Your semi-truck is one of the most visible pieces of your business. Using semi-truck graphics to display your company’s branding should be an important part of your marketing strategy.

High-impact, colorful graphics will turn your semi-truck cab into a rolling advertisement for your business that’s seen by everyone who passes it, making the cost per impression mere pennies compared with other types of advertising.

But planning semi-truck graphics isn’t a simple process. That’s why you need a trusted partner like Signature Graphics. We specialize in large fleet graphics, and our team has the know-how to ensure your fleet has design consistency that meets your brand guidelines and that your graphics include required safety and regulatory information, no matter where your semi-truck travels.

Key Elements of Semi-Truck Graphics

Door Lettering – Semi-trucks often highlight the business name or logo across a large portion of the cab door.

Graphics – The design, illustration or marketing message that fills the rest of the cab real estate and brings the business brand to life. This is typically what most people think of when they think of semi-truck graphics. This should be creative, be high-definition and leave an impression.

Truck Numbers – Fleet vehicles are typically assigned a unique number for logistical purposes, and the larger your fleet, the more important it is to be able to see the truck number at a glance. These graphics are often placed on the door of the semi-truck’s cab.

Regulation Numbers – Unique U.S. Department of Transportation Numbers are required in a number of situations, such as semi-trucks that make interstate deliveries or that cross state lines. Some states also require any commercial motor vehicle to obtain USDOT Numbers, regardless of where they deliver. It’s important to work with a company like Signature that knows regulations and can help you navigate them and display regulation numbers properly on your vehicles.

Safety Lettering and Decals – Graphics also keep your drivers and the traveling public safe., Highly visible graphics can inform other drivers about the safe following distance, blind spots, hazardous materials on board or speed limit or operational instructions such as “this vehicle makes frequent stops.” In the unfortunate event of an accident, graphics can show the location of the vehicle’s fire extinguisher. In addition, you may have other warning labels no-step zones, clearance and height limits, and more.

Trust the Experts at Signature

Experience matters when it comes to semi-truck graphics, and Signature Graphics’ knowledgeable team can provide a creative, consistent and complete package of graphics for your fleet. We proudly offer high-quality 3M materials and our “signature” technology, brandRESPONSE, to manage the process from concept to completion. Get in touch today.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

Many of us take the ability to navigate through a building or other environment for granted — until the day we find ourselves turned around and frustrated by a lack of good wayfinding graphics inside a space.

January is International Wayfinding Month, an observance that highlights the importance of wayfinding information systems in today’s communities.

Wayfinding graphics are one of the primary services that Signature Graphics provides, a service built on more than 40 years of experience creating navigational tools that easy to understand and unique to your purpose and your brand.

Why Wayfinding Matters

Wayfinding is a set of tools — typically signs — that help a person navigate from point A to point B within a space. These tools are a must for your public spaces.

These graphics and signs are helpful in any environment and critical in large and complex spaces such as sports arenas, hospitals, school campuses, shopping centers and transportation hubs. Wayfinding helps people find their way around and as a result, makes people feel welcome, comfortable and safe.

It takes skill and experience to do that. To develop an effective wayfinding system, designers must be able to put themselves in the shoes of a visitor and translate complicated system of maps, floor plans and building directories into simple and straightforward instructions.

How to Put Together Successful Wayfinding

There are four key steps to creating an effective wayfinding system.

1. Determine Your Strategy: Wayfinding systems can include signage, maps, color-coding and symbols. Think about your space and the common ways people move through it. Then design a system that will best meet your visitors’ needs.

2. Focus on Navigation, Orientation and Landmarks: A wayfinding system must communicate these three basic things. People need to know how to move from point A to point B and be able to figure out where they are within the space while they do it. Good wayfinding also points out important landmarks around them.

3. Be Functional: The basic wayfinding signs have four purposes:

• Provide information
• Give directions
• Identify important spaces like restrooms, landmarks and entrances and exits
• Give warnings such as no parking or no smoking

4. Be True to Your Brand: Design wayfinding graphics and signs using your brand’s fonts, colors and symbols.

Wayfinding Must-Haves for Municipalities and Businesses

Communication builds good relationships with your community, and signage is a powerful way to share information.

