Snow, Shop Work, and the Great Dinner vs. Supper Debate | Leaman Signs Vlog #006
Not every week at Leaman Signs involves crane trucks and dramatic installs. Sometimes it's an interior shop day, a snow-covered parking lot, and a philosophical argument about whether noon counts as dinner. Episode 006 captures one of those weeks — quieter on the outside, busy on the inside, and with the Christmas crunch tightening up fast.
Snow Clearing: Another Hat Greg Wears
The episode opens with Greg behind the wheel of the plow truck. He and Brad look after all the snow clearing themselves — whether it's the truck for general clearing or the tractor with the front bucket for moving bigger piles. It's one of those things that's easier to just do yourself than to coordinate around someone else's schedule, especially when the yard is a mix of gravel and uneven ground that hasn't fully frozen yet. Pulling gravel with the plow blade, navigating soft patches — it's a grind, but it gets done.
With nothing exterior on the schedule due to weather, the focus shifts entirely to interior and shop work. Brad’s flat out keeping the fabrication side moving, which is exactly where things need to be heading into the final push before Christmas.
Loading Up for Home Depot
The Home Depot exterior refresh for Pride Signs is ready to move. Getting the crates loaded onto the trailer takes some coordination — three crates, a tractor, a strap, and a crew that makes it work through a mix of muscle and improvisation. It's not always elegant, but it gets there. Pride Signs ships the fully fabricated package from wherever it's manufactured; Leaman Signs handles getting it to site and installing it. It's a clean relationship and a reliable source of work.
Once loaded, it's off to site. The national sign company model is worth understanding: companies like Pride Signs hold branded accounts — Home Depot, Tim Hortons, and others — all across Canada and the US, then subcontract installation to vetted local companies in each market. Getting on those install lists is a meaningful part of how a sign company like Leaman Signs keeps steady work flowing alongside direct client projects.
A Tricky Site Assessment
Graham heads out to scope a potential job for a chiropractor moving into a new unit. It looks simple from the road, but up close it gets complicated fast. The grassy area behind the property is steep and overgrown — not usable for a sign base. The pavement layout doesn't leave an obvious spot either. The conversation turns to whether cutting out a section of pavement and setting something back further might be the move. It's the kind of site assessment that produces more questions than answers on the first visit, but that's the point — figure out what you're dealing with before you commit to a solution.
Shop Fabrication and a Slow Burn Week
The rest of the week is heads-down shop work: fabrication running, finishing details on various jobs, and the team holding things together while the weather limits what can happen outside. An arrow sign for Gander gets assembled. Measurements get tracked down. A welder gets sourced for a repair job. The usual back-and-forth of keeping multiple projects moving at different stages simultaneously.
There's also a moment where a spilled vanilla oat milk gets mourned with appropriate gravity. Some losses hit different.
The Dinner vs. Supper Debate
The highlight of the episode that has nothing to do with signs: a full crew debate about whether noon is lunch or dinner, whether supper is the evening meal or a light snack before bed, and whether Newfoundland's naming conventions for meals hold up against the rest of the world. Greg lands on "supper" for the evening meal just to sidestep the confusion entirely. The Jamaican perspective (dinner and supper are both afternoon, supper in Jamaica is a light evening snack) does not simplify things. Google gets consulted. Nobody fully wins.
It's the kind of conversation that happens when you've got a crew of people who genuinely like each other and have been working together long enough to get into it over something completely inconsequential. That's also what makes these vlogs worth watching.
Three weeks left before Christmas. Subscribe to the Leaman Signs YouTube channel to follow along.