Funny Store Signs

2000photo humorclassic

Funny Store Signs are photographs of storefront marquees, chalkboards, and other displays carrying jokes, puns, or accidentally hilarious typos. The genre took shape online in early 2000 with dedicated collection sites like SignSpotting.com, then spread through YouTube compilations, humor blogs, and Reddit's /r/funnysigns subreddit across the 2000s and 2010s.

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Overview

Funny Store Signs are storefront marquees, chalkboards, and other displays that carry humorous messages, whether intentional jokes or accidentally funny errors caused by typos and technical malfunctions6. Photos of these signs have circulated online since the early 2000s, when dedicated collection sites like SignSpotting.com opened to gather user submissions1.

The comedy usually lives in specifics: a well-crafted pun on a pub chalkboard, a marquee where a missing letter warps the sentence into something absurd, or a business owner using their outdoor board as a bulletin for topical jabs at politics and pop culture7. The format thrives on passers-by snapping photos and sharing them, which keeps it loose and free of any single author or gatekeeper4.

How It Spread

Video compilations moved the genre onto YouTube in the mid-2000s. On November 8, 2006, YouTuber tomerikp uploaded a slideshow of funny store signs that pulled in over two million views within eight years3. On March 3, 2007, YouTuber Ernie Deveau posted a similar compilation of store sign FAILs that reached around 900,000 views6.

Blog roundups kept the material circulating through the late 2000s and early 2010s. Humor site Holy Taco published a set of hilarious storefronts on February 1, 20104. Reddit joined in on April 29, 2012, when the /r/funnysigns subreddit opened for user submissions8. BuzzFeed rolled storefront gags into its list format on August 31, 2013, with an article called 88 Funniest Signs of the Summer5.

Individual sign photos also broke out on Reddit. On May 21, 2014, Redditor Ludop0lis posted a photograph of a joke chalkboard spotted outside an Irish pub to /r/funny, where it drew more than 4,100 upvotes in three months7. Nine days later, Redditor cubs1917 shared a New York City bar's blackboard sign that ribbed former U.S. President George W. Bush, gathering over 3,500 upvotes in two months6.

How to Use This Meme

The format is documentation more than creation, so participation usually means photographing an unusual sign you walk past and posting it to a subreddit like /r/funnysigns8. Bar and pub owners are common producers, using sandwich-board chalkboards outside their doors to write daily jokes aimed at foot traffic7.

Frequently Asked Questions

Funny Store Signs

2000photo humorclassic

Funny Store Signs are photographs of storefront marquees, chalkboards, and other displays carrying jokes, puns, or accidentally hilarious typos. The genre took shape online in early 2000 with dedicated collection sites like SignSpotting.com, then spread through YouTube compilations, humor blogs, and Reddit's /r/funnysigns subreddit across the 2000s and 2010s.

sign memes photo fad memes misspelling memes pun memes single serving site memes

Overview

Funny Store Signs are storefront marquees, chalkboards, and other displays that carry humorous messages, whether intentional jokes or accidentally funny errors caused by typos and technical malfunctions6. Photos of these signs have circulated online since the early 2000s, when dedicated collection sites like SignSpotting.com opened to gather user submissions1.

The comedy usually lives in specifics: a well-crafted pun on a pub chalkboard, a marquee where a missing letter warps the sentence into something absurd, or a business owner using their outdoor board as a bulletin for topical jabs at politics and pop culture7. The format thrives on passers-by snapping photos and sharing them, which keeps it loose and free of any single author or gatekeeper4.

How It Spread

Video compilations moved the genre onto YouTube in the mid-2000s. On November 8, 2006, YouTuber tomerikp uploaded a slideshow of funny store signs that pulled in over two million views within eight years3. On March 3, 2007, YouTuber Ernie Deveau posted a similar compilation of store sign FAILs that reached around 900,000 views6.

Blog roundups kept the material circulating through the late 2000s and early 2010s. Humor site Holy Taco published a set of hilarious storefronts on February 1, 20104. Reddit joined in on April 29, 2012, when the /r/funnysigns subreddit opened for user submissions8. BuzzFeed rolled storefront gags into its list format on August 31, 2013, with an article called 88 Funniest Signs of the Summer5.

Individual sign photos also broke out on Reddit. On May 21, 2014, Redditor Ludop0lis posted a photograph of a joke chalkboard spotted outside an Irish pub to /r/funny, where it drew more than 4,100 upvotes in three months7. Nine days later, Redditor cubs1917 shared a New York City bar's blackboard sign that ribbed former U.S. President George W. Bush, gathering over 3,500 upvotes in two months6.

How to Use This Meme

The format is documentation more than creation, so participation usually means photographing an unusual sign you walk past and posting it to a subreddit like /r/funnysigns8. Bar and pub owners are common producers, using sandwich-board chalkboards outside their doors to write daily jokes aimed at foot traffic7.

Frequently Asked Questions