1. Trans­paren­cy: Price fluc­tu­a­tion if quotes aren’t approved in a time­ly fashion.

Mate­r­i­al pric­ing has been so volatile in the past 14 months with dis­trib­u­tors only guar­an­tee­ing for about 48 hours. Be open and hon­est with your mes­sag­ing. Ensure your client under­stands this con­straint and that you’re help­ing them get the best val­ue for their mon­ey. Help your client see the val­ue in a time­ly approval when it comes to their sign order.

2. Alu­minum Extru­sions Options: Avail­abil­i­ty and cost con­cerns lead to innovation.

We order and use extru­sions rou­tine­ly and have seen some dif­fi­cul­ty in avail­abil­i­ty. But, when need­ed, we also fab­ri­cate our own extru­sions (“stick build”) with angle, tube, and sheet goods in our man­u­fac­tur­ing plant. Hon­est­ly, it may take a lit­tle longer labor-wise, but we have more con­trol over the time­line, and your client will have a qual­i­ty prod­uct when they need it.

3. Vinyl Sub­strates: Col­or accu­ra­cy and match­ing options are available.

Con­straints in col­or and avail­abil­i­ty of vinyl sub­strates in the mar­ket have been an issue. For this, we’ve leaned on our in-house dig­i­tal print­ing team. We’re able to cus­tom print col­ors on white or clear vinyl to match colors/​textures need­ed for sig­nage so we can still meet our dead­lines. Cre­ative workarounds for the win!

4. Ship­ping and Freight: Volatil­i­ty can cre­ate creativity.

Pric­ing of LTL and gen­er­al freight over 8 feet has tripled in the past 60 days. While dri­ver (labor) short­age is at an all-time high, the pri­ma­ry cause is an opti­miza­tion of trail­er space and channel/​routes. We’ll get as cre­ative as pos­si­ble to get your signs to you, but keep in mind the costs con­tin­ue to increase. Some clients have cho­sen to send a ded­i­cat­ed truck and trail­er to avoid unnec­es­sary fees or delays. Luck­i­ly, Grin­nell, Iowa is smack dab (the Heart­land) in the mid­dle of the Unit­ed States, so it MAY make this option a lit­tle easier.