Wayfinding systems must have simplicity, so directions and graphics are easy to understand at a glance. That means translating a complicated system of floor plans, office directories and maps into plain language and considering the way the public would naturally move through a space. This is imperative for both businesses and governments.

Wayfinding signs must use design elements from your brand as well because it will make your directions trustworthy.

When you need to go big, go big. Banners, streetlight banners and window films offer. They are available in a variety of shapes and sizes and are sure to catch the eye of everyone who passes by or under them.

Window films can be applied on the interior or exterior sides and can be installed for short-term or long-term needs. As a bonus, window films can also provide a sense of privacy for an interior space.

Use Wayfinding to Create an Experience

Wayfinding is one component of environmental graphic design, which blends functionality with creativity to bring a space to life and put focus on your brand and messaging.

Wayfinding graphics make your space accessible to everyone and allow visitors and customers to move around with ease, finding what they’re looking for, discovering products and services they didn’t know they needed, or both. Good wayfinding encourages action and engagement!

Use Wayfinding to Make People Feel Safe

An effective wayfinding system, supported by high-quality and high-impact graphics, give visitors a sense of security within a space. That’s especially important when it comes to schools.

Educators can use clear and consistent wayfinding graphics and signs to support the school day. Signs can guide students, staff and families through the building and helping them orient themselves within the hallways. Color can be used to highlight safe zones, emergency exits or internal directional guidance so students always know how to get help if they need it.

Contact Signature with All Your Wayfinding Needs

Signature Graphics specializes in wayfinding graphic that work. No matter what sector you specialize in — business, education, entertainment, marketing agency or government — you deserve to work with a knowledgeable and professional partner you can trust.

Signature proudly uses quality 3M materials, and you have access to your projects 24/7 through brandRESPONSE, our highly customized project and asset management tool.

Let us pair you with an expert who can guide you through a wayfinding plan that is both useful and true to your unique brand.  Contact us today to request your quote.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

Changeable fleet, environmental and window graphics make it easy and economical for businesses to update the messaging to highlight short-term promotions, new products or seasonal messages.

These high-impact yet temporary graphics could also be used to support causes and nonprofits that connect with a business’ brand, such as promoting a community food pantry during the holiday season or celebrating a local sports team during a run to a championship.

Businesses are more than profit-generating entities. They are a vibrant part of the community because of their ability to nurture connections among people. Those connections can do a lot of good. 

One way to offer your support is to partner directly with a nonprofit organization for a short-term awareness campaign. Use temporary graphics to include the nonprofit’s logo or tagline on your fleet vehicles, showing your support for their mission and encouraging others to do the same.

Fleet Graphics 4 Good Ideas

Signature’s high-quality 3M fleet graphics can be designed in a variety of sizes, meaning you can illustrate a cause or the needs of a nonprofit without it overtaking the whole exterior of your vehicles. 

Using these temporary vinyl graphics, you can dedicate space on a full or partial vehicle wrap toward your chosen cause or simply add a smaller decal that highlights your ask to customers using text or a QR code to drive them to a website for more information.

Temporary graphics can be placed anywhere on your vehicle and even combined with your existing branding.

You know the impressions that fleet graphics can make. No matter their size, these vibrant graphics turn vehicles into mobile billboards that get noticed by drivers and pedestrians alike on the streets of your community.

Window Graphics 4 Good Ideas

Like fleet graphics, temporary storefront window graphics offer a large space to let your message capture the imagination of anyone passing by or walking into your business.

Changeable window graphics can range from full coverage to small decals depending how big an impression you want to make.

Smaller decals on entrance and exit doors can remind customers of your support of a nonprofit or community cause and give instructions on how they could get involved too. Or work with one of our talented designers to incorporate imagery and your messages of charity or support into larger window graphics, seamlessly blending with your existing business brand.

Environmental Graphics 4 Good Ideas

Beyond windows, Signature can create temporary graphics to go on walls, ceilings, floors — nearly any space can become a short-term advertising outlet for your cause.

