College Times

Media Credit: Ryan Ruiz

Tony Salazar stops traffic.

Not with his bronze tan, or his beaming smile, or even his bright orange jersey and colorful sneakers. Valley drivers crane their necks to catch a glimpse of roadside moves like the “Headspin,” the “Helicopter Pop” and the seemingly death-defying “Exorcist.” Salazar is a sign-spinner, and a damn good one at that.

Salazar is a leading member of a young group pushing the physical limits of a very simple form of advertising, and for some, creating a huge public nuisance.

There “sign-spinning” falls on the spectrum of acceptability depends on who you ask. The idea is simple. Brightly-colored signs, adorned with advertisements from local companies, are tossed, flipped, spun and waved on busy street corners in a rather extroverted ploy for attention.

Reaction to the signs is varied. Many passers-by amazed, some confused, at least a few annoyed. But response from businesses – including several big-name corporations – has been fairly consistent: sign-spinning helps boost sales.

And the sign-spinners themselves aren’t doing too badly, either.

When Salazar and his team of sign-spinners perform moves with names like “Chester Cheese Roll” and “Screw Me Sideways,” they work for more than just honks and hollers (although they certainly collect plenty of each). Advertising companies are paying people as young as 16 years old upwards of $20 an hour to spin signs. And they, in turn, have formed quite a tight, competitive community spanning across the country that’s helped to push the attention-getting “art form” to nearly unbelievable levels.

Sign Style Evolution

With several major advertising companies running rather profitable sign-spinning ventures, it’s virtually impossible to pinpoint exactly where the modern-day spectacle originated. More generally, sign-spinning is a twist on the old sign-holder standby.

“Sandwich boards have been going on for who knows how long,” says Rob Kee, part-owner of the Orange County-based Enlarge Media Group and its chief operation, signevents.com, which claims to be the largest sign promotion company in the US and has hired thousands of sign-promoters nationwide. “These probably date back to the beginning of the dawn of retail. So nobody can claim to be the originator, and if they do claim to be the originator, they’re lying.”

At least in the case of Enlarge Media’s employees, the transition from sign-holding to sign-spinning was almost entirely organic.

“These sign guys started it themselves,” Kee says. “We told them, ‘play around with this.’ It’s almost like skateboarding. It evolves over time. These guys took it upon themselves to come up with new ideas.”

That freedom of expression leads to varied styles with overwhelmingly positive results, Kee says.

“I have one guy that listens to heavy metal and air-guitars all day long … I’ve got another guy that likes to dance and listens to soul music. I’ve got another guy that likes to do the flips and throw it behind his back.”

“In a typical shift, they’re standing there five hours with the thing. And we want them having fun with it. It just kind of goes from there.”

Obviously though, one spinner’s fun is another citizen’s folly.

According to Kee, public complaint filings are not uncommon. Some residents protest sign-spinning under specific local ordinances, or simply as a “public nuisance.” But as long as the sign-spinners obey traffic laws and keep away from the public right-of-way and medians, they are fully-protected under the First Amendment, Kee says, and are made aware of such lawful limitations during initial training.

In the case of Tony Salazar’s employer, Aarrow Advertising, creativity is not only encouraged – it’s required. All employees must attend twice-weekly practices, run by “Head Spinstructor” Salazar, and new hires must show proficiency in a basic list of standard tricks before being deployed to the streets.

“It’s just like football practices,” Salazar says. “We do drills and all that stuff. After you get better with tricks, we’ll put you out on the corner.”

Spinnin’ Style

In nearly every art form – painting, dance, music – the community in which it is created has a big impact on its style. Sign-spinning is no different, Salazar says.

“There’s a West Coast feel to it, where it originated in San Diego. Then some of those guys from San Diego went out and spun on the East Coast, DC or New York, so they develop their own type of style,” Salazar says. “And depending on whatever type of music they listen to, whatever sports they’re in, that helps them develop their own personal style of sign-spinning.”

So, like a bizarre corporately-funded break dancing cooperative, sign-spinners splinter off into their own easily-recognizable sects.

Salazar says his style falls somewhere under the “rap/hip-hop” umbrella, and when he makes the brightly-colored sign flip and flutter with the flick of his wrist, he does so with a swagger that matches the music blaring from his headphones. He points and waves at nearly every passing car between precise, breathtakingly acrobatic moves and revels in the steady stream of honks that flow his way. Salazar’s mastered his style, but he says other members of his fleet get just as much attention by putting their own personal stamp on it.

“Some guys are into a real fluid type of motion,” Salazar says. “Some guys like to pop it – some poppers out there, they throw in some break dancing moves. Other guys are just super fast. Like they spin it super-fast, and they’ll freeze a sign at certain points, and it looks so crisp and clean.”

But Aarrow employees don’t just add to their repertoire of tricks just for respect (or the orange jerseys awarded to only the best spinners, an upgrade from the company’s stock red polo). For every new stunt a sign-spinner can demonstrate during the required once-monthly skill examination, the employee earns an additional 10 cents per hour. Tacked on to the $10 per hour base pay, and some Aarrow spinners are raking in a maximum of $20 per hour.

For proof of the ingenuity that good, old-fashioned capitalism can provide, one only needs to look at the ever-growing list of show-stopping tricks performed on street-corners with regularity.

The “Headspin,” where a sign-spinner twirls the sign like a helicopter and balances it on the top of his/her head, is merely a beginner’s warm-up move.

For a real challenge, give the “Buddha Spin” a go. The sign-spinner tosses the sign up in a similar fashion, but instead catches it on his/her stomach while leaning backwards, letting it spin away without even using hands.

Or, for only the most daring – and certainly not for the faint of heart – there’s “The Exorcist,” in which the sign is spun like a helicopter on one hand as the spinner completes a full, one-handed backbend. It’s a move a chiropractor would cringe at.

And don’t scoff at the idea of a sign injury – Salazar says it happens with great regularity.

“I’ve definitely had my share,” Salazar says. “Passing out. Throwing up. Bloody nose. Bruised ego.”

Raking It In

Companies like Best Buy, K-Mart, T-Mobile, Vitamin Water and countless car dealerships and car washes have all jumped at the opportunity to use sign-spinning services, and according to Enlarge Media’s Rob Kee, sign promotions increase foot traffic for businesses by 30 to 50 percent on average on any given weekend.

But it’s the sign-spinners themselves who seem to be getting the sweet end of the deal. In addition to $20 an hour, not including tips – Salazar says he was once tipped $20 – some spinners are collecting on perks that seem more young Hollywood than roadside employee.

Twenty of the country’s best sign-spinners were hired to show off their craft at the 944 Magazine Super Village during the last Super Bowl, hyping up the Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent and Paris Hilton’s VIP-only parties.

Salazar was flown out to San Antonio, all-expenses paid, to promote a George Strait concert.

And to hear Salazar recall his best sign-spinning moment, it makes one wonder: maybe sign-spinners are the new rock star.

“I was spinning down in Casa Grande,” Salazar recalls. “It was really, really hot. It was during spring break, so a lot of the girls were driving around in bikinis, looking for a pool to go to. There was this little Beetle, and there was like three or four girls in it, and they all flashed me, so that was fun.”

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