Is Your Sign Working For You?

You wake up in the morning and drive to work and the first thing you notice is that your sign is not illuminating. Great - Just what you needed. All you hear on the TV and radio is how dire the economic situation is becoming. The headline in the Wall Street journal today was “fears over the financial and automotive sectors as well as the broader economy showed no signs of abating.” Your customers are cutting out spending and your revenue has begun to decrease. In order to survive this downturn you are committed to cutting expenses. Surely putting off fixing that sign for a few months is the right thing to do.

When business gets tough, it is important to conserve cash. All expenses should be reviewed and justified. However, the decisions on what expenses need to be cut can be tricky. While putting off the service on the sign may appear on the surface to be a good choice, it could result in additional reductions in revenue.

A quality working sign brands your business and attracts new customers. We all can remember times when we were visiting a new city, driving down a street looking for a restaurant and made the decision based on the sign. According to the US Chamber of Commerce, on-premise signs draw in as much as 50% of a new business’s customers. According to the SBA, without a well designed properly functioning sign, a commercial site cannot function at its full economic potential.

The converse of this is also true. On the same trip to a new city, we can also remember not stopping at a restaurant because of the condition of the sign. Consciously or unconsciously, we all make decisions about businesses based on the visual appearance of the premises. Your sign is a vital component of this perception.

On my way into work this morning, I noted no less than 15 signs that were either not illuminating or in some state of ill repair. This amounted to over one sign per mile. What is the message these businesses are projecting to the public?

In tough economic times, the competition for decreasing consumer dollars increases. Money spent on the appearance of the premises, branding and advertising can be easy targets for reductions because it is difficult to quantify the return on investment. However, I would contend that expenses that support or enhance revenue streams should not be reduced and quite frankly should probably be increased. Consumers frequent business that project confidence. If a business’s signage is outdated, difficult to read or in ill repair, it is sending the wrong message to the consumer. As stated in Vital Signs – Vibrant Communities, “Nothing says open for business like a good sign”.

To view Vital Signs - Vibrant Communities, please click on this link.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtyBFzGry7I&eurl=http://www.signs.org/