SMALL BUSINESS | Trinkle Signs Owner looks to perfect service down to the letter

The business offers screen printing and may expand into vintage signs.
TRACEY D'ASTOLFO
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
Trinkle Signs is one of the oldest continuously operated business in downtown Youngstown.
The business opened in 1915, when Earl Trinkle quit his job at the Isaly's Dairy plant on Mahoning Avenue and opened his sign shop. Ward Page and Barney Carnes bought the business in 1969.
Page's son Bob bought out his father's partner in 1985 and became sole owner of the business when his father died in 1989.
Bob Page said the store has always been downtown, to the best of his knowledge, but in several locations, including a shop where the WRTA station stands and underneath the State Theater, where a fading sign painted on an enclosed bridge spanning the alley behind the theater still points the way to the former Trinkle shop.
Trinkle Signs made signs and displays for most of the downtown businesses and theaters back in Youngstown's heyday, Page said.
Not his first choice
Page didn't intend to get into the sign business. He attended Youngstown State University with plans to pursue a career as a forest ranger. When he had trouble in organic chemistry, Page changed majors and earned a degree in advertising art.
Page said his schooling helped him in the sign business to a degree, but his real education came from Carnes.
"I had the art training and the design in college, but the skill of hand-painting a sign has to be learned from someone who's doing it and [Carnes] was the best. He was recognized as one of the best in the country."
Trinkle Signs creates signs, banners, posters and T-shirts, designs trade show displays and paints logos on cars, including the YSU police cruisers. Page said he does work for the YMCA, Youngstown Symphony and McDonough Museum of Art. The company has been focusing on screen printing, which Page said is a service many sign companies do not offer.
"You have to find your niche with so many people in the business. I'm trying to emphasize the screen printing because that's something not everybody does. We do quite a bit of [screenprinting work] for other sign shops."
Page said he'd like to remain in the downtown area and has plans to possibly expand into vintage signs.
"We're kind of investigating going into collectible vintage signs, like old restaurant signs. We're going backward in time instead of forward."