I agree and disagree ... clutter is bad. Some customers want more on their sign or banner . I dont know why . But during my busy season . I do tons of Banners and 98% of the banners want a phone number on them . I think having a ohone number on the banner us good . It gives the customer that personal touch with the business owner. I guess 98 % owners like it and I'm ok with it .
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Discussion What's the most common design mistake you see made in sign design?
- Thread starter Tim Garner
- Start date
Jester1167
Premium Subscriber
Phone numbers can be useful on temporary signs (yard signs, banners, etc) and can work on vehicle graphics or wraps. They're best on ads people will encounter while walking.
I absolutely do not like phone numbers displayed on street signs or building signs, particularly when they're stuffed into the primary sign cabinet. Phone numbers are largely a waste of valuable space in any permanent sign because an unfamiliar group of 7 or 10 numerals is a piece of information that is almost instantly forgettable. A passing motorist would literally have to pull over and park just to write down the number safely.
I have never written down a phone number I saw on a sign ever. In the cases where I've wanted to remember a phone number, such as the number of a woman I just met, I have to write down the number or enter it into my phone so I don't forget it.
Phone numbers on signs suck even more today than ever before. Most of us are hauling around smart phones now. We can speak into to the phone to ask Siri or Google to look up a specific business and even ask the phone to call that business without even having to dial the number.
Just even on a personal level many of us can no longer remember many of the phone numbers of our family members and friends because we click on their names in the contacts book, pull up lists of recent calls or just verbally tell the phone to call a specific person.
Finally, phone numbers on permanent signs make a local business look small time. No major national brand sticks phone numbers on their signs. They're certainly never included in the main street sign cabinet. About the only exception I've ever seen is a phone number put on a changeable copy cabinet or LED display.
If anything the trend with national brands is a cleaner, more minimal look to maximize legibility. Here locally we have a big new Chick-fil-a restaurant opening on Cache Road soon. The old location had a red flex face street sign with the full Chick-fil-a signature spelled out across the face. The new street sign is a big red cabinet with full bleed flex faces. It just has a cropped "C" with the chicken face on it. Nothing else. The building has some channel letter signs on it. But that cropped "C" logo is extremely legible and powerful at a long distance. McDonald's and Starbucks have similar minimalist efforts with some of their street signs. Signs cluttered up with phone numbers and other phone book ad trash will never have that advertising power.
I absolutely do not like phone numbers displayed on street signs or building signs, particularly when they're stuffed into the primary sign cabinet. Phone numbers are largely a waste of valuable space in any permanent sign because an unfamiliar group of 7 or 10 numerals is a piece of information that is almost instantly forgettable. A passing motorist would literally have to pull over and park just to write down the number safely.
I have never written down a phone number I saw on a sign ever. In the cases where I've wanted to remember a phone number, such as the number of a woman I just met, I have to write down the number or enter it into my phone so I don't forget it.
Phone numbers on signs suck even more today than ever before. Most of us are hauling around smart phones now. We can speak into to the phone to ask Siri or Google to look up a specific business and even ask the phone to call that business without even having to dial the number.
Just even on a personal level many of us can no longer remember many of the phone numbers of our family members and friends because we click on their names in the contacts book, pull up lists of recent calls or just verbally tell the phone to call a specific person.
Finally, phone numbers on permanent signs make a local business look small time. No major national brand sticks phone numbers on their signs. They're certainly never included in the main street sign cabinet. About the only exception I've ever seen is a phone number put on a changeable copy cabinet or LED display.
If anything the trend with national brands is a cleaner, more minimal look to maximize legibility. Here locally we have a big new Chick-fil-a restaurant opening on Cache Road soon. The old location had a red flex face street sign with the full Chick-fil-a signature spelled out across the face. The new street sign is a big red cabinet with full bleed flex faces. It just has a cropped "C" with the chicken face on it. Nothing else. The building has some channel letter signs on it. But that cropped "C" logo is extremely legible and powerful at a long distance. McDonald's and Starbucks have similar minimalist efforts with some of their street signs. Signs cluttered up with phone numbers and other phone book ad trash will never have that advertising power.
kcollinsdesign
Old member
1. Margins. Sometimes I place a requested design on a busy photo background to visually explain why adequate margins are necessary. Looking at a design on a white sheet of paper is misleading.
2. Multiple letter styles. Two is fine, but any more looks silly. Different fonts are fine as long as they are the same type family (regular, bold, italic, etc.).
3. Kerning and letterspacing. That includes distorting letter forms to make them "taller". Shudder.
4. Excessive copy (including, in most cases, phone numbers, web addresses, and email addresses).
5. Poorly designed outlines and shadows.
4. Armor plate and flames in the background. Ugh!
Those are just pet peeves. The larger problem is amateur design in general. Anybody with a computer is a designer these days!
