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2010 Franchise of The Year
While our mothers told us we should never brag, this is definitely something to share. Speedpro Signs Canada (which is the largest group of signage and display product providers in Canada) has named us the top location in all of Canada for 2010. The award is based on our Sales volume. growth, ethics, innovation, employee satisfaction and community participation.
Glenn and Lynda, Owners of Speedpro Coquitlam, Accept the Award.
While the acknowledgement is nice, what we really appreciate is all of our customers, who have allowed us to serve them over the years, and supported us on our journey to become one of the best visual communications and marketing partners in B.C. and apparently Canada.
Thanks for your continued business and support!
Speedpro Imaging Coquitlam Team.
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Glenn and Lynda, Owners of Speedpro Coquitlam, Accept the Award.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Tradeshow Season.
It happens at least twice a year and many people find it even more stressful than Christmas. For us it starts before Christmas, when the best-organized call for quotes and to get the ball rolling, wanting to ensure that they will have their tradeshow booths in time. As the wave builds through January we see more and more people coming in closer and closer to their big show.
We love tradeshow season. We see certain customers that we haven’t seen all year and get to catch up. Everyone has big ideas that require some production knowhow and others are looking for a creative hand to fill out their 10’x10’ homestead. In the spirit of the season we have compiled 4 suggestions to help you out.
1.) Invest in your booth. This may seem self serving, but spending a little extra on flourishes like likes can make a $1000 tradeshow set up seem like a $5000 dollar one. People will ultimately make a quality judgment about your products based on the quality of your booth and your collateral.
2.) Money is secondary to creativity. Maybe you don’t need buy new banner-stands, but just replace the banners. Maybe you can get by with a continuous image over three banner stands for $900 instead of a 10’x10’ wall for $2000. If you are looking to brainstorm, talk to your graphic designer or a speciality graphics shop (like ours).
3.) Good booths prompt questions, not answers. To be perfectly honest, tradeshow displays aren’t sales people and won’t close sales. They need to a.) get you noticed and engage the person b) Establish your brands credibility, c.) give passersby an idea about what you sell and d.) Engage them to the point that they ask your exceptional sales people questions about the products.
4.) Set Goals and Calculate ROI. Tradeshows are not inexpensive; paying us is just the start. Paying you exhibitor fees, travel and the wages/meals for your best people to be gone for days on end is expensive. Set a goal for how many people you want to talk to, track how many turn into leads and ultimately sales. For many businesses (like this one) the tradeshow circuit
While there is lots of advice out there, I tried to keep this somewhat concise if you have questions call, and to be even more enticing we are offering 15% off our entire tradeshow catalogue as well as small promotion on our everyday low priced retractable banner stands, 50% off the lights with the purchase of the stands.
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The ABC’s of Visual communications: How to find the right signage for you.
Nearly every day, I will come across a customer who believes he needs a sign, but doesn’t know exactly what type of sign would best suite his business and his needs. With the plethora of options that sign companies offer today, from neon signs to vehicle wraps; how can you, the consumer, understand what you need from a sign and narrow down those choices to the right one for you? Here are some “real life” stories.
Robert is a small business owner; his shop is in a busy strip mall where he gets a lot of foot traffic, but limited visibility from the street. Our suggestion to Robert was a full colour, double sided a-frame sign for the entrance to his strip mall and a full colour digitally printed banner for his awning. These two items increase the visibility both within and outside of his strip mall, targeting both the foot traffic and the vehicles driving by.
Melanie is a designer whose products are showcased within various specialty stores in the lower main land. Melanie is looking for something that she can have within the stores to feature and promote her products, as well as something outside the store that will help drive business into her distributor’s locations. We suggested product display signage that would fit on the walls or shelves within the locations and small banners and window decals that the distributors could place outside to advertise that they feature her products.
Amy is a photographer who operates out of her own office and those of event planners. She wanted cool and dramatic ways that she could one-up the competition while showcasing her work with wedding and event planners. We offered Amy a series of custom plaque mounts and canvas stretches to showcase her wide variety of photos.
In the vast world of signage there is no one type of signage for any given application. Instead you will need to determine who you want to target with each sign and choose appropriately. Overwhelmed? Confused? Don’t be. Call one of our dedicated team members today and let us help you to choose the right sign for you.
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The A B C’s of Visual Communication Part 3 of 4. Branding and Imaging.
When we think about signage, we at Speedpro Imaging try to think outside the box. The beauty of digital printing is that there are few limitations to what we can do with graphics. With the wide variety of options available to our clients, we wanted to talk a little bit about some ‘rules’ to keep in mind when you think about your advertising.
It’s surprising in today’s consumer driven world how often you see inconsistent advertising. When you think about corporate branding what comes to mind? Coca Cola started selling their soda in 1886, what started as a small soda fountain beverage has grown into one of the most recognizable brands the world over. Why?
