The Art of the Vinyl Car Wrap

Eye-catching vinyl-wrapped vehicles are becoming more and more common on our streets. And no wonder – these mobile billboards make millions of impressions a year and can be used for long-term or short-term promotions with the addition of a decal. Flexible and cost-effective, vinyl wrap advertising is catching on fast.

If you’re looking for a company capable of creating vehicle signs in Lewes, you’ll need to check out whether they have a dedicated vehicle wrapping team. Why? Because wrapping a vehicle so that there are no lines, bulges and wrinkles to spoil the integrity of the design is an art.

Why You Should Vinyl-Wrap Your Vehicles

Think of a vinyl wrap as like lightweight armour for your car. Properly laminated, it can last ten years, during which time your vehicle is protected from wear and tear and damage from the elements. Highly mouldable and stretchable, vinyl can make your car look immaculate and give a professional shine to your advertising campaigns. And when you want to change your branding or make your campaigns more responsive, you can either opt for a partial wrap and decals or start all over again with a full body wrap.

Measure for Size

Before you even think about ordering your vinyl wrap, you’ll need to measure up your vehicle or vehicles so you have a good estimate of how much vinyl you’ll need. Don’t skip this step – a vehicle left half finished because you didn’t order enough vinyl will create a really poor first impression.

The easiest calculation is to measure the length of your car, multiply by three and add an extra five metres. The best way to plan for how much vinyl you’ll need for a professional car wrap is to ask the professionals and work with them on creating a design that will take advantage of the particular bodywork of your company car or van fleet.

Clean It Up

Next you’ll need to clean like you’ve never cleaned before. Waxes and oils affect the adhesion of the vinyl, so it’s critical that these are stripped from the car body before wrapping can start. Get right into the wheel wells and under the hood, as these are areas that you don’t often see yet can compromise the effect of your body wrap if you don’t pay attention to them.

Then you’ll need to give the bodywork a thorough going-over with paint cleaner and alcohol to get rid of any traces of grease. Also pay attention to any rust or paint chips. Because vinyl stretches over your vehicle like a second skin, any obvious blemishes will stick out, so fill any chips and deal with those rust spots. The rule of thumb is if you can feel it, it will show up on the outside – and that includes dead bugs!

Plan It Out

Before a wrap is applied, an installer will size up the vehicle and make a start with the most awkward pieces like the bumpers or the bonnet. It can often be easier to detach mirrors and trim rather than spending a long time trying to work round them. It might take five minutes to remove them and make your life easier.

Never Over-Stretch

Each piece of the wrap is applied separately by removing the backing paper and then smoothing into place with a squeegee. Sounds simple? Far from it. Experienced wrappers will know just how far a wrap can be heated, stretched and repositioned, but over-stretching the vinyl is one of the easiest mistakes to make. Do that and you’ll thin out the glue, resulting in imperfect adhesion of the vinyl. You’ll also distort the pattern and affect the finish, whether it’s matte or glossy.

Cut It Out

A really good installer can trim away the excess while the vinyl is in position on your car. The easiest way to achieve a good result without the risk of cutting into the paintwork is to peel away the edges, trim the vinyl to fit, and reapply.

Where you’re dealing with creating accurate seams, a product like knifeless tape will allow you to overlap two pieces of vinyl over the tape and then pull away the Kevlar thread, which neatly and accurately slices away any unwanted vinyl for a seamless finish.

Don’t Forget the Post-Heat

If you’ve applied a partial wrap to flat areas like car doors and bonnets, where no stretching of the vinyl is required, you can skip this step. But if you’ve applied a full car vinyl wrap, including mirrors and bumpers, then it’s imperative that you apply a heat gun to those areas so your stretched vinyl doesn’t shrink back to its original state.

Why Do I Need Vehicle Signs?

In a busy city like Los Angeles, a car with a full vinyl vehicle wrap can generate a staggering 30,000 to 70,000 impressions a day. Even in the UK, a long-haul truck with a vinyl wrap will generate ten million impressions during the course of a year.

But unless your vehicle wrap is done to the most professional standards, you’ll only create a poor first impression which turns potential customers off. At the Sussex Sign Company our technicians are highly experienced, and they’ll ensure that you get the maximum return on your investment from this powerful form of mobile advertising.

If you’re interested in getting your vehicle wrapping done by the professionals, contact us via phone or email today and we can discuss implementing your car wrap design ideas with our fully integrated design, manufacture, installation and maintenance services.

How The Sussex Sign Company can help if you are a marketing agency

Marketing agencies can have it tough, constantly having to think of increasingly innovative and creative ways to help their clients stand out from the competition. In a world dominated by image, online reviews and social media, things have never been so dog eat dog on the High Street, and companies across all industries are desperate to make their mark and stay one step ahead of their rivals. If you run a marketing agency, you need to think big when it comes to advertising – and that’s where working with The Sussex Sign Company could make a huge difference.