2. Multiple letter styles. Two is fine, but any more looks silly. Different fonts are fine as long as they are the same type family (regular, bold, italic, etc.).
3. Kerning and letterspacing. That includes distorting letter forms to make them "taller". Shudder.
4. Excessive copy (including, in most cases, phone numbers, web addresses, and email addresses).
5. Poorly designed outlines and shadows.
4. Armor plate and flames in the background. Ugh!
Those are just pet peeves. The larger problem is amateur design in general. Anybody with a computer is a designer these days!
Alan Clegg
New Member
I had a request for a beaver riding a moose, holding a hockey stick and an axe, oh and the moose was on skis. it went on his business card.
Alan Clegg
New Member
i too have done a deliberately wrong first proof to give the customer something to change, then i can begin the real design. Each customer is different, but the way they think is roughly the same.
GAC05
Quit buggin' me
He wanted you to print the Royal Coat of Arms of Canada?
signbrad
New Member
I agree.
Big phone number—big mistake
Phone numbers are rarely useful or remembered from sign work. They are only essential in the wishful minds of our clients, who almost always have unrealistic expectations about what a sign can do. I believe most people do what I do when looking at a sign—remember the name and then find the number online. I only recall one time I used a phone number on a sign. On a FOR RENT sign in front of an unnamed apartment building. I pulled over and wrote it down. Am I really the exception?
Big phone numbers are generally ineffective and waste valuable space.
The purpose of large sizing is to create dominance. Lack of dominance is a widespread weakness in sign work today, yet its importance can't be overstated. It's part of creating a hierarchy of design elements in a layout. It is how you lead a viewer's eye through the composition. The dominant element is often called the "entry point" to a design. The biggest element is seen first. This should never be a phone number. Why would you want to see a phone number first?
A dominant element should be instantly recognized—and be readable and digestible in about 1.5 seconds, the average time (in my opinion) a person spends looking at a sign, assuming either the sign or the viewer is moving. That means the dominant element should be meaningful. All other elements should be absolutely secondary to the dominant element, in no way competing with it.
Too much information?
Too much copy is a problem, to be sure, but it is more a sales problem than a design problem. You must, with your client, edit ruthlessly at the beginning if a sign is to be effective. Salespeople often see their only job as closing a sale rather than selling effective sign work. Savvy designers make the best sign salespeople. Or, at the very least, a salesperson should receive training in effective layout. Good layout is not magic. It is learned.
Mastering Layout by Mike Stevens, and The Elements of Graphic Design by Alex White, should be required reading for a sales department. The first book is straight forward, not a difficult read, and was written by one of us, a sign guy. The second book is packed with stuff and may seem intimidating for nonreaders, but everything in it is valuable and most of it is applicable to sign work. It is written in such a way that you can just pick a chapter and read it by itself without much time and effort (especially the second edition). You can even randomly open the book to a single page and learn something useful almost every time.
Brad in Kansas City
Last edited:
I think the community here is very old school and prefer to jot down the number instead. We still have some that just don't do text or email proofs and would rather come in person. I can only think a handful where the customer didn't want the phone number to be huge but I can see why if that is the most likely way someone will contact their business.
While the "little guys" have a tendency to clutter up their signs with phone numbers the bigger companies are striving to simplify their signs, stripping away as much extraneous stuff as possible to arrive at something far more legible and far more powerful at reinforcing the brand.
Attachments
I drive past this building frequently and shudder every time. Finally stopped and took a picture for posterity because, judging from the banner, this sign may be coming down soon.
On the one hand, the "dominance" certainly does draw your attention! On the other hand, the "discord" deters me from ever consider them for my taxes!
Honestly, given how horrible this is, I'm surprised they didn't justify everything by stretching the font on the shorter lines.
On the one hand, the "dominance" certainly does draw your attention! On the other hand, the "discord" deters me from ever consider them for my taxes!
Honestly, given how horrible this is, I'm surprised they didn't justify everything by stretching the font on the shorter lines.
SignosaurusRex
Active Member
You need a few more categories...
• Lack of Legibility
• Lack of Negative Space / Breathing Room
• Color(s) Compatibility
• Balance
• Lack of Legibility
• Lack of Negative Space / Breathing Room
• Color(s) Compatibility
• Balance
Gino
Premium Subscriber
How come you talk like, Tonto ??
Gino
Premium Subscriber
Evidently, we don't know our common animals, do we ??
Boudica
I'm here for Educational Purposes
Gino's an elephant seal
Stacey K
I like making signs
Apparently not! LMAO!!!
Notarealsignguy
Arial - it's almost helvetica
and I'm a Boudica