Times, are they a changin'?

[Mike Jackson]

We received an email for a possible job on a 4' x15' banner to be located at a busy intersection. The banner hangs off the back of a grocery store facing the intersection at about 100 feet on the close corner and 200 feet on the adjacent viewable corner.

The supplied copy includes a logo and copy for the institute, the name of the event, the dates including the year, the place including Jackson Hole, names of two people speaking at the event, a list of topics to be discussed at the event, a web site address, and a phone number with the four letters spelled out and the actual number in parenthesis.

If that isn't tough enough, they want it on a yellow background with blue lettering and are calling out Mistral and Times fonts to be used.

Additionally, here's another line:
Material: peel off lettering on the plastic banner so some elements can be changed from year to year.

We obviously won't be doing the banner with all this on it, but it is a continuing trend we see of customers (with no background in graphic arts) telling us how to do our job. This is somewhat like me going into my car repair man and telling him to change the alternator, instead of asking him to tell me what is causing my car to not perform. He could change the alternator and it still might not work, but he only did what I asked him to do.

I am sure the sign trade has had similar variations of this issue forever, but it seems to be more common lately. End users are capable of laying out their own projects in their MS Word program using their generic list of system fonts.

I drafted a fairly lengthy response for the client and mailed it back suggesting they consolidate the wording on the banner to just the name of the event, date, and location, and use more bold and legible fonts. I also suggested that if we did the job the way they asked for it with all the copy and logos, the cost would be substantially higher. Money is usually a big guiding force on these kinds of projects.

This post isn't intended to sound like I am venting, but more to suggest we are still going through some changing times.

Mike Jackson

[Tony Segale]

yep.. we are.

And for this reason, and with the advice of a few others letterhead friends, when I receive a request like this I politely tell the potential (?) client I can refer them to three different sign shops to obtain estimates.
My forte' is creating an original client image, and if they prefer, I can do the same for them.

Of course, we all have to listen to the business mood of our areas, but if I can't produce what I am passionate about, I prefer not to deal with that client.

Nothin matters anymore, not the job, not the money, not the fame, cause now I know what to do to make me happy.

[Mike Jackson]

Hi Tony,
We have a few different approaches we could take on a project like this. Knowing it is a one week display project, I hesitate to attempt to make it a portfolio style project. The bang out projects are fine for us now, but we still like to know we made something that reads well at the intended distances. There can be some satisfaction in helping a client achieve their goals, even if the sign itself isn't going to knock your socks off.

We were recommended to this group by another group we work with, so we want to try to help them.

There might be a lesson in all this for some of the newer members. We see signs all around town that appear to have been created more on what the client says they want than taking the effort to deliver a sign that really fits their needs. Going back to my alternator analogy, one mechanic might just schedule the appointment to change out the alternator as I asked, while another mechanic might question whether that is really the problem and attempt to isolate it and fix it. Maybe it is only a small electronic part, vs the entire alternator? In the case of the banners, leaving off the bulk of the copy and secondary logos will make it work and save them money.

Mike Jackson

[Ray Smith]

Although I don't do a whole lot of lettering,the jobs I do take on are ones that pretty much give me total control over the final product.These mostly include small signs for show car displays and an occasional truck or fire engine.

I would agree that the times are definitely a-changin'. Seems like a whole bunch of people who have no concept whatsoever of composition,color compatibility,fonts and readability consider themselves graphic designers. I have a couple of friends who operate commercial shops and they get extremely frustrated. I am glad that I don't have to deal with this on a daily basis.

It would seem to be very difficult to try and balance the need to provide a customer with what they want and what is an effective job that you would not hesitate to attach your name to and still put food on the table. To paraphrase and old saying by a famous outlaw biker:'When we do right no one remembers;and when we do wrong no one forgets". I wish I had an answer.

[Tony Segale]

Howdy Miguel,

Yes, in the case of moving forward with the client, I would take the approach of advising less copy, more effective...
and justify with the thought of the additional copy is money spent with less return.