Strategically placed signage can pack a punch. Signature’s temporary interior retail graphics can be scaled to any size too fit your location and are easily removable at the campaign’s end.

Likewise temporary retail floor graphics get noticed because they’re in an unexpected location. These, too, are available in any size, easily removable and will not damage your flooring.

You’ll create new visibility for the nonprofit and create a shared sense of purpose with your customers. Doing good for your community can also do a lot of good for your business, building emotional connections and reinforcing your brand values with the community.

Let’s Get Creative

Signature Graphics specialists will work with you to create unique and eye-catching changeable fleet graphic for every occasion, including special causes. We offer top-quality products, 24/7 management, and tailored planning and design. Contact us today.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

The Signature Difference was on vibrant display at the 2023 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

The Signature team designed, produced and installed eye-catching, holiday-themed vehicle wraps for the RAM trucks pulling the floats for Wonka, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Santa!

Even more impressive, those exceptionally creative and perfectly executed wraps went from idea to reality in just 72 hours.

You read that right — 72 hours to design, produce, ship to the client and install!

This project was all about teamwork. The Signature team, through our partnership with Signature Express, supported RAM by leveraging our ability to engineer high-quality full wraps on tight deadlines.

Working under a 72-hour deadline for an event as big as the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade requires the experience and skill to understand clients’ needs quickly and efficiently, says Alyssa Despoy, division manager for Signature Express.

“Signature Express has one point of contact which makes this extremely easy. I ask project-specific questions to ensure maximum efficiency, enabling Signature Express to deliver precisely what the customer needs within their project timeline,” Desopy says.

An amazingly talented group of designers and installers jumped right in and got to work.

“A lot of clients will have a simple idea, but our designers turn these ideas into concepts and ensure that the preconceived vehicle wrap concepts perfectly align and conform to the vehicle’s contours, ensuring a seamless and optimal fit,” Despoy says. “And our installers are the ones who use their skills to turn these wraps into art out on the road.”

The entire Signature Express team takes pride in delivering high-quality work when promised.

“The biggest challenge is hoping that all the pieces of the puzzle with fall where they need to,” Despoy says. “In situations like this, we are expecting every department to communicate, hit their mark and help move the project on to the next department. Quick timelines require all eyes and hands on deck and leave absolutely no room for error from any of the experts involved, from start to finish.”

Signature puts in this kind of effort for all its clients — whether they know Santa Claus or not. Our graphic services and professional designers and installation experts are ready to get to work on your vehicle wrap. Contact us today.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

When you walk into a business, you see the company’s branding and color scheme splashed around the space. You see directional signs pointing out departments or specific offices as well as exits, restrooms and other critical areas. Light shines through promotional advertising on widows. 

You are immersed in that business and encouraged to act. You feel at home.

This is the job of environmental graphic design: Thoughtful planning and creative graphics create a space that is both functional and attractive to customers and puts the business’ branding and messages front and center by using every available space.

Here are a few ways that environmental design can impact the customer experience.

Wayfinding and accessibility: Directional signs, known as wayfinding, are important to helping all customers explore your physical space and make it easy for them to find things. Don’t let your visitors feel lost or unwelcome.

Storytelling: Large graphics such as wall murals or window coverings offer ample opportunity to tell the story of your business on a grand scale. Curate images that illustrate your mission and values. Use original photos, messages from founders and more to honor your business’ history and show your long-term ties to the community. 

Encourage action and engagement: Signage placed throughout a space can highlight promotions, special sales and new products and services. Be playful. Tease a customer’s FOMO. Similarly, use signage, kiosks and other touchpoints to ask questions or gamify information, urging customers to action.

Environmental graphic design organizes a space to meet people’s needs and inspire them to action. 

Signature Graphics partners with clients to design dynamic graphics with meaningful messages that maximize the available space and create engaging and cohesive experiences for visitors. To being reimagining your space, contact us today.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

Mobile advertising using temporary vinyl graphics or complete vehicle wraps remains one of the most effective marketing tools available today. They’re cost effective, highly visible to potential customers and, done right, can leave a lasting impression.

