New marketing direction?..

[ucmj22]

I have been kicking around the idea of changing our identity from a "Sign Shop" to a "Print Shop." we dont make cabinet or backlit signs, we dont fabricate anything here, but we do have an XC-540. 95% of what we do is printed and put on a substrate and thats it. Many of our customers do their own installation. I was kind of wondering what others thought about this. we would still offer everything we do now; everything ranging from collateral & identity packages to vehicle wraps and printed signs, we would just focus on bringing in more of the logos and business cards first then selling them a wrap and a sign. It just seems like there is more people looking for the former than the latter and by bringing them in on the print side will give us a larger base of customers when they need a sign.

 

[Locals Find!]

How about advertising Printing & Signs. Why separate the two divisions in the eye of the public?

 

[HulkSmash]

Not sure if that's the best move. If you don't offer it.. start to. If you don't do it in house.. try sourcing it. 90% of the sign shops can't and don't make cabinets. They just buy them from manufacturers. Why not do that? It's pure profit on jobs like that.

 

[Locals Find!]

Not sure if that's the best move. If you don't offer it.. start to. If you don't do it in house.. try sourcing it. 90% of the sign shops can't and don't make cabinets. They just buy them from manufacturers. Why not do that? It's pure profit on jobs like that.

Have to agree with Colorado here. I am just a broker but, sold 5 cabinet signs last week. I outsourced the entire thing including installation. The company I outsourced to even pulled the permits for all the installs. I just pick up the check and make sure everyone gets paid.

 

[royster13]

What the heck difference does it matter what you call yourself?......If you are out knocking on doors, finding out what your clients problems are and filling their needs, people will know what you do.....

 

[Circleville Signs]

The problem with branding yourself as a "Print Shop" is that you will start to get all of the walk-ins who want 20 copies made of their 8.5x11 flyer, and they want to pay $.11/ea for them. That's nothing but lost time.

If you are wanting to focus on the branding side of things, then I would change your branding to be something like "XXXX Signs and Design"

 

[Gino]

This might date me, but when I hear 'print shop' I automatically think of the printing industry such as offset types of printing. Printing of business cards, brochures, stationery, small posters and other printed matter. Even digital printing falls into that category.

On the other hand, just printing everything on an inkjet printer and doing nothing technically in-house other than moving vinyl through a machine doesn't sound very 'sign-like' either. Perhaps you could try one of them thar fancy names like Grapix Shop, Vinyl Graphics or What's Your Sign ??

 

[Circleville Signs]

That's a good point Gino. I think there it all depends on what the public in your area expects when they see certain words. If I see the words "Drive-Thru", my assumption is that I can grab a 6 pack on the way home. That might not be the case if you live in a dry county...

 

[ucmj22]

The problem with branding yourself as a "Print Shop" is that you will start to get all of the walk-ins who want 20 copies made of their 8.5x11 flyer, and they want to pay $.11/ea for them.

I had considered this to be a downfall.

This might date me, but when I hear 'print shop' I automatically think of the printing industry such as offset types of printing. Printing of business cards, brochures, stationery, small posters and other printed matter. Even digital printing falls into that category.

On the other hand, just printing everything on an inkjet printer and doing nothing technically in-house other than moving vinyl through a machine doesn't sound very 'sign-like' either. Perhaps you could try one of them thar fancy names like Grapix Shop, Vinyl Graphics or What's Your Sign ??

We do outsource alot of offset printing. People like our designs, and are wiling to pay for them wich makes outsourcing these items nice and profitable.

We do install some signs, but we dont have a boom truck, so that limits what we can install on our own. I think the problem with this shop is that it has never been owned or operated by a sign maker, its just been someones play business and possibly a shell company for profit loss of another. I just want to make it in to something that I am at least passionate about, because yard signs aint it.

 

[Circleville Signs]

I had considered this to be a downfall.



We do outsource alot of offset printing. People like our designs, and are wiling to pay for them wich makes outsourcing these items nice and profitable.

We do install some signs, but we dont have a boom truck, so that limits what we can install on our own. I think the problem with this shop is that it has never been owned or operated by a sign maker, its just been someones play business and possibly a shell company for profit loss of another. I just want to make it in to something that I am at least passionate about, because yard signs aint it.

We don't have a bucket truck or in house fabrication either. We still do a ton of install work. I can almost guarantee that somewhere in your area is a "sign" company that does NOTHING but install work for other sign companies. We have a great one here that we get fantastic rates from who can install ANYTHING. None of our customers need to know that we aren't the ones doing the install. I know HOW to do the installs, but why spend $75k+ on a truck when I have a great company who can do it for me?

Same thing with electrical signs. If you don't know how to design them, learn. There are great resources to do so. Then sub out the manufacturing. It really isn't a difficult process.

 

[HulkSmash]

its just been someones play business and possibly a shell company for profit loss of another. I just want to make it in to something that I am at least passionate about, because yard signs aint it.

Exactly what it is. It's actually not that common to have a sign shop for this reason. There's 4 in Colorado that i know of.