，如果我的雇主为我安排好了一切，没有我自主发挥的空间，那么我觉得离开是最好的抉择。”

Peterschick has learned that you always have to appreciate the people on your team. His shop’s foundation is built on recruiting, retaining, and motivating great employees.
彼得希克也认识到表扬的重要性。你必须经常表扬团队中的人，他的公司建立在招聘，留住和激励优秀员工的基础之上。

He has improved not only the morale of many of his employees but also their lives. Peterschick writes a personal letter to somebody every week—calling it the “play of the week”—pointing out their efforts, thanking them, and giving them a $50 gift card.
他不仅提高了许多员工的士气，还改善了他们的生活。彼得希克每周都会选一位员工为他写一封私人信件，大家称之为“每周的游戏”。彼得希克指出员工的努力之处，并给他们一张50美元的礼品卡感谢他们。

“You have to let your workers know that they’re appreciated and give them recognition for their efforts and do it every day,” says Peterschick. “Because in the end, it’s not about your equipment, your facility, or your logo. It’s about your people.”
彼得希克说:“你必须让你的员工认识到他们的努力是值得的，对他们的努力加以赞赏，给与认可。这与你的设备、设施或标识无关，这关于每一个为公司辛苦付出的员工。”

To succeed creatively and financially as a company, they always look for a good attitude amongst their employees.
为了公司在各个方面有所进步，他们也在努力优化员工的服务态度。

“It’s inevitable that, when you get more than three, four, or five people in any business, there’s always going to be that one guy constantly complaining. And that can spread like a disease,” says Pollard. “We’ve always just nipped that in the bud and, in doing so, has left us with the best group of people I’ve ever worked with in my life. You’ve got to be able to come to work everyday and enjoy what you do.”
波拉德说:“不可避免的是，当你在任何行业员工超过四、五个人的时候，总会有一个人不停地抱怨。这就像一种疾病一样传播开来。我们一直在努力扼杀这个萌芽，这样做，留给我们的是我一生中共事过的最好的一群人，你能做到每天都来工作并且享受你的工作。”

Another thing they stress to employees every day is that they work as a unit. “We don’t do anything by ourselves here,” says Pollard. “There’s not one guy down there feeling forced to figure everything out. It’s all of us as a whole.”
他们每天向员工强调的另一件事是他们是作为一个整体在工作。波拉德说:“没有一个人觉得哪里需要单独工作，因为我们是一个整体，我们要一起行动。”

Production meetings are held first thing each Tuesday morning. These typically run an hour-and-a-half and involve costs reports where they analyze spreadsheets and study how much labor was quoted (and how much it took), how much material was quoted (and how much they used), etc. This helps them better bid on jobs and know how they can save on certain types of projects down the road. “You can’t underbid a job, because if you do, you’re going to see that you underbid the job in front of everybody in Tuesday’s meeting,” laughs Pollard. “But this allows us to tweak and redefine what we do. We look at cost per minute and not cost per hour.”
每个星期二早上都要开会，会议包括成本报告，分析电子表格，劳动力的花费和材料引用等等，一般需要开一个半小时。这些可以帮助他们更好地进行竞标工作，并了解如何在未来的某些类型的项目上节省开支。“你不能出价过低，因为如果你出价过低，你就会在周二的会议上看到你在所有人都会调整价格。” 波拉德笑着说， “但这可以让我们调整并重新定义我们的工作，我们关注的是每分钟的成本，而不是每小时的成本。”

They typically have five crews going at a time and run an average of a dozen jobs a day. “Project management is where we shine and is what brings people back,” says Pollard. “You don’t have to worry about it as much when you have the right people in the right place. We have the best installers in the city by far, and these guys don’t need a lot of direction. In the morning, we talk about what they’ll be doing that day, and they go knock it out.”
他们通常有五名工作人员平均每天要干十几项工作。波拉德表示:“项目管理是我们的亮点，我们不会担心我们的员工，因为我对他们有充足的信心。到目前为止，我们有城里最好的安装人员，这些人不需要太多的指导。早上，我们会谈论他们那天要做什么，然后他们就会按时完成手上的工作。”

If you can name it, then the shop floor probably has it—CNC routers; channel letter notching, bending, and flanging machines; large format printers; welding equipment; paint booths; etc.
我们拥有最全的设施，只要你能说出的设备或工具，我们全都有——CNC切割机、发光字、折弯机、翻边机、大幅面打印机、焊接设备、油漆等等。

Pollard says that Peterschick has been able to grow the company because he is “fearless” and “cognizant” of what his employees need. “If you need a piece of equipment that’s going to speed up the job and let him know how it’s going to save you on average fifteen minutes a day and this is how much money this is going to save over the span of a month, he’ll buy it,” he says. ‘If we tell him that installs are getting a little backed up and guys are working sixty hours a week, then he’ll either buy another truck or hire more crew.”
波拉德说:“彼得希克能够把公司发展的这么成功是因为他‘无所畏惧’,并且知道他的员工需要什么。如果你需要一件能够加快工作速度的设备，并让他知道平均每天是如何节省十五分钟的或者这能在一个月内节省多少钱，他绝对会买的。如果我们告诉他员工每周工作60个小时，需要一些方法来减少工作时长。那么他绝对会购买一辆卡车或者雇用更多的工作人员减轻员工负担。”