Today, no federal laws or regulations exist that prohibit vehicle graphics or wraps. However, states, cities and other localities may have their own fleet graphic advertising laws and rules that could affect your plan.

Before you order a custom vehicle wrap or put a sign on your vehicle, it’s important to do the research, and the team at Signature Graphics is ready to share our expertise and experience and help you navigate fleet advertising regulations.

Here are a few areas to think about.

Size and Placement of Ads

While restrictions on content of vehicle advertisements are rare because of First Amendment rights, restrictions on where a vehicle decal or wrap can be placed focus on safety. Signage generally cannot obstruct the visibility of the person driving the vehicle and, in some cases, should not obstruct the visibility of a person trying to see into the vehicle. Vehicle wraps often fall under the same rules as tinted windows.

Vehicle Registration

Some states require a vehicle carrying any advertising to be registered as a commercial vehicle, meaning you can’t wrap your personal vehicle to advertise your business. Check this with your local DMV office. Also be mindful that re-registering a vehicle as commercial can come with additional fees, rules of use, insurance costs and tax considerations.

Parking and Mobility

Local laws and regulations may affect where you can park a wrapped vehicle, meaning your business’ car, truck or van can’t act as a mobile billboard that’s unattended in a high-traffic area.

Homeowners Association Rules

If you plan to drive your vehicle home and you live in a neighborhood with a homeowners association, read the bylines. Your HOA may not allow a vehicle wrapped with advertising to be parked in a location visible from the street. 

Crossing State Lines

If your vehicle needs to travel outside your local area or cross state lines, you’ll need to know how the rules and regulations change and factor that into your design plans.

The Signature Advantage

Signature Graphics can help you navigate local, state and federal laws and regulations for your fleet graphics and vehicle wraps with both a knowledgeable team and our “signature” technology, brandRESPONSE, to manage the process from concept to completion. Get in touch today.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

If you plan to celebrate your new year with fresh fleet graphics, now is the ideal time to get the process started.

Signature Graphics’ dedicated team is ready to give you as much support as you need to ensure your fleet goes into 2024 with pop and pizzaz, either by replacing faded graphics or rebranding for a fresh start.

We strive to make the brand maintenance process as easy and seamless as possible. Our “signature” technology, brandRESPONSE, helps you manage the ordering process from idea to installation. 

3 Advantages of Planning Now

• Add year-end tax deduction. Because it’s an advertising expense, wrap-around vehicle graphics, partial wraps and decals for company-owned vehicles, as well as the cost to design them, generally are included in what the IRS allows for “ordinary and reasonable” miscellaneous tax deductibles.

• Maximize your marketing budget. If your marketing budget for 2023 doesn’t roll over into 2024, spend down unused funds on the design and printing of new fleet graphics. Or, Signature and help you look ahead to 2024 with a graphics plan that’s cost effective and flashy.

• Get compliance checks for 2024 completed early. Ensure your fleet meets local regulations and safety standards, such as the placement and style of USDOT Numbers on your vehicles. With our graphics service, we make sure your fleet is good to go and that the USDOT Numbers on your vehicle are the right size and in the right locations.

Year Round Results

Fleet graphics is one of the most effective ways to get your business noticed, and Signature offers custom and high-impact wraps and decals for every type of vehicle, no matter its size or shape. We proudly use 3M graphic films and overlaminates, so you know you’re getting a quality product for your money.

We also are conscious about ensuring that our products are eco-friendly and meet our commitment to reduce our ecological footprint.

Our designers and consultants have the experience to help you document a fleet graphics strategy for the coming year and beyond. Want to take advantage of seasonal fleet graphics that can be swapped out as the seasons change throughout the year? We can help with that too.

We offer unmatched service and support including 24/7 online ordering and fast fulfillment. That’s one of the many reasons that brands across the country work with us again and again.

Signature Graphics is your trusted partner for success in fleet graphics. Contact us today for a quote!

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

Every day, we use technology that didn’t exist 10 years ago.

Think about it. Smartphones continue to get smarter. We ask Siri, Alexa and other virtual voice assistants random questions — that they answer. QR codes made a comeback. We can make fabrics from recycled water bottles, and we can connect with the world on TikTok.

