Epic Signs & Graphics Blog

We are fortunate to live on the North Coast. We do not get hit with hurricanes and the type of flooding our friends in the South are experiencing. Businesses down there will be updating their signs as part of the process to get back on track no doubt. But even with the tough weather swings we do get, how have your business signs held up? Every summer they get blasted with UV and every winter they get blasted with temps below zero.

Relentless snow, ice and rain can wreak havoc on even the most durable of signs, which is why it’s important to survey all of your exterior business signs -- from your building sign to vehicle graphics -- for signs of wear and tear after severe weather and periodically throughout the year. However, the weather’s not the only reason for you to update your business signage.

Is it time for a sign update?

Physical damage to exterior signs or peeling graphics are the most visible indicators that it’s time to update your business signs, but you should also take stock of some of the following indicators for a sign refresher.

You purchased on a budget (or no budget)

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with going with budget signage when you’re first getting started in business, as long as the signs work for you and your company. However, if you’ve been in business for a few years and haven’t invested in new signage, it’s time to upgrade. When you meet with our designers to discuss options that will work for your business, your budget is factored in, and our designers work within those constraints.

Your signage is outdated

The easiest way to tell if your exterior business signs is obsolete is if it’s no longer working for your business. You know, when your sign has been around so long that it just blends in with the surroundings -- you don’t want to be in that position.

When you first went into business, did you try to put everything on your sign? If your sign is too wordy, it’s time to change things up, and if you’ve been around for a while, you don’t need to list each of the products and services you offer on your sign.

All businesses change over time, sometimes subtly, sometimes drastically, and your signage should reflect those changes. If the atmosphere or general feel of your company has changed, make sure that your business signs indicate it.

You’ve never changed it

If you need to be hit over the head with obviousness, we’ll help you out -- if you’ve been in business for years and have never changed your signage: IT’S TIME FOR YOU TO UPDATE YOUR SIGNS!

Give us a call to update your business signage. Our designers will work with you to create graphics and sign designs that reflect positively on your business and attract new customers.

Whether you’re simply looking to wrap a new incoming fleet of vehicles, seeking to advertise your business in a new way, or ready to make your company fleet uniform, wrapping trucks, vans and cars presents endless possibilities. Let’s take a deeper look at vehicle wraps.

Not a new concept

While car wraps have become popular in the last decade or so, vehicle wraps have been around since the 1950s. In 1954, Newhouse Automotive Industries of Los Angeles, California began advertising what they called the “very latest automotive sensation.” That sensation was the vehicle vinyl wrap, which presented an appealing aftermarket product. The technology behind vinyl vehicle wraps has greatly evolved from the early iterations, offering customers a wider range of custom options.

What’s a wrap?

Vinyl vehicle wraps create a kind of second skin on a vehicle, allowing owners to change the color of their vehicle (color change wraps) without the expense of a new paint job. Better yet, now a days, we can print full color high resolution graphics on vinyl, laminate it and apply to your fleet of vehicles so they all look the same.

Vinyl wraps are created with an adhesive backing that is specially designed for vehicles. You can use the vinyl as a way to change your vehicle’s color and texture -- technology now allows for 3D textures -- or add images and graphics to advertise -- race cars are wrapped to include their sponsors. Essentially, vehicle wraps allow you to customize your fleetgraphics at a lower cost than a custom paint job.

How does it work?

If you’ve ever tried to place a screen protector film on your smartphone, you’re likely wondering how vehicle wraps are able to be applied without bubbles and wrinkles. Very carefully. In all seriousness, the makeup of the vinyl adhesive allows for a smooth application. Popular Mechanics describes it well:

 Modern adhesive reaches its most sticky state after 24 hours, making it repositionable. The vinyl itself, a highly formable "cast" vinyl, has channels to allow air to escape, eliminating bubbles. A factory laminate coating can make the vinyl wrap last up to 10 years. Finally, vinyl called supercast can stretch up to 40 percent, so it can be molded around curves and sharp bumper edges.

 Another appeal of the vinyl vehicle wrap? Car wraps can “protect paint from scratches, rock chips, and fading from the sun.” So when it’s time to time to trade in or sell your vehicle your paint job will be in pristine condition.

 Ready to make the switch? Contact us today to discuss your vinyl wrapping options with one of our talented team members!

We’ve all heard the saying, “Dinner and a movie,” and Solon, Ohio’s Villa Toscano restaurant came to us to promote just that. Nestled between two hotels and directly in the line of sight of a movie theatre, Villa Toscano wanted an exterior business sign that would draw moviegoers over.

The objective: get movie patrons to see Villa Toscano as they’re exiting the theatre.