Signage is, in effect, one of the most powerful advertising tools a business has in its arsenal. Signs act as a round-the-clock and year-round advert for a business, helping to forge a strong brand identity, building trust and familiarity and letting potential customers know what a business can offer them. For more than two decades now, The Sussex Sign Company has been crafting beautiful, bespoke signage solutions for companies across London and the south-east. If you need help with your next marketing campaign, here are just a few reasons why working with us could revolutionise the way you advertise and market your clients.

Corporate signage: a marketing dream

Over the past few years, some big names such as BHS and Woolworth’s have met their ends as the High Street took a battering post-financial crash, concentrating business owners’ minds on how best to promote and grow their own establishments. Whether they operate a shop, restaurant, café, bar, gym, pub or estate agency, every business owner with a High Street presence is now keener than ever to find novel ways of differentiating themselves from their competitors.

It can’t simply be about constantly refreshing the product or service range available, important though that clearly is to winning over potential customers. It also has to be about building a brand name and an image which people become familiar with – one which they grow to trust and keep returning to. Marketing and advertising agencies play a massive role in helping companies to shape that powerful corporate identity, and factoring corporate signage into the package is the key to High Street success.

Corporate signage, in whatever industry, is an effective marketing tool. Think how instantly recognisable the sign outside your local M&S or Tesco store is, how relieved you feel when you see the familiar orange signs of a Sainsbury’s when you need to grab some lunch, or the NatWest logo when you need a cash point. We’ve all felt that moment of instant recognition when we see a shop front sign we know and love. Branded signage can make a deep impression, acting as a beacon to pull people in and helping them feel connected and invested in a particular company or brand.

Factoring in bespoke signs

Companies these days have to market themselves in all sorts of ways. You might advise your clients on how best to keep their social media pages up to date, how to launch a leaflet advertising campaign, how to improve their internet search listings or website, or give them guidance on which promotional goods they should be giving away to potential customers.

Investing in a shop sign and a vinyl wrap for their commercial vehicles might feature highly on the agenda. When creating a new brand or conducting a rebranding exercise, signage is often the best place to start – this is, after all, the most visible and eye-catching form of marketing. Shop front signs are the first thing people see of a High Street company, prominently displayed on the façade of the premises and telling them everything they need to know about the business. A well-designed and well cared for sign tells a story, and shows the pride an owner takes in their work.

If you can get the colour scheme, font choice, logo and layout right on your signage, then the rest should follow naturally. From business cards to letterheads, van sign writing to promotional pens, once a client has decided on how they want their signs to look, you can use that as a basis for creating a coherent, unified brand image across a whole range of other marketing materials.

How can we help you?

The Sussex Sign Company is proud to employ a team of leading graphic designers and sign installation engineers, all of them at the top of the game in the signage industry and all with countless years of experience under their belts. We have spent more than two decades building up our expertise in this field, which is why we attract and retain some of the country’s most creative, innovative and highly-qualified signwriting professionals.

We have worked closely with many marketing agencies and companies across London and the south-east, to design, install and maintain the boldest and most beautiful bespoke signs. We work closely with our clients to tailor-make the highest quality signage which truly reflects their brand and their business.

We understand just how busy marketing agencies are and how hard they have to work to come up with new concepts which differentiate their clients from the hundreds of other businesses out there. For more information on how The Sussex Sign Company can help your marketing agency craft incredible new signage, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with our expert team today, call us on 01273 424900 or email us now.

How New Estate Agent Signage Could Help You Prepare for the New Year’s Rush

We all know there’s a dip in the property market in the run-up to Christmas. After all, nobody wants the stress of moving into a new home only a few days or weeks before the busiest time of year. However, the quiet period almost always ends as soon as the New Year begins, and people who have been delaying putting their houses on the market or holding off on the start of their search for a new home suddenly see the New Year as a new beginning.

If you own or manage an estate agency, this is one of the most important times in the calendar, and anything you can do to increase footfall and drum up interest can only be a good thing. With competition from other agencies and online agents so fierce, ensuring yours is the go-to agency can be a challenge. So what can you do to make sure that the New Year brings those much needed sales and success? The first place to start is with your shop front.

If you make one New Year’s resolution about your business, let it be that you’ll spruce up your estate agent signage and give the façade of your premises a little TLC as we enter the darker, gloomier winter months. When it comes to attracting new customers, there is little that can have so immediate and impressive an impact as a new sign above the door, so look no further and read on, to find out more about the benefits of sparkling new estate agent signage.

