Brite Nites is hiring crews to build large-format illuminated displays at outdoor venues this fall. Five cities, one site in each, local work.
Cities: Salt Lake City, Oklahoma City, Orlando, Raleigh, and Seattle.
Pay: $19-21 an hour, with overtime at time and a half after 40 hours. Most weeks run 48 to 60 hours, which is about $990 to $1,470 a week. Operators, drivers and electricians earn above the base rate.
Dates: Each city has its own run, Monday through Saturday:
- Seattle: running now, through November 12
- Salt Lake City: running now, through November 5
- Oklahoma City: October 12 to November 7
- Orlando: October 19 to November 10
- Raleigh: October 26 to November 20
Where: One site in the city you apply for. This is a local hire everywhere we are posting it.
Type: W-2, full-time seasonal, non-exempt. Training provided, no previous display experience needed.
What this job is
You will be building the large illuminated sculptures that fill outdoor venues each fall. Some pieces stand three stories tall; some run the length of a walking path. They arrive crated as steel frames and fabric, and your crew assembles them on site, sets them, secures them against wind, wires them, and lights them.
Every tool, lift, and material is supplied.
What you will do
- Assemble displays from parts: bolt up steel frames, fit and stretch the fabric skins, set them on their footings.
- Secure everything against wind: drive stakes, run wind rope, place ballast, set expansion bolts, install steel back-bracing.
- Work at height: the big pieces run up to 26 feet tall. Boom lifts and scissor lifts.
- Inspect and repair reused sets. A lot of inventory moves between venues and some of it arrives rough.
- Run power: pull and dress cords, connect plug-in whips, balance loads across the show.
- Hang the ambient work: light strings and canopies, PAR fixtures up in trees, signage, tents.
- Tear down: disassemble, inventory, pack, and load onto flatbeds at end of run.
- Keep the site clean. You are working around live landscaping, finished surfaces, and public walkways.
What the work is actually like
Read this part carefully.
- 8 to 10 hour days, Monday through Saturday. Sundays off. That means overtime most weeks.
- Outside the entire time. Rain and cold are the job, not an interruption.
- The work is heavy: steel frame sections, ballast, lift work, ground work, repetitive overhead.
- Occasional wet work, because some displays sit in water.
- The schedule is fixed by opening night, so the last week compresses.
The crew we are building
Crews run 8 to 15 people on a single site. Most of the crew are general installers. A few seats carry a designation and pay above the base rate, so say so on your application if one of them is you.
- Heavy-equipment operators: forklift, telehandler, boom lift, scissor lift.
- Flatbed trailer drivers: moving crated displays on and off the site.
- Installer and electrician: display wiring, load balancing, plug-in whips. Each site has its own licensed electrician for anything hardwired, so this seat does not require a state license.
Requirements
- 18 or older, authorized to work in the United States.
- Able to get yourself to the job site six days a week in the city you apply for.
- Comfortable working at height from boom and scissor lifts.
- Able to lift 50 lbs or more repeatedly and work on your feet through a 10-hour day.
- Available Monday through Saturday for the full run in your city.
- Valid driver's license preferred.
Helpful, not required
Mention it on your application if you have it:
- Forklift, telehandler, boom lift or scissor lift certification
- Experience towing a flatbed trailer
- Electrical experience with temporary power, load balancing and distribution
- OSHA-10 or OSHA-30
- Rigging or stagehand experience
- Spanish and English bilingual
Operators, drivers and electricians earn above the base rate.
Who does well here
- People who have finished a full season of physical outdoor work such as construction, landscaping, roofing, stagehand, rigging, oilfield or tree work.
- People who have built things from parts and drawings before.
- People genuinely comfortable at height in a lift.
- People who show up on time every day for a month.
- People who want a short, defined stint rather than an open-ended job.
What we offer
- Bi-weekly pay on a set schedule for the run of the project.
- Overtime. 8 to 10 hour days, six days a week. Every hour over 40 is paid at time and a half.
- A short, defined run with a known start and end date.
- Training provided. Nobody arrives knowing how to build these; your crew leader teaches it.
- Crew-based work, so you are never solo.
- More work after this. Brite Nites runs work in these markets through the holiday season, so do this run well and there may be a next one.