Resources...                     Our Work Samples...	"Graphics Firm in Business of Customization" by Bob Batz                                    --Dayton Daily News May 29, 2005 Article--    Neat name, Colorful place.    Those four little words speak volumes when used to describe Yipes Stripes, a 17-year-old vinyl graphics firm tucked away in a corner of the Englewood Industrial Park.    It's hard to pinpoint the thing that best characterizes the company's easy-going approach to doing business.    It could be owner Dave Corbin himself, an effervescent 59-year-old who delights in telling visitors, "We try to keep it loose here, have a good time, get the job done."    Or, maybe it's the many interesting and offbeat items that fill the front office of the 10,000-square-foot building and include vintage racing helmets, scale model cars and a red-white-and-blue refrigerator that's shaped like a mail box and boasts a siren that shrieks whenever the door is opened.    Then again, it might just be the shop's "official greeter" -- a friendly, black Labrador Retriever named Nitro who can pluck a basketball out of the mid-air with her paws.    Even the founding of the company has a touch of whimsy, according to Corbin. "My wife Mary and I started the business in the garage of our home in what is now Clayton with zero customers and zero money and ... well ... it just grew," he said while giving a couple of visitors a guided tour of his shop. "Without Mary, there would be no Yipes Stripes. Before this, I sold food for 24 years, but I was always a car nut, so it was easy for me to get into this."    Yipes Stripes provides lettering, striping and more for everything from garbage trucks to helicopters.    Twenty-five Miami Valley fire and policy agencies, including the Dayton Police Department, contact Corbin when they need vehicles lettered or otherwise adorned. Other Yipes Stripes customers range from waste management firms to television stations. The firm also does murals and makes banners and job site signs.    "Almost everything these days is vinyl," the owner explained. "The old days of painting are almost gone because there's nobody around to carry on the trade."    The first step is to take a digital photo of the vehicle.    "We do a full-size layout on the computer, then, after getting approval from the customer, we use that layout as a map to do the vehicle," Corbin explained.    A digital printer prints the ink on vinyl and customers have 120 colors from which to choose.    After excusing himself for a moment to talk to two Dayton policemen who popped into the shop to have their helmets lettered, Corbin moved into the next room where works-in-progress included drag racing car, a pontoon boat, and the Kettering Fairmont High School band trailer.    "I've been a hot rod enthusiast for 40 years, but I never raced because my wife wouldn't let me," Corbin said, walking over to where master installer Lynne Hines, 25 -- was putting the finishing touches on the Dayton Police Department's new crime scene investigation van.    "I just picked this up after I came to work here," Hines said, carefully applying vinyl to the side of the large vehicle. "It has taken me four, maybe five hours to do this job, and I love the work because no two projects are ever alike."    Other Yipes Stripes employees are Todd Schindler, a graphics expert who has been with Corbin 14 years, and bookkeeper/accountant Lois Elrich.    "Business is good," Schindler said, "because people like to personalize their boats, cars and what-have-you."    The weirdest thing Corbin's crew has ever decorated was a toilet on wheels.    "It was a joke gift this guy made for his buddy," Corbin said. "He called it the 'Sea Do Do' and it was a riot."    Then after pausing to point to a wall sign that declares"Growing old is mandatory. Growing up is optional," he was talking again about the casual atmosphere of his shop.    "We're not a retail-oriented outfit. We don't advertise or make sales calls. We don't go looking for customers. They just find us. I want a fun mood in the workplace. If I die tomorrow, I want people to say, 'They had a nice company and did a great job.'"    That said, he stepped outside into a driving rain to play a little one-on-one with his favorite Labrador Retriever.