Multi-Grafix owner works to earn place in Othello

Wells finds satisfaction in graphic communication

OTHELLO — Cliff Wells landed his first graphics job of many in Othello.

A resident of the Royal City area growing up, Wells and a friend were hired to design the Christmas decorations on the window of an Othello drug store when they were in grade school.

"That's my first art job," Wells recalled. "My first commercial, paying job was here in Othello."

Wells returned to Othello last year with his business, Multi-Grafix, located at 105 N. Railroad Ave., which launched in January, and moved into its space in Othello in October.

Wells had done graphics works for several other companies on and off, including a sign business in Ephrata and a smaller operation in Soap Lake.

"That's when those damn planes hit those towers," he said, referring to the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks upon the World Trade Center. "Nobody bought anything. I was just barely hanging on, and that was the straw that broke the camel's back." So Wells quit the graphics business.

While in rehabilitation for a 2002 trucking accident which separated his clavicle from his sternum, Wells got back in the graphics business in the meantime, working in conjunction with several other businesses before opening Multi-Grafix.

Wells considers himself a commercial artist, with projects including restaurant menus, photography, brochures, wall and lighted signs, posters, business cards and vehicle signage.

The majority of Wells' business in Othello is done over the Internet and for older customers from his previous graphics endeavors, including designs for other "graphic-oriented people" or people who need specialty work done.

"I have not earned the respect of the public in Othello yet," he said. "I expect that I have to, and I'm looking to do it, it's just that I haven't."

Most of the people who know him from his previous endeavors know the quality of his work, Wells said, but residents in Othello aren't yet aware of him.

"I've been in and around, but not really part of this community," he said, relating many of the stories of his family members about their time in the area. Wells himself spent seven years in the Christian school in Othello, while his mother and father worked for various Othello operations and bought a house there. "I grew up in Royal Camp-Royal City area, so we'd come to Othello for church and for groceries. I can remember going over the viaduct and the population (sign), 1,800, 'Wow, that's a lot of people! Eighteen hundred people, wow!' Royal Camp was 200, Royal City 700, so 1,800, wow."

Wells started in the sign business when he was 16 and got his first car.

"I was already drawing and stuff like that at that time," he recalled.

Wells' father asked him to design the logo for his trucking business. Wells hopped in the car and drove to the Tri-Cities to observe a sign shop in action. When the owner of the business he was observing approached him, he asked what he was doing. The owner shooed him away, but told him to meet him at a certain address later after buying supplies, and proceeded to teach him the ropes.

"He showed me the strokes to use, how to set up and stuff like that," Wells said. "Never seen him again. So I came home, practiced, and started lettering trucks."

Wells enjoys creativity and effective graphic communications within his business.

"Anybody can make a logo," he said. "But you want to put it together in such a way that you're communicating. When we do restaurant-type designs, we can communicate the culture, cuisine, create the desire to acquire. That's what I do with my graphics. It's a challenge, and I don't always hit the nail on the head either."

Wells said he doesn't think most people realize when a graphic is effectively communicating. It's subliminal, he said.

"When I see it happen, I think, 'Yes, we got it,'" he said.