Which brings to mind... are times really changin? We still have to be the educator and knowledgable professional
to the new customers of today. If we're willing to continue....

Don't much like one week projects. Never have.

[Mike Jackson]

Tony,
The project isn't due until September or October, but it will only be up for one week. We sometimes did extra effort on projects downtown with the most visibility, but it is hard to justify extra on a one week display piece.

I heard back from them this afternoon and they cut about half of the copy. When told they either need to supply one of the logos in vector format or pay an extra $100 for me to digitize it, I believe they are going to cut the logo out of the job. So, I have now swayed them into a job that will probably work for their needs.

We don't have the job yet, but I think we are progressing towards it.

Mike Jackson

[Doug Bernhardt]

yes....times are changing. Whats worse is I agree with both approaches. Just to go back into the more distant past (and I don't remember who wrote it) The customer wants an Orange letter with a blue border only means he saw an orange letter with a blue border and liked it. Much of this seems to be going on these days "without" the advice of a professional in that field. My guess is it's all part of "living in the Digital Age"

[Raymond Chapman]

OK...I'll add my two cents.

There have always been folks in our business that had no idea what they were doing, but it does seem that their numbers are increasing. Rather than be the creative type that produces design, they simply do whatever the customer suggests, allowing the client to be the designer and they just become the machine that churns out the work.

Recently an insurance company added some vinyl lettering to their windows not far from me. All the lettering is in dark blue vinyl and is unreadable from any distance. It would seem that when the customer said they wanted the lettering in dark blue that the sign person would advise them that you can't see dark blue on an exterior window. But they installed it anyway. Possibly, the designer did offer the advice and was over ruled.

One of my biggest pet peeves are the folks that design the body wraps. The general rule seems to be to try to get as many photos and special effects on one vehicle that is humanly possible - all in the same value, with little or no contrast between copy and graphics.

One of my favorite customer statements ..."I want something different, can you do it in red?"

We will always have those folks in our craft that simply have no eye for layout and design. They were present back when I started lettering with a brush fifty years ago and they are still out there today. Thankfully, there are also those that still will not settle for the mediocre and try to make each project better than the last. It will be interesting to see the direction our business takes over the next decade or two.

Sorry Mike, I guess I turned your post into my personal vent.

[Mike Jackson]

Raymond,
I didn't read your post as any sort of "vent". We had a customer supply me with a layout for his window. There were 9 lines of text, all the same size and all the same font with pretty much a full cap height of space between each line. The top three lines were to be yellow, the middle red, and the last three were yellow again. Of course, he had it crowded to the edges. Then he wanted a price for us to install them and price if we just supplied the vinyl strips so he could do it.

That's somewhat perplexing. So, do I do it the way he wants in vinyl strips, shut up and collect the money? Or, do I tell him the red line of text will not read? Or do I spend the time to educate him on how the whole thing should be done? After all, there is a good chance he will only order the strips of vinyl and slap it on. I gave him a price both ways. He thought it was too high will hopefully find someone else. All is well.

We are just now getting the final go ahead on a 4x8 panel with pictorial Edge print of the upcoming building project. I asked for a high res image for the pictorial. I got back a note saying the supplied image is a large of an image that they have and I can just enlarge it in Photoshop. Okay. I guess that is what I am going to do. It may end up a little soft and blurry, but what else can we do?

I guess this is no different than in the old days when someone handed us a 2x3 business card with a logo an wanted us to paint it on a 4x8.

Mike Jackson

[erik winkler]

I hope I translated the former posts corectly....