Practice good design

When designing exterior business signs, especially those that will drive traffic into your place of business, you need to follow the rules of good design, all of which are meant to appeal to a general aesthetic.

Contemplate color

First, choose your color wisely. This is a tough aspect as color is often a huge part of branding, but colors usually go out of style. If you want to play it safe, go with a timeless classic like white. Villa Toscano chose illuminated channel letters in white to provide a simple, elegant look that stands out to moviegoers at night.

Use contrast to your advantage

Use contrast to make a statement and make your business pop! Internally illuminated, Villa Toscano’s LED sign makes a statement against it’s dark, brick exterior after dark.

Size accordingly

Finally, you want to make sure that your sign is the right size for its position. In an interview with Entrepreneur, Sapna Budev, Director of Strategic Initiatives for the International Sign Association suggests the following for calculating the appropriate sign size, “A good rule of thumb might be 10 feet per inch of letter height,” Budev says. “So lettering with 10 inches of height may have the best impact at 100 feet distance.”

Even in the daytime, Villa Toscano’s sign makes an impact, don’t you think?

Call us today to see how your Cleveland area business can benefit from a signage update or upgrade!

Take a look around your office, what do you see? Step outside yourself and really look close. Is it an inviting space or is it cold and bare? The signage displayed in and around your offices can affect not only your employee morale but also client perception. If you’re a customer-oriented business, your interior office signage is your first chance to make a great impression. Make sure your office signs convey the message and atmosphere you want customers and prospects to experience when they walk into your business.

What is the first thing you see when you enter your office lobby or reception area? What does the lobby area convey to potential clients? If your reception area is lacking signage or is composed of bare, white walls, it’s time to re-evaluate your lobby office area and make it stand out and feel inviting for all who enter.

Cleveland attorneys and counselors at law, Koblentz & Penvose, LLC recently contacted us to help revamp their reception and office areas. To really make an impact, Koblentz & Penvose chose to use dimensional wall lettering that literally pops!

Fabricated with one-inch thick hard foam lettering and a custom paint color, Koblentz & Penvose chose a design and material that looks durable and heavy but is actually light and easy to handle. Comprised of GemLeaf, the letters are laser cut to create an ultra-clean design, and feature a thin metal laminate that produces a high-quality effect to the finish -- you’d never know that these letters are ultralight!

Measuring twelve-inches tall, Koblentz & Penvose’s office signs were applied by flush mounting them flat, directly to the drywall with strong double stick tape and secured with stud mounts. Gemini letters come with a lifetime warranty if the material should ever fail and are ideal for interior business signs. The entryway to this law office now stands out from the rest!

If you’re looking to update your business space, consider creating custom interior signs to incorporate throughout. Not only will it breathe new life into your existing space, it can inspire employees and leave a positive, lasting impression upon clients. Call today for a consultation to design the perfect look for your office.

We’ve talked about making your fleet market for you by branding your trucks, vans, trailers and other equipment with your logo, contact information and services, and Armorlike is another example you’ll see in the Cleveland area.

A customer of ours, Armorlike, provides high-quality installation of floor coatings in and around Northeast Ohio. They recently came to us to update their trailer graphics and make it stand out while parked outside and traveling to and from jobs around Cleveland.

From design...

After discussing the important information Armorlike wanted to display on their trailer, and where it should be positioned, our designers went to work providing a proof. Once completed, the proof was sent to Armorlike for them to approve and we got to work creating the elements to be applied to their trailer.

For Armorlike’s logo portion of the graphics, we printed it on one of our high-quality wide format printers, applying a laminate for additional protection. The lettering for the trailer was die cut on our wide format plotter, which is typically used to create larger printed products, such as vinyl lettering.

...to application

Once the logo and graphics design are printed, they’re ready for application. To make the entire application look like it’s hand-painted, we use a process called masking, which allows us to apply the graphics straight and clean.

When we create vinyl graphics for trailer or vehicle stickers, the graphics are sandwiched between two layers. One side of your graphic design is covered in backing paper designed to protect the adhesive. In the middle is the actual vinyl graphic or logo and the outer layer, or masking layer, keeps the entire design in position, perfectly spaced so that the whole graphic can be applied in one piece. Masking helped us create this cool wraparound with the Armorlike Coatings logo image.

With trailer graphics, Armorlike Coatings is maximizing its presence traveling around the Cleveland area. This small investment -- adding graphics to your fleet -- can have significant returns when you think about the fact that over 90 percent of people notice ads on the sides of trucks and vehicles, and can recall the ad up to three days after seeing it. Impressive, eh?