Consistency, followed by a bit more consistency. The Coca Cola name is their brand, and this brand is everywhere and has been for generations. Their vehicles, signs, business cards, bottles, even their delivery drivers are required to wear Coca Cola shirts. You have Coca Cola coasters, pens, hats, stuffed toys and so much more. They have made their mark on our consumer world.
When you see this brand it is always crisp, clear, and to the point. Rarely will you see this reproduced in bad quality. Why? Well that would reflect badly on them. Would it right away produce a drop in their sales? Probably not, but it does leave the consumer with a negative impression of carelessness.
The average consumer will make a decision based on your product, service or business’ presentation within the first 90 seconds. What does your presentation say about you?
For high definition digital printers we often find that when printing logo’s on signs or vehicles the customer doesn’t realize how a 5”x7” logo will look when blown up to 5ft x 7ft. Why? It’s not their business, that’s where we come in. It’s important for our brand and our company that we don’t let you leave with graphics that are a poor representation of our work. You become our brand.
The best advice we can think of for small businesses or those just starting out, is to remain consistent in your branding. When you think about your vehicle advertising look at what you already have and build on that. Starting from scratch and creating something totally new is great, however when you hand them your business card, is the image you are trying to project the same on both items?
It all comes down to repetition, repetition and some more repetition. The more the customer is bombarded with your consistently recognizable brand, the more likely they are to remember you. Be discriminating, this is your company image.
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The ABC’s of visual communications part 2: Colours and signage, what are you not saying?
With our last post focusing on legibility and the way the mind reads your sign, we wanted to take some time to talk a bit about what your sign says without using words. It will probably not come as a shock for you to hear that everything on your sign will have an impact on the people who see it, and sometimes it’s what you are not saying that can make the biggest impact.
For years market researchers have been exploring the emotional responses that people have to colours that they see. The secretariat of the Seoul International Color Expo 2004 conducted research on the relationships between colour and marketing. 93% of people said that visual factors were the most important when purchasing products. 85% of the research group think that colour accounts for more than half of the deciding factor in choosing products.
The CCICOLOR-Institute for Colour Research has further research revealing that people make a subconscious judgement about a person, environment, or product within 90 seconds of initial viewing and between 62%-90% of that assessment is based on colour alone.
These stats speak to how much our minds absorb subconsciously. However the emotional responses that colour evoke in us is not a universal constant. Each colour has a positive and negative effect on the viewer, and then the response will differ depending on the age, sex, cultural background and status in life.
For instance men are attracted to deep colours, women to light tints, for children bright colours attract and hold their attention. While older people find colours such as blue are easier for them to see. Your target market will have a great influence on what colour choice you make. If you are selling tools, you will not be picking a colour such as light pink, if you are selling cosmetics, you will not be picking colours like hazard orange.
The colours and images you choose for your sign will say a great deal about your product, company or event and will appeal to different demographics. It is important to remember that this will have an effect on how people react to your signage. Small changes in tint and tone will have a large impact on how the colour is perceived.
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The A, B, C’s of Visual Communications – is what you see what you get?
Sign making has become much more than simply painting words on a piece of wood and propping it up on the side of the road. In today’s advertisement driven world, we now have government agencies with teams of psychologists and scientists, as well as private organizations trying to figure out the ‘art’ of creating effective signage.
In addition to content, a good sign takes many factors into account; font colour, background colour, Viewer Reaction Time (VRT), terminology, arrows and symbols, and the size of the sign. One of the most important aspects of a sign is the size of the letter and the fonts that are used. Coincidently this is often one of the more overlooked aspects in sign making.
The overall legibility of a sign is defined by its colour, its height and the font characteristics. Take serifs for instance., These are the small details found on the stroke ends of each letter, commonly found in fonts like Arno pro, Century and Serifa BT. It is these little details that make a word harder to read from a distance and while travelling.
Why would such a small thing have such a large impact on a sign and its message? It all comes down to word recognition. Word recognition is your mind’s ability to determine what a word is by the outline made around the word shape. For those of us with less than 20/20 vision, word recognition plays a big part in our lives.
That being said, there is some dispute in the sign world regarding upper and lower case letters. It is a common assumption that capital letters are easier to read than lower case letters. However in a recent study it was found that 90% of people preferred reading the combination of upper and lower case letters while only 10% preferred upper case only. It was also found that by using upper case letters the reading speed was significantly reduced.
So, what is the right size for the letters on a sign? Well let’s say that you have a sign that you need to be read from 120 feet away. We’ll say that you chose to use an external lamp to light your sign. With a white background and black letters using a Helvetica font, 1” upper and lower case letters can be read as far back as 29ft. You would need 4.25” high letters to have them be legible at 120 ft away. If you opted for a green background with yellow letters you would need letters 4.6” tall letters.
