Shipping orders of multiple ADA signs?

[IDB Signs]

Happy Monday everyone! For those that produce ADA signs, or plaques, and ship, how do you package them safely? This is something I have been fighting and trying out different solutions for a very long time, with not much luck. To give you a better idea, we produce a lot of ADA signs with 1/2" thermofoiled MDF backers with Rowmark faces on them, as well as some out of 1/4-1/2" acrylic instead of MDF. Most are irregularly shaped, round, ovals, several compound shapes. We typically make orders that have many signs in them, sometimes 2-300. Each sign gets sealed in poly tubing to prevent scratching. Usually I will have several boxes with stacks of odd shaped signs in them that need to be stabilized and protected. While it is a fair portion of our sales, we certainly don't do enough to be able to justify having any sort of custom foam or inserts made, so I'm stuck with 'stock' options.

In the past, we have used corrugated cardboard corners all hacked up and pieced together to provide a fairly solid void fill. It looks very unprofessional, makes a giant mess of cardboard dust, and has still allowed some damage to occur a time or two. More recently, I have tried the larger, stronger bubble wrap, which allowed some signs to be damaged a couple months ago. I have tried the expanding foam packets, which I had high hopes for. Despite being fairly costly, they still didn't work too well for what I am needing The foam didn't fill all the voids, it was difficult to keep my stack of signs together while getting the expanding foam down in the box. Something like packing peanuts or a loose fill definitely wouldn't provide enough stability.

If anyone has any experience shipping something like this, I would greatly appreciate any tips or ideas! Thanks!

 

[MoultrieMade]

If you're not already, try bundling stacks of similar signs in stretch wrap before boxing. Then you'll just have a few big parts to pack, instead of hundreds of tiny ones.

 

[IDB Signs]

MoultrieMade Ahh! Thank you! So simple, but I guess tunnel vision happens sometimes with the one man show. Just did a few for a test, and I think doing that will allow me to use the expanding foam closer to how it is intended. Thanks again!

 

[BIG EASY DOES IT]

Foam wrapped, cut custom cardboard boxes by hand.

 

[IDB Signs]

Foam wrapped, cut custom cardboard boxes by hand.

That's sort of where we started at, way back when, and went from there. The foam doesn't quite provide enough protection. The corners of the MDF backers were still getting damaged and we were spending way too much time hacking away at cardboard. I have since ordered a few different sizes and shapes of boxes that work fairly well for most of what we ship.

 

[bowtievega]

We individually wrap each sign in 1/8” foam wrap and stack them in bundles of say 6-10 signs on average as well as wrapping the stacked package in foam as well. We have also used the foam envelopes from unlined I believe, signs slip in one end and fold and tape it closed. Also need to pad your boxes and pack them so the bundles can’t move around in transit.

 

[IDB Signs]

That's close to what I'm going to start doing, just with the poly bags and stretch wrap instead of the foam wrap. Then I'll secure those within the box to keep them from moving around. Some of ours have square corners which has punctured the foam wrap in the past.
Thank you all for the input!!

 

[amandaveronica]

MoultrieMade already said it, but stretch wrap. That’s the first thing I thought. And I don’t know if you have to put them in their own poly bags but you can use some of that soft foam to layer in between the pieces to prevent scratching and keep it in place with the stretch wrap.

That’s how I pack acrylic signs together, light wrapping of the thin soft foam then stack a few signs together, stretch wrap so no movement then wrap in cardboard. (Same thing with sharp corners punching through the foam... if you’re wrapping in cardboard after you’ll have a uniform shape at the end.)

Actually, once I discovered stretch wrap at work I realized I’ve had such a useful supply in my kitchen at home this whole time, haha.

 

[IDB Signs]

Way back when, we would use little squares of the thin foam and layer in between, but I found the poly bagging worked better for our needs. I've used the stretch wrap this week some, and it's definitely the way to go. Now I just have one or two bundles to toss in a box and secure.

 

[petrosgraphics]

Uline should have everything you need for packaging. look them up on line