Overview
Sign Fabrication/CNC Operator (Will Train) Jobs in Saint Paul, MN at Dimension Sign
WHO WE ARE
Dimension Sign has built custom signage in the Twin Cities for over 20 years. We’re a UL Listed sign manufacturer and the shop other sign shops call when a job is too big, too complex, or too tight on time for them to build themselves – 200+ trade partners and 500+projects across five states, for hospitals, schools, city halls, hotels, and national retail.
What that means for you: we don’t make the same part 400 times a day. Nearly every job crossing this floor is one somebody else couldn’t do. You’ll build things that didn’t exist last week and drive past them for the rest of your life. Every week will be a new challenge and learning opportunity. We are a small team(6 people) that runs lean and seeks continuous improvement from the office to the shop floor.
THE ROLE
You’ll run our cutting and forming equipment and learn sign fabrication from the ground up. No experience needed – nobody teaches this trade anywhere, so we teach it here, on the clock.
Our shop is equipped past its weight class:
– CNC routers
– CNC plasma table
– Waterjet
– CO2 laser
– Rotary engraver
– SDS automatic letter bender
– Graphtec vinyl plotter
Day to day: load and unload material, run the programs, keep the machines fed and maintained, deburr parts, and stage finished work for fabrication and paint. Between cuts you’re a shop hand -assembling, prepping, sanding, masking, packing. Work orders and travelers run on software we built ourselves, so you’re on a screen, not a smudged clipboard.
The job grows on its own, too: between the plasma table and the waterjet you’re already cutting the metal, and welding it together is the natural next step.
WHO WE’RE ACTUALLY LOOKING FOR
Read this part carefully, because it matters more to us than your resume.
We are not looking for someone to babysit a start button. We’re looking for someone who takes ownership of their equipment – who notices the cut quality drifting before we do, who has an opinion about how the parts get nested, who asks why we do it this way and sometimes turns out to be right.
If you’re the kind of person who wants to be handed a machine and left alone to master it, this is a very good job. Bring us that and you won’t be an apprentice for long – the ceiling here is a lot higher than the title.
We’re growing, and we’d rather grow people than rent them.
WHAT WE’LL TEACH YOU
On the floor:
– Machine setup, tooling, feeds and speeds, and nesting
– Reading shop drawings and cut lists
– Working aluminum, acrylic, ACM, PVC, and steel
– Channel letter fabrication and returns
– Layout, assembly, prep, and paint
– Vinyl – plotting, weeding, transfer tape, and laying graphics down clean on flat and curved faces
– Welding – aluminum on spool guns, ~90% of our work, plus steel
– Fabricating to UL standard, a credential that follows you
On the screen:
– Fusion 360 – real CAD, designing parts, not just opening somebody else’s file
– Programming our CNC equipment, not only operating it
– Our own fabrication software, built in-house
That second list is the part we’d point at hardest. Most shops teach you to run a machine and stop there, because an operator who can’t program is easier to keep. We’d rather you could do both. CAD and CAM separate someone who runs a CNC from someone who decides what it makes – and you’ll learn them here, on the clock, at full pay, instead of paying a tech school for the privilege.
WHAT WE PAY
$24 – $27/hr to start, depending on what you bring
+$2/hr on top of that if you come in as an experienced welder
$30/hr is the top of this role as it stands today – and that ceiling isn’t bolted down. It moves with what you bring. Pick up welding, get quick on the programming side, become the person we hand the hard job to, and the number follows. No waiting on a review cycle – you’ll know where you stand because we’ll tell you.
WHAT YOU NEED
Required:
– Reliable. You show up, on time, every day. This is most of it.
– Mechanically inclined – you’ve taken things apart and gotten them back together
– Tape measure and shop math – fractions, decimals, to 1/16″
– Able to lift 75 lbs – full sheets and raw material – and stay on your feet through a shift
– Careful. A sheet of acrylic costs real money; a crashed bit in a finished panel costs more.
– 18+, valid driver’s license
Bonus points, and they move your starting number:
– Any CNC experience
– router, plasma, mill, laser, waterjet
– Any welding at all. We run aluminum spool guns, not TIG
– if you can MIG steel, you’re most of the way there.
– Vinyl, graphics, wrap, or decal experience
– Tech school coursework, forklift time, or any shop, construction, ag, or automotive background
If you’re running a machine in a plant right now and you’re bored out of your mind, come talk to us. Same if you’ve been weeding vinyl at a print shop and want to learn the metal side.
SCHEDULE & BENEFITS
– Monday-Friday, 8-hour shifts. No nights. No weekends.
– You choose your start time between 7:30 and 8:30 – then keep it. Flexible up front, predictable after, because the floor plans around knowing when you’re here.
– No mandatory overtime. Offered occasionally, never forced.
– 401(k) with company match – we match 50% of your first 3%
– 10 days paid time off
– 8 paid holidays
– $200 annual boot allowance
– Tools and PPE provided
– Training paid at full wage – you learn on the clock, not on your own time
HOW TO APPLY
Apply through Indeed, or email [email protected] directly. Skip the cover letter. Tell us two things instead:
1. Something you’ve built, fixed, or taken apart — and what went wrong while you were doing it. Pictures welcome.
2. The last thing you taught yourself, and how you went about it.
Pay: $24.00 – $30.00 per hour
Expected hours: 40.0 per week
Benefits:
- 401(k)
- 401(k) matching
- On-the-job training
- Paid time off
Work Location: In person
Title: Sign Fabrication/CNC Operator (Will Train)
Company: Dimension Sign
Location: Saint Paul, MN
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