Every Tilt-Up Looks The Same.
Kent sits in the Green River valley south of Seattle, in the middle of one of the largest warehouse and distribution belts on the West Coast. Tilt-up buildings run for miles along the valley floor and half of them look identical from the road. Our prepared DIY LED sign kits ship right into that, with the LEDs mounted inside the welded aluminum sections before anything leaves the shop.
If you run a business here you already know what a sign crew charges to weld, wire, truck and install. We cover the welding and the wiring, cut the frame to your size, and ship it in sections you can handle yourself. That is where the savings live — up to 60% depending on your project.
The Kit, And The Price Difference
Shipping To Kent And Every Town Around It
Kits ship to Auburn, Renton, Tukwila, Federal Way, Des Moines, Covington, Maple Valley and SeaTac — and everywhere in between. If FedEx delivers there, your sign kit can too.
On the valley floor a customer is looking for one grey building among fifty grey buildings, usually in the rain, usually already running late. A lit cabinet at the driveway solves that better than a suite number on the glass ever will, and it keeps working after four in the afternoon in December when nothing else out there does. Sign rules vary by zone and by landlord in this valley, so confirm the code that applies to your parcel and check your lease terms, then get the approved size in writing before we weld anything.
Every prepared kit includes: an aluminum frame cut to your size with welded corners, LEDs mounted inside, and a 12-volt power supply with wiring hardware as listed in your written quote. Sign faces and graphics are available separately through DIY Graphics.
How Your Kit Gets To Kent
There is more freight capacity in the Kent valley than almost anywhere in Washington, which makes it a little funny that ground shipping is still the better answer. Roughly 95% of our kits go FedEx Ground rather than freight, and that holds here too. The boxes come off a normal route truck straight to your unit, whether that is a warehouse door on the valley floor or a storefront up on East Hill.
What shows up. Four long boxes on a standard cabinet, six on the larger ones where we add splice joints to keep the sections inside ground dimensions. The LEDs are already mounted in the frame when it ships. The 12-volt power supply and the mounting hardware go in the same boxes as quoted. Nothing arrives separately, nothing sits waiting at a terminal, and there is no crate to get rid of afterward.
Delivery day. You might actually have a dock here, which puts Kent in the minority. You still will not need it. There is no pallet, no liftgate and no delivery appointment to build your morning around, so whoever runs receiving does not have to stop what they are doing. One person can move the boxes, and a retail tenant on East Hill with no dock at all is in exactly the same position.
Open the boxes the day they land. Look the sections over even if the cartons look perfect, and do it before install day rather than the morning of. Photograph anything crushed, torn or bent and keep the packaging exactly as it arrived — that is what a carrier claim is built on. Finding a problem the day a box shows up is a phone call; finding it with a crew standing on a ladder is a lost day.
Where to put it. Aluminum does not rust, and a Puget Sound winter is not going to bother the frame once it is mounted. Cardboard is another matter. Boxes left by a roll-up door through a wet week will not hold up, and the LEDs and the power supply are inside them. Get everything indoors the day it lands, and let it come up to room temperature before you start opening things.
Measure Twice. Order Once.
Your kit is cut to a size, welded, and pre-lit before it ships, so the size has to be right the first time. In Kent that means three phone calls before you order, not after.
1. Ask what you're allowed
Start with the City of Kent if your address is inside city limits. The valley runs straight into Auburn, Renton, Tukwila and unincorporated King County, and each of those reviews signs under its own code, so a building a mile up the road may be following completely different rules than yours. Confirm the jurisdiction on your actual address before you go any further. Ask for the maximum sign area and height for your zoning district, whether your sign counts as wall-mounted or freestanding, and what setback applies. Sign area is usually tied to your building frontage, so the answer is specific to your address — not to the block or to the business next door.
2. Ask your landlord
If you're in a plaza or center, the landlord's sign criteria sit on top of the city code and are often stricter. Cabinet depth, face color, letter height and mounting method are all commonly spelled out. Get the criteria sheet in writing before you pick a size — it is cheaper than rebuilding a cabinet that the center won't approve.
3. Ask about engineering and wiring
Washington sits in seismic country too, and a freestanding or pole sign here generally needs drawings and a footing design stamped by an engineer licensed in Washington. Electrical is the wrinkle: in much of Washington, electrical permits and inspections run through the state Department of Labor and Industries rather than the city, though some jurisdictions handle their own. Confirm which applies at your address. Plan on a licensed electrician for the final hookup and inspection either way. We build the cabinet; the permit, the footing, the disconnect and the sign-off are local work done by local people.
Straight Answers For Kent Businesses
Can this mount on a tilt-up wall?
The cabinet is aluminum and the same frame works wall-mounted or freestanding, so a concrete tilt-up is a normal application for it. What matters is the anchoring, which depends on your wall and is worth having someone competent look at before you drill. Tell us the mounting situation when you request the quote so the hardware that ships suits what you are fastening to.
Are the faces included?
They are not. What ships is the welded aluminum cabinet with the LEDs mounted inside, the power supply as quoted and the mounting hardware. Faces and printed graphics are handled separately through our DIY Graphics page. Sort the artwork out while the frame is being built and the two pieces tend to be ready around the same time.
What does Kent require for a lit business sign?
Assume a permit is required. Start with the City of Kent if you are inside city limits, or King County if your address is unincorporated, and expect an illuminated sign to need electrical review as well as the sign permit itself. Landlord approval is worth chasing at the same time out here, since a lot of valley buildings sit under one owner with their own signage standards written into the lease.
Who should make the electrical connection?
A licensed electrician, and that part is not negotiable. These kits are not UL listed, and in Washington the hookup is permitted and inspected work. Assembly is the part you keep: sections bolted square, cabinet mounted and level, faces installed. Have the electrician lined up before the boxes arrive so the sign is not sitting there dark for a month.
Ready to get your written quote?
Every kit is prepared to order. Tell us about your project and we'll answer with a straight, written quote.
Contact DIY Sign Guy