Daytech Company History
Daytech Limited: A century of history and still growing
Back in 1907, (the last year that Chicago's National League team won the world series), Henry Ford was preparing to introduce his Model T at a retail price of $850, and Philadelphia was completing an elevated railway system, following those built earlier in Chicago, Boston and New York - and Day Signs Co., opened for business in Toronto, Canada. Day Signs quickly earned a reputation for expertise in hand painted signs and gold leaf lettering and between the World Wars, expanded into wall murals and electric signs.

By the 1960's the company had grown and diversified into new markets using the technologies developed in the sign business. A new subsidiary, Day Specialties, supplied the expanding appliance market with screen printed tempered glass and ceramic faces for stove tops and other related applications. Another new venture put the company in the forefront of the development of electronic scoreboards, supplying high quality scoreboards across Canada and the United States, with high profile installations in such major venues such as the Montreal Forum, Boston Gardens and Chicago Stadium. In the late 1970's, a new commitment to the transit industry was made by the company (now renamed "Daytech" to reflect its diversification), with the design and introduction of a new line of prefabricated transit shelters. The "Daytech" shelter enjoyed immediate acceptance and success, with hundreds soon installed in major Canadian cities, such as Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary, Montreal, Halifax, Winnipeg, and Vancouver, as well as a number of cities in the USA.

In an international design competition conducted by the City of San Francisco in 1987, Daytech was selected as the supplier of choice to fabricate and install more than 1,000 custom-designed Daytech shelters that have since become a part of San Francisco's beautiful streetscape.

A full century after its humble beginnings, Daytech manufactures the widest variety of transit shelter designs and styles in the industry. With sizes and configurations to suit every need in any climate and environment, they are installed across North America. Modified, high capacity units are installed on rail platforms, in transit terminals and airports. Other variations are used as smoking shelters, bicycle lockers, shopping cart corrals, postal stations, covered walkways and entrance way canopies. Daytech shelters have even been installed on ship decks, such as the famous "Maid of the Mist" fleet at Niagara Falls.

Daytech's long success has been based on its reputation for producing top quality, consistent product year after year, and its ability to be innovative in meeting the needs and desires of the market. With 40,000 square feet of modern production facilities in Toronto state of the art manufacturing and experienced designers, Daytech is able to provide customers with the special look or quality that they want, at cost effective prices.

While best known for the thousands of its transit shelters installed from coast to coast, Daytech also remains a leading supplier of custom signage, illuminated advertising display cases for wall mounting or as freestanding units in one, two, three or four-sided configurations. Back lit displays come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, starting at a depth of under three inches, and naturally, all illuminated products are UL / CSA certified and built with energy efficiency in mind.

A full line of street furniture and accessories, such as benches, bus frames, map frames and poster frames for use in stations, subways, malls, airports and on advertising benches and kiosks rounds out the Daytech product line. The company's attractive, easy-to-use and rugged Infopost™ for example, has become the standard schedule holder of Amtrak and transit systems across the continent.

As we forge a new path into the new millennium, Daytech also crosses the threshold of its second century as North America's leading manufacturer, with the widest range of well-designed, first quality shelters, street furniture and accessories. Special shelter designs and embelishments are made to blend into historic districts, or echo the architecture of the surrounding environment. New innovations in shelter design, materials and fabrication, continue to improve function, environmental responsibility, resistance to weathering and vandalism, and simplify installation - while offering higher value for each investment dollar than ever before.