Mark Van Milligan crafting lettering for a Pride float in his workshop garage (By Frank Sabatini Jr.)
Entertainment, Hillcrest
Everyone Loves a Sensational Parade Float
Mark Van Milligan of North Park Knows Exactly How to Build Them
By Frank Sabatini Jr.
Our city’s largest civic event is the annual San Diego Pride LGBT Parade, which this month marks the 50th anniversary of the 1.5-mile-long procession down University and Sixth avenues. For at least the past two decades, the splashy event throws Mark Van Milligan into high gear as he builds and decorates floats for a variety of clients.
On behalf of this summer’s parade, he is working simultaneously on five large-scale floats, which will enter into the colorful lineup that starts at 10:00a July 20, at Normal Street and University Avenue.
But the Pride parade is only a blip on his yearly work schedule as Van Milligan also gets called upon by clients taking part in other major parades throughout San Diego and the region.
We caught up with this industrious artist/craftsman at his North Park home, where he uses his garage as a workshop that is equipped with tools, paint, and the latest and greatest decorations.
Downtown Condo Guys: How did you become established in this very niche business?
Van Milligan: I’ve been doing this now for 27 years. It started out of Pacific Beach United Methodist Church, when I designed a float for their Christmas parade. People started asking who designed it. And it steamrolled from there.
Later I started a company, currently called Floatasia. A welder who worked with me named Matt Arnold bought the company, and I stayed on as a builder and decorator of the floats. Matt lives in Alpine, where our chassis and trailers are stored.
Downtown Condo Guys: Did you have an eye for parade floats as a kid?
Van Milligan: Yes. My hometown parades in the south side of Chicago where I grew up were always pretty spectacular. I was one of those weird kids who went running onto the streets when there was any kind of parade. I loved the decorations and everything about the floats, which I would help build when I was in junior high.
Downtown Condo Guys: How many floats a year do you build and decorate these days?
Van Milligan: 30 to 35.
Downtown Condo Guys: What are some of the parades they enter?
Van Milligan: The Holiday Bowl, the Portuguese Festa, The Mother Goose Parade, Poway Days Parade, Coronado Fourth of July, the St. Patrick’s Day Parade, and pride parades in San Diego, Los Angeles, West Hollywood, Palm Springs and Southern California cities.
Downtown Condo Guys: What is the price range per float?
Van Millilgan: They are all rentals. Our trailer floats start at $10,000. Our self-propelled floats, which have the vehicles underneath the platforms, start at $20,000 and have gone as high as $55,000. We custom-design their builds so it depends on how big the props are, what kind of signage and decorations we’re using, and what messages they want to get out.
Downtown Condo Guys: Who are your typical clients?
Van Milligan: Corporations and nonprofits. We have happy repeat clients every year, such as Hyatt Hotels, BluPeak Credit Union, HP, Harrah’s Southern California Resort and Casino and ASML— all of them are taking part in this month’s Pride parade.
Downtown Condo Guys: What are some of the most elaborate floats you’ve built over the years?
Last year, the Pride float we built for Harrah’s won the award for ‘most outstanding float.’ It had elaborate props, different textures and sparkles that were very colorful.
Another was for a past Pride parade, for the former Universal nightclub. We had a bunch of recreated planets all over the float. They were fluorescent and very bright.
Downtown Condo Guys: Have the materials and techniques for decorating floats improved since you first got into the business?
Van Milligan: Yes. In my early days, we never made floats as elaborate as today. Floral sheeting, fringe, and other decorations used to be made of tissue paper. If it rained, your float was destroyed. Now they’re made out of polyvinyl chloride (PVC). There was no 3-D lettering back them. We made signs using a hot knife to cut Styrofoam. Now we use laser-operated CNC machines. We also today use dense ‘ultra board,’ which is a type of very hard Styrofoam.
Downtown Condo Guys: Do your services include rigging floats with sound systems?
Van Milligan: No. We have an approved vendor that has experience in that. It’s a separate cost that isn’t included in our contracts.
Downtown Condo Guys: Are floats that carry a lot of people specially reinforced in any way?
Van Milligan: Yes, our platforms are reinforced with steel and plywood decking on top.
Downtown Condo Guys: How far in advance do clients taking part in the San Diego Pride parade every July contact you?
Van Milligan: About eight to 10 months prior. They usually start contacting us by October or November the year before to brainstorm. Then we wait for Pride to release their annual theme, which is usually in January. [This year’s theme is ‘Making History.’]
Downtown Condo Guys: What are the biggest challenges and rewards in your line of work?
Van Milligan: My biggest challenge is putting together the logistics, especially if we’re doing a parade out of town. We need to ship our floats to wherever, offload them, and then find a large enough lot for putting them together.
The rewards are seeing kids along parade routes smiling and saying, “wow” – and having clients tell us that our float was above and beyond their expectations, which we hear a lot.
Downtown Condo Guys: What is the most common question you get asked when people learn you are a float builder?
Van Milligan: ‘How much will it cost?’
Downtown Condo Guys: Do you often get to stand on the sidelines to admire the creative contributions you make to all of these parades?
Van Milligan: Never, because I’m either driving one of the floats or spotting a driver along the parade route while wearing a headset.