 “As stated earlier, they have developed into a national ship-in installer. “Ship-in work is one of those things where if they trust you, they trust you and they’ll keep coming back to you,” says Pollard. “But you have to show them that you can do the work and that you’re going to make their life easier and that it’s worth it, even if it costs a little more than the other guy.”
如前所述，他们已经发展成为一个全国性的船舶标识制作商。波拉德说:“如果客户在工作中信任你，那么他们以后会一如既往的信任你。但一定向他们证明，你们值得他们的信任，虽然我们的成本比其他公司高一点，但这一切都是值得的。”

They’re really starting to ramp up their work with national accounts. Their largest customer is Landry’s, Inc., a dining/hospitality/entertainment/gaming corporation, and they have cultivated a nice relationship with their CEO Tilman Fertitta. Their work perfecting this over the past few years is allowing them to branch out and serve other national organizations and Fortune 500 companies.
他们的各个国际公司的订单真的越来越多了。他们最大的客户是Landry公司.，一家餐饮/酒店/娱乐/游戏公司，他们与CEO Tilman Fertitta建立了良好的关系。在过去几年里，他们在这方面的工作不断完善，这使得他们能够拓展业务，为其他国家机构甚至为《财富》500强企业服务。

“The last thing that you ever want to do is rush in and try to grab up a bunch of these larger companies and be unable to actually handle the workload. If you do, you’ll just go downhill from there,” says Pollard. “And once word gets out, you won’t be able to recover and do anything.”
波拉德说:“你最不能做的事情就是不根据实际情况接很多大公司的订单，如果你这样做了，你就会走下坡路。一旦消息传出去，你就无法恢复元气，什么也做不了。”

Humble Sign Company doesn’t do cookie-cutter signs; they’re all custom fabrications. “We design it and then we figure out how to build it,” says Pollard. “We have some of the best fabricators around, and I don’t think there’s anything we can’t do.”
安布勒标识公司不做千篇一律的标识，所有标识都是单独定制的。波拉德说:“我们精心设计它，然后想尽办法如何才能把它建好。我们周围有很多优秀的制造商，我认为没有什么是我们做不到的。”

They wanted a unique lighting solution that would go from brilliant white to any color in the spectrum. “We designed a system that utilized alternating white and RGB LED modules,” says Peterschick. “CEO Tilman Fertitta loved it. Since he is also the owner of the NBA’s Houston Rockets, he wanted it to light up red every time the team wins!”
彼得希克说:“他们想要一个独特的发光字标识，可以从明亮的白色过渡到任何颜色。于是我们设计了一个利用交替白光和RGB LED模组的系统，首席执行官Tilman Fertitta很喜欢这个标识，由于他也是NBA休斯顿火箭队的老板，他希望每次球队赢球的时候都能闪起标识。”

They do face-lit, LED-illuminated pylon signs and channel letters for Saltgrass Steakhouses all over the country. “Back in the day, they would use open-face neon channel letters,” says Pollard. “But today, they are normal face-lit letters with faux-neon LED inside them. We apply two layers of vinyl onto the second surface and one layer on the first surface. When it lights up at night, it looks like brilliant neon.”remote-mounted on a pan sign. They custom-painted them in their booth using AzkoNobel and Matthews Paint paint systems.
他们为全国各地的盐草牛排餐厅做LED发光字和标识。波拉德说:“在过去，他们会使用开放式的霓虹灯发光字。但在今天，这些都是普通的发光字，里面装着人造霓虹LED。我们在第二个表面上涂了两层乙烯基，在第一个表面上涂了一层。当它在晚上亮起来的时候，它看起来像灿烂的霓虹灯。” 他们专门为标识定制了AzkoNobel和Matthews的油漆涂料。

They used push-thru letters and routed aluminum panels. The back side of the panel is a three-inch-deep can, which they inserted LED modules into. “To create the rust effect, we had to put on a chemical finish,” says Pollard. “Since it’s Landry’s, it has to be perfect. You can’t have a bunch of rust in one corner and not that much in the other. It had to be something we call ‘consistently random.’”
他们使用可推动式发光字和铝制板材，板材的背面是一个三英寸深的罐子，把LED模组放入其中。波拉德说:“为了防止生锈，我们必须进行化学处理。因为它是为Landry制作的，所以必须做到完美无缺。后期不能存在某个角落有一堆生锈的情况，这是绝对是不允许的。”

Each year, and sometimes each quarter, Peterschick sits down and wonders how his company is going to top that one and go to the next level. It has led him to develop a new tagline for this company: “Faster. Better. More.”
每年，有时甚至是每个季度，彼得希克都会坐下来思考，他的公司将如何超越现在做到更好并进一步发展，这促使他为这家公司想了一个新的标语“更快、更好、更多” 。

“Where do we go from here? We’ve done it incrementally and steadily with a 30 percent growth on average year after year. Every time we do that, we have to force ourselves to look for the next level,” says Peterschick. “My vision is continued growth by offering your customer more than you did the previous year and try to exceed their expectations. That’s how we’ve retained customers for seven years.”
彼得希克说：“我们将何去何从?我们的逐渐成长回答了这一问题，年复一年，我们的业绩平均增长了30％。每次看到公司不断变好我们都强迫自己寻找下一个目标。我的愿景是持续增长，为你的客户提供比去年更优质的服务，并努力超出他们的预期，我们就是这样留住了7年的客户。”

And from the looks of it, with the skill, equipment, and high employee morale, Humble Sign Company will be retaining customers for many more years to come.
安布勒标识公司有着精湛的技术、设备和高昂的员工士气，我们相信他们将会在未来拥有更多的客户。