We too have for years and years people who play around with word, powerpoint etc and they come with their homemade designs.
Often it takes more time to prepare their design than to make our own design that flows gently out of the trained hart and mind.
4 or 5 yearsback we made a big strategic mistake: we were so bussy that we did not invest enough time in new and old clients their designs prior to the final order. We lost a lot of pitches like that. Since 3 years now everyone who wants something gets a design in a cleancut pdf-file.
Ofcourse we still have the problem with good willing people and their home-made designs. But nowadays i found out that the investment in two designs is worth it. First is their design on page one of the pdf-file and as i know that i can do better, second i show them mine interpretation of the lay-out and necesary information on a design in page two of the pdf-file.
As for big banners hung up high and distant i always ask them to sit 4 meters (12 feet) away from their monitor and look thruw their eyelids and compare visabilty of the two designs. In this way i show respect for their efforts and later judgement that mine esign is better in practise
This way of handeling with future customers is much appreciated and id strategicaly helped us to get lots of new clients.

Raymond,
I asked for a high res image for the pictorial. I got back a note saying the supplied image is a large of an image that they have and I can just enlarge it in Photoshop. Okay. I guess that is what I am going to do. It may end up a little soft and blurry, but what else can we do?
Mike Jackson

Again i make an pdf-file or jpeg (by the way with my logo as the designer in it) with a little cut out and size it in photoshop to its true production formats. Send this by email and soon they will comprehend that making a blow-up of this poststamp is not positive advertising for their company but negative advertising.

[Doug Bernhardt]

I also enjoy a bit of a "rant" although it seemed to be much more a "matter of the facts" Just today I had another sign shop ask me if I would paint and decorate some signs he designed and someone else CNC'd. It goes without says that that idea went nowhere and I told him quite frankly that the client would be fortunate to get the "same" sign from my shop at double what he was charging. I also said quite truthfully that if I couldn't do business the way I like I would be in another business.....I actually said I'd be a plumber. I wasn't angry or anything just stating a fact and he understood that also. I also have to say that only a few months ago he called asking how to prepare some wood panels. More and more I see ppl in our business who have no idea of what I'd call the very basic's. This guy has been in business doing vinyl trucks and coroplast signage etc for maybe 15 years. It will be very interesting to see what happens in the next couple of decades.

[Mike Jackson]

Erik,
This will shift the topic a lot, but I simply DON'T make a sketch to get a job until the client has agreed to the price and we know we have the job. On bigger projects, we get a design deposit up front. Once we have the job in the bag, I don't mind making a few "sketches" (computerized nowdays).

If you want to expand on this, we might start it in another thread.

Mike Jackson

[Raymond Chapman]

On a few occassions I had the privilege of working with Mike and Darla (actually, I just stood around drooling, most of the time), and one of the first things I noticed was how rough Mike's sketches were. They were not crude by any means but they were not these really fine detailed drawings either. The ones I saw were just pencil sketches with no color. Of course this was before all the digital stuff available today. Mike would explain the colors and then begin the production process. By not having a super detailed architectural drawing, he could adjust things as he went along to make the layout better.

At least, that is what I saw from where I was standing.

[Mark Yearwood]

Hi guys!
I find myself doing these polished photoshop renderings more and more these days. Of course, those are are for nice jobs that we have in the bag.

I was going through stuff in our recent move to the new studio and found some old pencil sketches. They sure had character even though they weren't in color or filled with tree lined backgrounds. I sure sold a lot of work back then based on those drawings and color notations. You made the customer "visualize" the finished sign while doing the same in your head.
The outcome was usually surprising and it didn't matter that the shade of green was a little different in the border than noted.
It was changed on the spot to go with that rusty orange you mixed up.

Usually the comment was... "That turned out better than I expected! Wow! "
It's hard to wow them these days because they are too busy making you revise your rendering or logo to the point you get tired of even looking at it.

[Mike Jackson]

Hi Mark,
I wrote an article in SC on that very topic quite a while ago. The old guys didn't need a color sketch to sell a job. All we do is waste valuable bench time in the process of making a glossy four color image for review. The clients put very little value in that time and have a tendency to want to make changes.

I just ran across some of George Seelander's old sketches. He let me snag a few from a pile next to his bench when I was living in Oklahoma City. He couldn't figure out why I would want them, but said okay. They are true treasures to me.

Mike Jackson