Community gem: Quirky signs highlight of day for commuters

John Drummond is in the attic of the Welcome Bay Vet Clinic.

It isn't your standard storage space housing old furniture, televisions or boxes.

Instead, Drummond is looking through the 40-odd handmade signs that are kept in plastic covers and catalogued in the roof of the busy vet clinic.

Each week a different sign is pulled down and displayed at the front of the vet clinic on Welcome Bay Rd, some weeks there are more than one sign on display at a time.

Each symbolises a current event, a major milestone or an upcoming holiday.

If you drive down Welcome Bay Rd often, chances are you will be pretty clued up about what is going on in the world.

For example, if you were to drive past Welcome Bay Vet Clinic last month you would have seen a dog, wearing pink snow gear, downhill skiing.

This sign was displayed to congratulate Zoi Sadowski-Synnott and Nico Porteous on winning bronze medals at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics.

Drummond had been making the cat and dog inspired signs for more than 15 years and said time had flown by to the point where there were more than 40 different signs.

John Drummond has been brightening up Welcome Bay Rd for more than 15 years with his signs and Christmas lights. Photo/ John Borren

Each sign was used more than once and could be pulled out annually at Halloween, Anzac Day, Christmas, Easter- just to name a few.

Some signs had multiple uses like the one that debuted when the final of Dancing With The Stars aired then was used again during the school ball season.

Another was used during the Melbourne Cup and then got a makeover to represent Movember, the month of November when men grow moustaches to raise awareness of men's health issues.

"People love them," Drummond said.

The owner of Welcome Bay Vets said the business received a lot of positive feedback from customers who visited the clinic and others who write to them on Facebook.

"Some people say it makes their day when they are on their way to work," Drummond said.

The idea for a new sign normally started with an upcoming event and every sign featured a cat or a dog.

"We think of something coming up or something that is happening, then I draw them out," he said.

Drummond said the design of the signs were always basic and the more intricate ones were made by his daughter, Amy Drummond.

The vet clinic was not only popular for its quirky sign but also because of the Christmas lights that drenched the business every year.

"If we are a bit late with the lights, people start to worry and ask if they are going up this year," Drummond said.

But he said like every year for more than a decade, the Christmas lights always went up.