The perks of proper signage

There’s nothing like the dawning of a New Year to fill us all with good intentions and the get-up-and-go we need to make some big changes. After all the fun and indulgence of Christmas, this can be a month of transformations for the better, and that extends from the health kick in your personal life to the little shake up your business premises needs.

For most people, the New Year marks a fresh start, so it’s often the time when people spruce up their homes ready for sale, or begin to trawl Rightmove once again in search of the perfect property. That’s all good news for you, but now you need to capitalise on this sudden rush of interest. In order to attract as many people as possible through your doors, you need more than some nice homes on your books. You need to look the part to the casual passerby in the High Street and pull in customers with a winning shop front.

Giving your estate agents a new, well made and eye catching sign above the door will certainly give you an edge over the competition. People notice change, and seeing your estate agent signage go from tired and lacklustre to bright, bold and beautiful will definitely generate new interest in your business. At this time of year, when the evenings draw in early and the weather can be miserable, a well illuminated sign and shop front will offer a warm and inviting welcome to people out and about in the neighbourhood, encouraging them through your doors and onto your books.

Reaping the rewards of good signage

Giving your premises a little love and care now will pay dividends over the winter months. Poor weather can really affect old or poorly maintained signage, often causing it to look shabby and run-down, all of which puts off potential customers. We have all passed shops, restaurants and other High Street facades, where the signage is falling to pieces and looking a little worse for wear, and you wouldn’t want to join that particular club…

Installing and maintaining new signage will not only make the front of your agency more appealing, it will also speak volumes about your company and the work you do. Like the front door of your home or the clothes you choose to wear, the signage you have fitted reflects something much deeper. Good signage shouts ‘good company’, demonstrating that you care about and take pride in what you do. A bold, beautiful sign suggests that what lies beyond the front doors is similarly promising, whereas poorly maintained and outdated signage doesn’t bode well in any customer’s eyes.

A well made sign is also a memorable one, which is precisely what you need in such a competitive market. If your sign is bold and helps put your brand on a more visible platform, you’re already well on your way to garnering greater interest in your business. People like to see attractive shop fronts, and images including your brand name and colours will stick more clearly in their minds if your signage is distinctive.

A resolution worth keeping

Resolutions are hard to keep – just one last chocolate before the diet starts, just one more weekend before you hit the gym, just one more hour in bed before you start your novel. Whatever resolutions you might have made (and already broken) in your personal life, make new estate agent signage the one you keep for your company’s sake.

With many years’ experience providing bespoke and beautiful signage, the Sussex Sign Company are the number one choice when it comes to providing the best signage solutions for estate agencies everywhere. We can install and help you maintain the new signage your premises needs, so for more information on the services we offer, simply get in touch with our expert team today.

How to give your business a boost using shop window promotional signage

You can never have too much custom. Whether you’re an established and booming business with a loyal customer base, or a new franchise in an unfamiliar neighbourhood, it pays to avoid becoming complacent. The strategy of using your shop windows for promotional signage displays offers a range of benefits to all retail-oriented businesses with bricks-and-mortar premises.

Shop window signage – types and options

We’ll discuss the numerous benefits of a marketing campaign involving shop window signage further down, but firstly we’ll take a look at what this form of signage actually entails. Promotional window signage comes in several forms, but usually involves a vinyl film which is held in place on the window with adhesive.

Face-mounted signage is applied onto the interior of the window facing out. The face of the sign is protected by the glass, which is a benefit of this form of window signage. However, the downside is that it may limit the view into and out of the shop itself, depending on positioning. Window signage can also be affixed onto the exterior of the window, but due to the exposure to the elements, thicker and heavier films should be used.

One modern innovation in window signage is perforated film which is see-through on the non-graphic side. The film is affixed to the window of your premises, creating an eye-catching magnet for new customers, while those inside the shop can see through the film onto the street as it allows light to pass through. This provides the best of both worlds and can be used in highly innovative ways to create striking adverts and promotions.

Graphics are printed onto the surface of the film, making it possible to use a huge array of colours, high resolution photos and typefaces of your choosing. This means that the sky really is the limit in terms of the designs you can create. What’s more, the computerised aspect of the design process succeeds where hand-painted signs fail by ensuring consistency in the appearance of your signs. This is vital if you seek to increase your brand recognition and plan to use a series of signs, changing one after the other.

And this leads to another highly useful feature of window signage: its ease of installation and removal. Many shop-owners have had negative experiences with vinyl applications in windows before, but yet another modern innovation has come to their rescue. Special vinyl film is now available with air channels on the adhesive surface to allow full air egress, making frustrating bubbles and wrinkles a thing of the past. Window films can be installed in minutes with excellent, smooth results and best of all, no special tools are required.

The vinyl signs can also be removed whenever you choose, simply by peeling them away from the window substrate. Modern adhesives should leave behind very little residue as well, making these signs absolutely perfect for seasonal, short- and medium-term promotions.

