Painting Truck Decals: Logo and Van Lettering for Painting Contractors

Painting truck decals are for painting contractors who want their van or pickup lettered with a name, a phone number and a mark. (If you came looking for how to paint a truck itself, that is a body shop job, not a decal one.) A painting company sells careful work, so the truck has to look neat: straight lines, evenly spaced letters and colors that do not clash. Vinyl decals make that easy, since the layout is printed once and applied the same way on every vehicle.

Hand-painted lettering or vinyl decals

Searches for hand-painted truck lettering show that some owners like the look of a sign painter's work. It is a craft, it is done by a person, and every truck comes out slightly different. A vinyl decal is printed from a file, so the second van matches the first exactly, which matters when you add vehicles. We make vinyl decals only, not hand-painted lettering, and the customer applies them with the instruction sheet and the install video that come with the order. See how to install truck door decals for the steps.

What a painter's truck needs to say

A painting company's vehicle often sits at one house for days, so the audience is the whole street. The essentials:

• Company name, big and clean.
• Phone number, in plain digits.
• The word painting, plus a qualifier such as interior, exterior or commercial if the name does not say it.
• Nothing else that needs squinting.

Check with your state licensing board whether it wants a contractor license number displayed on a vehicle, and add one only if it does. Whether a truck needs a USDOT number depends on weight and use, and who needs a USDOT number is where to start.

The paint roller logo

The Paint Roller Block Logo stacks heavy navy capitals on three lines, with a red paint roller at the top right and a stripe of blue paint running from it. The sample reads FRESH COAT PAINTING. It says the trade without a word, and the roller and stripe add color to an otherwise navy design.

A few things to know before you pick it:

• The type is heavy and stacked, which makes it tall, so it suits a door with some height, such as a van's side panel or a pickup's cab door.
• A three-line name is a natural fit. A one-word name leaves the layout looking unbalanced, so look at the proof.
• The red and blue are bright, so the logo stands out most on a white or light truck.

You see a proof with your name fitted before anything is printed.

Sample painting door text

Made-up names and (555) numbers:

• LARKSPUR PAINTING, Interior and Exterior, (555) 555-0144
• WESTBROOK PAINT CO., (555) 555-0167
• STEADYBRUSH PAINTERS, Residential and Commercial, (555) 555-0182

The Business Name + Phone Number decal is the simple choice for a second van, a trailer or a pickup that does not need the full logo. The Make-Your-Own 5-Line decal takes up to five lines of free text. Use the door size guide to check widths on your door.

Colors: painters will notice

Painting customers notice color, so the truck is a small sample of your taste. Stick to two or three colors and keep them consistent with your estimates and signs. Navy and red read well on white. Pastels look pretty on a card but wash out on a vehicle. On a dark truck, white lettering reads cleanly.

Do decals hurt the paint underneath?

A common worry, and a fair one. A decal covers the paint, so that area gets less sun than the rest of the truck. When the decal comes off years later, an outline can show, called ghosting, and careful washing and polishing can soften it. Our guide to how to remove truck decals covers what to expect. If you want something you can remove without that risk, magnetic USDOT signs explains the magnet route, though we make adhesive decals.

Contour cut for a roller logo

The optional contour cut adds $10 per door. The decal is cut to the outline of the logo, so the roller and the paint stripe stand on the paint without a rectangle around them. The stripe trails off in a long curve, so check the proof to see how the cut looks.

Crews that wash houses before painting can read pressure washing truck decals, and exterior painters who also repair roofs may want roofing truck decals.