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Antique Store Font?

jfiscus

Rap Master
A new antique store is opening up & needs a decent sign. Any ideas on a good font to use (free is the best, but we have a lot of commercial ones already)?

Currently I'm going with Dauphin until something better comes along. What are your suggestions?
 

Vinylman

New Member
A new antique store is opening up & needs a decent sign. Any ideas on a good font to use (free is the best, but we have a lot of commercial ones already)?

Currently I'm going with Dauphin until something better comes along. What are your suggestions?


Seems like an oxymoron!:Oops:

Why is "free is the best"?

Are you in the sign business? Or, are you giving your work away 'cause you don't have anything invested in your "FREE" type library, so why charge for your work?:help
 

Billct2

Active Member
Old English:ROFLMAO:

Actually I would think about the style of the store the type of antiques, the neighborhood, the architecture of the building etc.....
 

jfiscus

Rap Master
Seems like an oxymoron!:Oops:

Why is "free is the best"?

Are you in the sign business? Or, are you giving your work away 'cause you don't have anything invested in your "FREE" type library, so why charge for your work?:help
Because this is a small sign (24x30"), so an expensive font will eat up our profits. They also are not wanting to spend that much on a sign.
 

SignManiac

New Member
I don't see how investing $25.00 towards a nicely designed sign can break the bank or kill profits. If margins are that thin then you have more to lose than $25.00 bucks.

The advertising value to the client should easily exceed the price of an appropriate font. The size of the sign shouldn't necessarily determine the value of it either. I can make a 3'x3' sign for $90.00 or a 3'x3' sign for $900.00 It just depends on the client and how much they value their companies image.
 

jfiscus

Rap Master
What are your thoughts on these?
Customer is cheap; friend of owner.

With all of the good free fonts at places like dafont, etc, why pay for a premium font in most cases? Do you guys purchase a font to show a customer a proof & just hope that they'll buy it?

For 99% of all customers I've dealt with in the past 10 years the font choice I came up with was always good with them, but you see so many "cookie cutter" antique store signs; considering we already have over 8,000 fonts here it shouldn't be a problem to find something similar to an expensive version. Is this just me???
 

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Vinylman

New Member
Though none of your presentation are awe inspiring I might suggest you work from either #1 or #4.
They show some readability.
 

Gino

Premium Subscriber
Your original question was what fonts will work for your customer's sign...... I don't think that is your most urgent concern yet.

Your layout and composition skills are very lacking, so good or bad fonts won't help you. I don't want to pick you apart too much, but now is the time to stop this, before you get too much time involved and later someone bursts your bubble.
 

Jillbeans

New Member
Not to be a snot but those layouts are all kind of un-snappy.
Have you read the Mike Stevens book yet?
And also, never show a client that many proofs (after their deposit) because you will only confuse them.
And think of buying "good" fonts the way you would buy any needed tool for your business.
What lind of material is this sign made of? Sometimes making the background a nice rich color and the lettering lighter will help. But with these layouts, everything is run to the edge, the spacing between the phrases doesn't help, etc.
 

bob

It's better to have two hands than one glove.
There are no typefaces that can save these layouts. It is not often that one encounters typography this bad. Takes your breath away.

If you need, or even think you need, a particular typeface then buy it. You will use it somewhere. Your collection of typefaces are a much a part of your tool kit as the rest of your tackle. Most likely it will save your butt in some situation or another where nothing else will do.
 

jfiscus

Rap Master
Deposit? wish we got something like that around here!
Mike Stevens? Never heard of him?
Buy fonts like tools? Wish I controlled what was purchased around here, it's like pulling teeth to get new knives!

I haven't shown the customer anything, just wanted some basic opinions on fonts. Seems like someone peed in your cheerios for some reason. this is just a cheap job for a cheap customer; even brought their own sign substrate in if that helps to show how cheap they are. Just cut vinyl applied to an old sign hanging by two holes at the top. I just don't want a ugly sign to leave here if I can help it.

Obviously I must be going in the wrong direction here, so I will scrap this work & go another route. It appeared that the suggested fonts above were similar to my choices I had on hand I used in the image I attached above, so clearly I must be doing something else wrong also???

:banghead: :frustrated:
 

OldPaint

New Member
iam with most here, FONTS AINT YOUR PROBLEM, its the design/layout. all runs together, no punch. A, OF THE............can be a a lot less visable........or BIT of the PAST should take most of message. A is not a word.
but will get you to front of the section in a YELLOW PAGE ADD.))))))
old english is a bad choice..............sorry. this is an example of what iam saying as for sizing of the words.
 

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