Purposes and benefits of promotional signage

The options for shop window signage have expanded enormously in recent years and incorporate several new technologies to provide the best user experience possible, ensuring a high return on investment for the business that uses them. What other benefits do they hold for businesses?

Shop window graphics provide a highly cost-effective means of driving new business. After all, you already own or rent the space, so window signage is essentially a free marketing tool. Why pay for space to advertise all over town when you already have space – and on exactly the same location as your shop?

Shop window signage is a particularly effective form of advertising due to its presence at eye level. This creates far more impressions on pedestrians walking past your shop than a sign several meters from the ground.

Other than customers who leave home intending to buy from you, and impulse buyers, many of your customers will have noticed your shop at an earlier date, glanced through the window and thought “that place looks nice, I should pop in there sometime.” Attractive and informative promotional signage in your window gives the potential customer a reason to come back.

Shop window promotional signage also affords you the opportunity to enhance your brand’s familiarity with your target market. Over time, by making your store noticeable, it will come to be seen as a stalwart of the community; something that is very important for engendering customer brand loyalty and repeat custom.

Bright and attractive window signage will draw the attention of those passing by your shop, but very few of them will actually come in. However, by making an impression even upon those who do not enter your store, you ensure that your business will be at the front of their minds when they do require your product or service. This also applies to recommendations.

For example, if someone passes by a bakery twice a week during their normal routine, they will definitely have noticed the window signage and will be aware of the bakery’s presence. They may have no need for its products at the moment. But one of their friends asks them if they know anywhere good to buy fresh, high quality bread, your business will be the first one that comes to mind thanks to the passive yet memorable effect of well-designed promotional window signage.

As explained above, shop window signage gives you the ability to refresh or remove your sign whenever you choose. Keeping your shopfront looking fresh provides several other benefits, including preventing your shopfront from ever fading into the background, which is important in the increasingly competitive high street.

The modern retail environment is a tricky one for anyone to navigate, but at The Sussex Sign Company we can offer a wealth of advice as to how to ensure that you get the most out of your signage. Come and talk to us today, call us on 01273 417057.

Supporting South East Dance exhibition

As part of our mission to help support the arts, we are delighted to have been involved with an exhibition held at the Onca Gallery, Brighton.

The Sussex Sign Company designed, in collaboration with South East Dance, the window graphics and the information displays for ‘Hawkers Pick Over Fruit Here’. Working alongside artists Becky Edmunds (Straybird), and Zoe Manders, we are delighted with the completed designs. The Exhibition includes photography and film and ran for one week. The Circus Street Market Hall is due to be demolished this year, and with it disappears ways of working that have sustained several generations of Brighton-based families. straybird artists – Becky Edmunds and Lucy Cash – and photographer Zoe Manders invited members of these families – grandfathers, fathers and sons – who worked at the Market, to attempt to describe what the site looked like, sounded like and felt like at the height of its working life. The resulting exhibition uncovers the patterns and rhythms of this way of life and celebrates the communities that once inhabited the space as we look towards its future use as a space for dance. Traders cam from all over the home counties, including London and Croydon. As part of Brighton’s Cine-City Festival 2015, ONCA will be hosting an installation of still and moving images: Hawkers Pick Over Fruit Here. Commissioned by South East Dance. Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England. Based on an original concept by Lauren Proto and Zoe Manders. Commissioned by South East Dance and supported by National Lottery through Arts Council England . For more information contact us on 01273 417057 or contact us using the contact form. A list of the towns we work in throughout East and West Sussex is listed below. East Grinstead , Crawley, Gatwick, Horsham, Haywards Heath, Burgess Hill, Steyning, Worthing, Arundel, Littlehampton, Bognor Regis, Selsey, Chichester, Midhurst, Petworth, Portslade, Brighton, Hove, Newhaven, Seaford, Eastbourne, Bexhill, Hastings, Hailsham, Lewes, Uckfield, Heathfiled, Crowborough.

JUICE 107.2 Networking Breakfast

Once a month, The Sussex Sign Company and Sussex Promotions sponsor a local networking event, hosted by JUICE 107.2 radio station, that invites all local companies to join them at various venues across the city.

It’s a vibrant, lively gathering of businesses who want to connect with other like minded entrepreneurs and the aim is to help support and generate business opportunities in a professional environment.

Along with the networking, guest speakers are invited to talk about their strategies, experiences and how to create opportunities for business.

The Sussex Sign Company is proud of the local community projects we support from our headquarters in Portslade, Brighton. We support organisations from all over the southern region, including, Croydon, Crawley, Horsham and Burgess Hill.

If you would like to know more about our services then please contact us today on 01273 417057.