Our designers work with you to create trailer graphics that work for you, within the budget parameters you set.

Contact us today to find out how we can make your business vehicles and equipment stand out in Cleveland.

Say it in style. That’s exactly what Cleveland Reporting Partners did in their Ohio City office location. To-the-point acrylic interior office signage added a polished touch to the Cleveland Reporting Partners offices. With a sleek, high-gloss clean design, the mounted acrylic wall sign Cleveland Reporting Partners added to their offices adds a sophisticated touch without a budget-breaking cost.

Why acrylic?

Precision, clean lines, bright, bold, pigmented colors -- the possibilities are endless with acrylic wall signs. Acrylic comes in sheets that can be cut to custom size and specs, and works especially well for contour cut designs. Acrylic is also incredibly versatile to work with and presents a variety of options to further customize and refine your sign design. Add a metal backing for mounting and have your acrylic lettering and/ or logo pop by mounting directly to the metal. Simply put, acrylic looks highly polished and sophisticated.

Designs that pop

Cleveland Reporting Partners wanted to dress up their office without creating an office sign that would be too flashy. The end result was to use Cleveland Reporting Partners’ logo, paired with a simple, sans serif lettering design -- each custom routed and finished.

The wall sign was made from ⅜ inch thick acrylic, mounted to stand off of the wall. Cleveland Reporting Partners’ logo was created with two layers of ⅜ inch acrylic and the finished effect really pops off the wall!

Easy to maintain

As long as your acrylic sign is indoors it should have an extremely long life. Acrylic interior office signs will maintain their appearance as long as they’re out of direct sunlight -- the sun’s heat can actually make the acrylic pliable. To care for your acrylic sign, simply dust or polish with a non-abrasive cloth -- you can even use room temperature water for a more thorough clean. Just be careful to use the appropriate cloth as acrylic scratches very easily.

If you’re looking to update your business space, consider creating custom interior signs to incorporate throughout. Not only will it breathe new life into your existing space, it can inspire employees and leave a positive, lasting impression upon clients. Call today for a consultation and develop a plan!

When a customer of ours purchased a golf course, we were happy to help with a new look. To reflect the new ownership and the pristine shape of the greens, Coppertop Golf Club enlisted our help to refresh and elevate the longstanding exterior signs in Valley City, Ohio.

When golfers and families pull into the club parking lot, they’re now greeted with signs, mounted onto the stone walls that mark either side of the entryway. The Coppertop Golf Club signs were fabricated from aluminum panels with a copper vinyl application, with text and graphics die cut from black vinyl and applied overtop. Both signs were installed with offsets in the corners, as well as in the center, on both top and bottom, to allow for a simpler installation and a streamlined finish (instead of using regular screws to anchor the sign in place).

Your on-site exterior building signs should be the cornerstone of your marketing strategy. A Signs.com study found that 50 percent of customers discovered businesses because of their on-premises signs. That same study found that 85 percent of your customers live within a five mile radius of your business -- don’t let a poorly designed or placed sign let your business down!

Coppertop Golf Club also added directional signage to the parking lot, implementing a strategic directional system for the course and clubhouse. Once golfers and other visitors enter the property, they’re easily able to navigate to the bar area, patio, snack bar and restrooms. The directional signage also carries through the look of the exterior entryway signage, with copper vinyl and black die cut vinyl text in a matching font.

A study by Signs.com found that the addition of just two new directional signs resulted in an average increase in sales of 8.9 percent for businesses! If you’re unsure whether your business or property is in need of directional signage, give us a call to consult with our talented team to see if you can benefit from an updated or additional exterior sign.

Call us today to see how your Cleveland area business can benefit from a signage update or upgrade!

“What's in a name? That which we call a rose

Romeo and Juliet

One of the many memorable lines from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, “What’s in a name?” is actually a rather profound statement, which can be applied to your business signage philosophy. Your business sign strategy is much more than just a name, it’s your brand identity. So, what’s in a sign? Well, everything, really.

Visual communication

You only get one chance to make a first impression, so you want to get it right for your business. Be it text, graphics, or a combination of both, signs communicate what your brand or business is all about. How many times have you seen an interesting logo or sign, and then hit the internet to find out what the business behind it is all about? This is what you want your exterior signs to do for you -- make people look twice and want to know more about your business. And the best part about this is that your sign will function as passive marketing for you. A well-designed and well-placed exterior sign will continue to convert, well beyond the initial investment.

On a similar note, you don’t want to get too wild with your sign design; while a truly unique sign can attract attention, over-the-top signage can actually act as a deterrent. The key to creating effective and impactful signage is to find a balance in design, to ensure that it is both legible and pleasing to the eye.

