HISTORY OF RICHARDS SIGN COMPANY

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Blaine Richards was a local artist from Ogden, Utah. He was born on December 20, 1909. In 1929, at the age of 20, Blaine opened Richards Sign Company.  

Despite the Great Depression gripping the nation, Blaine preserved and his small business survived, garnishing a hard earned reputation of quality signs that has continued through the decades. 

Blaine hand painted signs, billboards and buildings; including many of the iconic signs throughout the cityscape of Ogden.  

In March of 1950, Blaine took on an apprentice named Derek Warnes.   Blaine continued to expand the business,  and, in 1969 he built the custom sign shop located at 2853 Grant Avenue.  

A documentary, entitled, “Painting the Town” was made about Blaine and his skills as a master sign maker.  

After 42 years of sign making, Blaine retired in October of 1971. 

Derek Warnes began working at Richards Sign Company in March of 1950, just two weeks after immigrating from England. 

Derek’s quick mind, skilled hands and a good eye, quickly served the shop well and led to him becoming a full partner at the sign shop.   

For 21 years, Derek and Blaine worked side by side, often on scaffolding and hanging from ropes off the sides of buildings, or just laughing over the workbenches at the shop.  

On October 21, 1971, Derek purchased the sign shop when Blaine retired. In honor of his mentor and long time friend,  Derek decided to keep the name Richards Sign Company, 

For the next 23 years, Derek ran the shop with the same hand painted craftsmanship that Blaine had established, as well as introducing new technologies, such as screen printing.   

Derek retired in 1994, having worked at the sign shop for 44 years. 

Mylan Warnes officially began working part time at Richards Sign Company at the age of 14; although unofficially he had been in and out of the sign shop for years watching and helping his father, Derek.  

After graduating from high school, Mylan took a 2 year absence from the sign shop to serve a mission for his church. When he returned home, Mylan began working full time at the shop.  

For the next 17 years, Mylan continued to work with his father creating thousands of signs with an exacting eye, a skilled hand and an engineer's precision.   

On January 6, 1994, Mylan and his wife, Sue, purchased the shop from Derek.   

Sue ran the front office and Mylan ran the shop for the next 27 years. During that time, they transitioned away from hand painting by updating the screen printing process, using cut vinyl, and creating the digital print division; they also invented the patented PerfectPost.  

Mylan and Sue retired in November of 2021, making Mylan the longest running employee of Richards Sign Company’s history with 49 years of experience. 

Zena Manley first worked at Richards Sign Company in 2007 as a graphic designer, running the, then new, large format digital printing division.  

Zena spent a year working with Mylan, and although she already had a degree in Multimedia and Computer Graphics, she often spoke of Mylan’s training as being pivotal to her design career.  

After this initial time at the shop, Zena went on to run her own company as well as working for many large corporations and local businesses in a variety of industries.   

In May of 2021, Zena returned to the shop as the lead designer while Mylan recovered from a health crisis. After several months, Mylan and Sue decided to retire in order to spend more time with their family and on November 4, 2021, Zena became the new owner of Richards Sign Company.  

After 93 years, Richards Sign Company is still proudly locally owned and operated by Ogden artists.