History

In the 90s I was working as a Senior Mechanical Designer for an aerospace company in southern California where we designed and manufactured helicopter rescue hoists and cargo winches.

Living in Southern California means traveling on freeways and boulevards and this means there are a lot of signs everywhere but the signs that caught my eye were the tri-paneled signs. Being a Mechanical Designer I became interested in how they worked. One day I stopped and looked at one of them and after seeing it I thought to myself:

1st: Do they really need all those parts just to make the prisms turn?

2nd: It sure looks like a heavy sign. If it wasn't so heavy they wouldn't need all those brackets and welding in order to attach it to the structure.

From this point on I always kept my eyes open for these types of signs. Then I started to notice that there were many times these signs weren't running or the prisms would actually be out of sequence so the image would be messed up. At this point I thought the companies who own these signs must be getting tired of fixing them and the advertiser must be getting tired of their ads not showing. I called some of these companies and found out they like the revenue generated from the signs but were unhappy with the reliability of the drive systems. I also talked to a company in Minnesota that was using a tri-paneled sign and they said they were unhappy with the drive system they had. In the winter time water would get into the gearbox and then when the temperature got below freezing the sign wouldn't turn because the water in the gearbox had turned to ice.

In 1995 I started sketching on paper different types of designs for a drive system. When doing this I would always try to keep the design as simple as possible keeping in mind the following:

Someone has to manufacture the parts.
The less machining the better, use standard parts.
Someone has to assemble the parts.
Use standard tools, allow room for assembling the parts.
Someone is going to purchase this product.
It should look good, be reliable, be sold for a fair price.
Someone has to install the product.
Make it quick and easy to install, keep it simple.
Someone is going to use the product.
Keep it simple so anyone can understand it.
Maybe someone will service this product.
Use off the shelf parts that can be easily replaced.

In 1996 the first prototype was built and testing on the drive system started.

In 1997 a utility patent was applied for.

In 1998 a utility patent was issued.

In 1999 the decisions was made to quit my job as a Mechanical Designer after having been at the same company for 14 years and move to Minnesota with my wife and two kids. I grew up here and this is where we wanted to raise our family and start Action Signs and Billboards. This was also the year we sold our first billboard size sign to Flynn Outdoor in Sioux Falls, SD.

In 2002 sales continue to increase as people see the simplicity of the patented drive system. Our customers are still happy as their signs continue running. Our website is created in order to attract more companies that want a great product. The Minnesota Vikings purchase one of our signs.

In 2003 one of our customers asked us to build a mobile billboard truck with our tri-paneled signs mounted on it. The truck would be used for mobile advertising. They choose us because they like the simple patented drive system and our light weight signs.

In 2004 we continue to grow and now are selling our signs to larger companies like Universal Studios in Florida, the PGA tour, Sara Lee and other companies.? The mobile advertising truck business continues to grow so we build our second mobile billboard truck.

In 2005 we export our first sign to Aruba. We continue to build more mobile billboard trucks because people like the overall size, simplicity, reliability, looks and because we build our own signs and trucks the cost is much lower than our competitors.

In 2006 we continue to export signs. We continue to build more mobile billboard trucks and come out with our new Dodge Sprinter mobile billboard truck that get 20-23 mile per gallon in the city.

In 2008 the economy was slowing up so we diversified.  Along with continuing to build signs we designed and started building Hay Hopper Feeders.  Both our cattle feeders and horse feeders help eliminate hay waste because the bale sits in the chain hopper and not on the ground.? By having the hay in the chain hopper cattle and horse's can't pull the hay out of the feeder like they do on a regular bale feeder.

In 2012 we had a customer of ours who had purchased signs from us ask if we would be interested in manufacturing some of their replacement parts they use in their food processing machines.   After some thought we purchased a new Hurco VM10 CNC vertical milling machine.  This gives us the ability to machine parts much faster with more accuracy and tighter tolerances.