Quality

How many times have you driven around Cleveland and seen hand painted or hand-lettered signs? Do you feel compelled to check any of those businesses out? You want to invest in exterior signage that is going to work for your business and brand, not against it.

Our talented team works with your business to create a quality marketing image -- start to finish. And while we use our expertise to come up with designs that showcase your business, we work with you every step of the way. Our designers will work with you and your budget to create high quality signage and branding tools that you can be proud of.

Contact us today to see how we can make your business stand out in Cleveland!

When you’re an award-winning architectural firm, your office aesthetic is important, which is why we were honored to be commissioned to fabricate interior office signs for Arkinetics. As the 2017 Ohio State Historic Preservation Award winners, Arkinetics are no strangers to classic design, with offices housed in an old, brick fire station in Cleveland, Ohio.

Pairing old with new, Arkinetics opted to have their logo pop in the front of the building. We fabricated interior wall signs, made from ⅜” acrylic in their eye-catching logo colors. On the same wall, beneath Arkinetics signature logo, is their motto, “we make it right,” with 3d letters routed from acrylic and applied directly to the wall.

Because Arkinetics core values drive their business, they opted to incorporate their brand values into their office design. The four core values Arkinetics stands behind include:

Good People -- both internally and externally, we hire good people and we work with good people.

Make it Right – no matter what, do it right the first time. But if you do find a mistake, do what it takes to make it right.

Value Adder – we are leaders in our market focus areas and will bring that knowledge to the team.

Resourceful solutions – we see challenges as opportunities. Using the resources of the entire team, together we’ll come up with a solution that’s best for the project. 

Using wall lettering and graphics, we were able to produce an inspirational wall for Arkinetics, just outside of their break room area. With Exceptional Teammates as the header, followed by their signature logo square graphics, with vinyl letters spelling T-R-U-S-T interspersed, the wall was complete once the four core values were added at the bottom.

By incorporating custom office signs and wall signs, Arkinetics is capitalizing on two of the benefits of interior signs -- branding and atmosphere. Keeping the Arkinetics logo consistent throughout the building helps solidify their company brand and brand message. Arkinetics use of wall lettering and graphics displays a consistent brand awareness and cohesiveness, especially for visitors in their offices, as well as a reminder of the company’s driving force -- their core values.

If you’re looking to update your business space, consider creating custom interior signage to incorporate throughout. Not only will it breathe new life into your existing space, it can inspire employees and leave a positive, lasting impression upon clients.

We typically talk about signage that helps drive business on the blog, so we decided to change things up a bit today. While there’s no doubt that signs and graphics are an integral part of brand awareness, marketing and communication, signs can also serve to deter potential clients and customers.

Busy signs

Not only do potential customers stray away from signs they can’t read, cluttered or busy signs are skipped over and businesses are bypassed. Less is more, so keep your sign and message clean and simple, and opt for an easy to read font -- while scrolling, handwritten-type fonts may be pleasing to you, customers will likely have a difficult time reading your sign as they quickly speed by in their car. We see this often with truck wraps.

Size matters

One of signage professionals’ cardinal rules is that signs must be of sufficient size or height to be seen from the location in which it’s placed. If a sign is too small, or the lettering too small or crammed together, you’ve wasted your money on signage. Keep it simple, make it large enough to be read easily, and make sure that your sign is placed high enough for optimal visibility (and away from any obstructions).

Misspelling

Let’s consider that the Sign Research Foundation (SRF) reports that 34 percent of North American shoppers associate sign quality with store and product quality. If your signs look unprofessional, hastily put together, or worse -- misspelled -- what does that say about your business? Make the investment to work with a sign professional to ensure that your business signage has a clean look and is devoid of any embarrassing misspellings.

Illegible

Using a hard-to-read font is only the start to featuring signage your customers can’t read. When you work with a sign professional, they’re experts in proper letter proportion and spacing; we’ll work with you to create signage that both fits your aesthetic preference and will be easily readable. And last, but not least, sign professionals and designers can work with you to make sure that your color preferences work for you, not against you.

Unkempt

Sign maintenance is of the utmost importance to attracting and retaining customers. If sign quality is equated with store and product quality, consider what your exterior sign is communicating with a lighted letter (or more) out. If your business features an illuminated sign, what’s the point if a bulb is burnt out? Even worse, what is being communicated when signs -- either interior signs or exterior signs -- are grimy, covered in dirt or dust?

Not sure if your current business sign or fleet graphics is turning away customers? Contact us for an audit, to see how we can help your signage properly communicate your business to customers.