Scientist and inventors are driving change at a phenomenal pace in every industry, including ours. At Signature Graphics, we can’t wait to see what the future holds for innovative materials  and new ways for your fleet graphics to reach and engage with customers.

Here are a few innovations we expect to see within the next decade.

Greener Materials

Signature is meticulous about choosing partners who support our mission to reduce our environmental footprint and using eco-friendly materials, including using recycled or organically derived inks and substrates.

Water-based and soy-based inks will continue to evolve alongside new innovations, such as algae inks and UV-curable inks. Manufacturers will get better at making these inks and adapting them for commercial applications like fleet graphics.

We also expect the process for manufacturing vinyl to improve and move toward incorporating more bio-based materials.

Multi-Use Wraps

A few years ago, scientists at Purdue University developed an ultra-white paint that reflects 98.1 percent of sunlight and seen as a viable way to reduce a building’s energy costs.

Could an ultra-white vinyl wrap have the same effect on an electric vehicle? We hope we’re headed in that direction, where fleet wraps could offer high-impact advertising while also have a real impact on the operation of the vehicle or in offering its occupants protection from UV rays or pollution.

Autonomous Vehicles

Researchers have nailed down the technology that allows vehicles to operate autonomously. But practical questions remain about how these driverless vehicles can be integrated onto our roadways and interact with people in general, including other drivers, first responders and roadside workers.

Fleet graphics could play a critical role in this integration, alerting first responders to a human point of contact for the vehicle or giving customers — for example, someone receiving a delivery from an autonomous vehicle — instructions and peace of mind that a person is ultimately behind the operation of the vehicle.

More Dimensions

3D billboards blend art and technology to make type images appear to leaping off the sign. The optical illusion helps advertisers stand out from the crowd and is novel enough to get people talking.

It will be interesting to see if 3D images and holographic wraps could be safely introduced to fleet graphics, too, balancing fun and interesting designs with the need to not add more distractions to drivers.

We’re Ready at Signature

Our team at Signature Graphics is has the excitement and the expertise to help incorporate fleet graphics innovations into your marketing plans. We believe in the power of fleet graphics now and into the future to drive success in your marketing endeavors. Contact us to learn more.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.

No matter how you feel about the pumpkin spice phenomenon, it’s hard to argue with its success.

What about the fall and winter seasons makes your business stand out? Drive sales and delight customers with seasonal marketing graphics for your business and your fleet.

With Signature Graphics, it’s a breeze to change up your graphics with the seasons. Whether you need fall fleet graphics, winter fleet graphics or window and retail graphics, our team is standing by to help you with design, planning, sizing, printing and installation.

We proudly use 3M graphic films and overlaminates, so you know you’re getting high-quality, eye-catching products.

Think Bright and Bold

One sure way to connect your short-term messaging to fall or winter is through color. When you think of pumpkin spice, you envision oranges and creams, right? Choose intentional combinations that highlight the high-saturation colors of the season.

A fall color palette is warm and organic. It includes rich shades of orange, red, yellow, brown and dark purple, all inspired by the changing of the leaves.

Winter has two palettes that both play on high-contrast colors. Cool-based jewel tones in rich reds, blues and greens make you feel the crisp air on a sunny winter day, or go classic with neutrals that mix high-contrast shades of black, white and navy.

Color Psychology

We’ve talked before about color psychology — the discipline within psychology that studies how colors affect human mood, behavior, and emotions — and why designers and marketers rely heavily on color psychology when building a brand.

What mood do fall and winter colors signal?

Fall colors project authenticity, nostalgia and work ethic. They feel friendly, warm, comfortable, cozy, earthy and welcoming.

Winter colors have drama, precision and confidence. They feel bold, determined, luxurious and sophisticated.

Time to Get Creative

Signature’s professional design and installation teams make it easy to switch up your fleet and retail graphics to get the most out of your messaging for fall and winter.

No matter the size of your order, Signature Graphics’ nationwide team gives you the attention you need meet your goals with high-quality products and service. Get in touch with us today.

We proudly use 3M^TM graphic films and overlaminates.