Let’s say that you chose instead to have all upper case letters on your white sign with black Helvetica letters. Using the same specifications as mentioned above 1” high letters can be read as far back as 25ft away. This is word recognition, while individually uppercase letters are easier to read from a distance, as words they reduce the visibility distance by 4ft. Why? Well, upper case letters are less distinct than lower case letters. So this sign would need letters nearly 5” tall to be visible from 120 ft away. For a green background with yellow letters you would need 5.45” tall letters.
The science of how humans recognize and interpret words can be a vast and intriguing study. Visual communications specialists make a practice of understanding and applying much of this technology when working with their clients. Join us again as we continue our journey through the A, B, C’s of visual communications.
Scridb filterMore about March!
In February we told you about Julie Rogers and Jacqueline Goring and their hopes to help the orphans of Haiti. Well, Helping Haiti’s Babies collected enough diapers, formula and other baby goods to supply two orphanages for a whole year. They also have enough Tylenol to share with the hospitals. It continues to surprise us how much good we can do when we reach out as a community. This event will be happening again in the fall, so watch for the Helping Haiti’s Babies Banners in your neighbourhood.
We ask that you continue to open your hearts over the course of the year, as Haiti will be struggling to rebuild for a very long time to come. You can reach Heart to Heart Ministries through their website found Here. The Heart to Heart Ministries orphanage in Haiti has a meal program which feeds 400 children every day in addition to the 2000 people currently living in tents in their yard. Your donations would continue to be a blessing to them. http://www.hearttohearthaiti.com/
Water’s Edge Festival at the Evergreen Cultural Centre
March was a busy month for us at Speedpro Imaging, Coquitlam. The Evergreen Cultural Centre held the 2nd Annual Water’s Edge Festival, March 19th-21st. With musical guests like Elektra Women’s Choir, the Coastal Sound Music Academy, JUNO Award winner Brad Turner and an “instrument petting zoo” it was yet another successful event for the Evergreen Cultural Centre.
Last year we had the benefit of working with the Water’s Edge Festival and the Evergreen Cultural Centre to produce the various signs that they would need for this event. From basics like outdoor banners and directional signage to specialty items like the Storm Pro stands and double sided vertical banners we were delighted to offer unique and customized products that would enhance this great event.
The Evergreen Cultural Centre is one of our favourite Coquitlam Venues, the vaulted ceilings and the walls of windows make their foyer bright, open and the perfect showcase for the fantastic graphic designs of Ballistic Arts. These double sided vertical banners are printed on a block out banner material; they hang suspended by wire from the ceiling with dowels top and bottom to ensure that they hang straight. Even after a year put away, these banners continue to make a great visual impact.
The Storm Pro stands were a multi-use addition to the Water’s Edge Festival. These indoor or outdoor Banner stands have a hollow plastic base which can be filled with water or sand. The extra weight of the base helps to prevent the stands from flying away in the wind when placed at the shores of Lafarge lake. They can then be emptied and used indoor’s for other events, all that is needed are additional graphics. Which brings me to ask, do you have a stand that you are not using? Ask us about updating graphics for your current banner stands.
Scridb filterTri Cities Helping Haiti’s Babies
With the launch of social networking tools such as Twitter and Facebook, we can be repeatedly surprised by just how small our global network has become. We have all heard of and seen the horrible state of life in Haiti, this month we have had the opportunity to take park in a movement that is spreading throughout the Tri Cities.
Julie Rogers is a single Coquitlam mother, after seeing the aftermath of the earthquake and helping two friends bring their adopted son home from Haiti, she posted a comment on Facebook regarding her desire to do more. Jacqueline Goring saw the post about helping Haiti’s orphans and responded, creating a movement that would quickly show just how much our community is willing to support not only those within our community but those of the world.
From businesses like Coquitlam’s Speedpro Imaging, Rhino Marketing, Coquitlam Centre and Save On Foods to sports teams, schools and other service providers Tri Cities Helping Haiti’s Babies has already touched so many. If you are driving past Coquitlam Centre right now you probably have seen the 40 foot container that sits at the corner of Lougheed/Barnett Hwy and Pintree in Coquitlam.
The goal of Julie Rogers, Jacqueline Goring and Heart to Heart Ministries is to fill this 40 ft railway container with diapers, powdered formula, children’s vitamins, children’s Tylenol and other baby supplies that they can ship directly to several Haitian Orphanages. This container will travel with volunteers from Heart to Heart Ministries and others to ensure it’s safe arrival.
On February 20th and 21st we all have the opportunity to help. There will be two areas where you can bring your donations; the south-east corner of the Coquitlam Centre parking lot, or inside Coquitlam Centre at the kiosk by the Gap.
Angel Answering Service has provided a telephone message line, call 604-468-3044 for more information on this event and how you can help the children of Haiti.
