Meet Ramon Escobedo

It started with pinstriping

Around 1990 I went to work for my brother-in-law, who had been pinstriping cars around Ogden for a long time. He taught me the trade, and by 1993 I opened my own business.

I didn't want to step on his toes, so I stayed away from his accounts. I drove 30 miles out to car lots in Salt Lake, Logan and Brigham City, places he didn't cover, and pinstriped car after car. That first year went well enough that I knew this was what I wanted to do.

When he moved to Idaho, he passed his whole route on to me. I traded him a stereo and a little cash for every account he had. Those accounts became the foundation of everything I've built since.

From airbrush to wide-format printing

Next I bought a plotter and started cutting vinyl. I'd cut the outline, then airbrush the graphic by hand: the color, the shadow effects, the splatter, the stripes. When I pulled the outline off, it left a clean, sharp custom graphic. Every one was hand-sprayed.

Then I bought my first printer. I started printing graphics, wrapping toolboxes, then hoods, carbon fiber and full graphics. The more I learned the design software, the crazier the work got. Today I build my own templates for every vehicle we sell, so each kit is drawn to the real body lines of that machine.

We print and cut everything in-house on a high-end 54-inch printer and 54-inch cutter.

One business, six names

The name changed as the work grew, but it has always been the same shop and the same owner:

1. Ray's Graphic and Design — my first company, opened in 1993
2. Innovative Images — graphics, banners, car audio and window tint
3. Unique Wraps — when wraps became the main thing I did
4. 360 Audio
5. Badazz Wraps (B.A.W.) — our longest-running name and a popular one, especially on eBay
6. KGFX Kustom — where we are today, and the name we're keeping

Badazz Wraps had a big following, but some customers weren't comfortable with the name, and I knew it was costing us work. So in the move to KGFX Kustom I kept the designs and the attitude and gave the shop a name everyone can put on their machine. The B.A.W. style still lives on as one of our collections.

During the Innovative Images years I also did car audio and window tint alongside graphics. They took a lot of time for the return, so I dropped them and put everything into graphics and wraps. That's been my focus ever since: graphics, banners, company trucks, boats, paddle boats and just about anything else people bring in.

If it holds still, I'll wrap it

UTVs, ATVs, snowmobiles, dirt bikes, boats, RVs and trucks are what we do every day. Some of my favorite jobs have been the unusual ones:

• A 4-foot vintage ice chest, the kind old stores used to keep pop on ice, wrapped in my brother's favorite football team
• A prosthetic leg, wrapped to look like a robot leg with a mechanical air piston
• A wheelchair
• A helicopter
• Gas tanks with flags and patriotic designs
• Memorial wraps for families honoring someone they lost

Those memorial wraps mean the most to me.

Not just vehicles

One of my favorite techniques is printing on white or clear see-through vinyl and laying it onto things you'd never expect: plates, cups and tile. I've made memorial plates, family-photo tiles with sayings on them, and even a full tiled shower. I've wrapped a lunchbox too. If it has a surface, I'll find a way to put a graphic on it.

Four styles, one shop

Every KGFX kit is built for your exact machine. What changes is the attitude:

• KGFX — clean, classic wrap kits for any machine
• B.A.W. — Badazz Wraps — more rugged and more aggressive, the legacy style
• Nemesis — skulls and out-of-this-world artwork for riders who want something nobody else has
• DUBS — lowrider style: big metal flake, candy colors, pinstripes and wild color combinations

What I tell every customer

Prep is everything. Clean it, clean it again, and take your time on the edges. I put everything I've learned into our install guides so you can get a shop-quality result at home.

Want something nobody else has? Design your own wrap, or call me at 801-644-6633.