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Exterior Signage and a Business Brand Causes Problems for Ft. Worth, D/FW Airport

07 Jan 2011

The battle over a business, its exterior signage and their proximity to the south entrance of D/FW Airport has raised some interesting questions and shined a spotlight on the impact of signage in the public space.

The business in question is an adult-oriented business named Rick’s Cabaret, and we want to be very clear that we are not condoning or defending the activities associated with an adult-oriented business. What is fascinating about this story is that the exterior signage and the “Rick’s Cabaret” brand on the signage is really what are at the heart of this problem.

Click here to watch the video report from CBS News:

A Tarrant county judge and the Ft. Worth mayor have both raised circumstantial concerns about Rick’s Cabaret, such as the potential for alcohol-related accidents, but in truth, it really comes down to the visibility of the exterior signage and the association of the brand.

One might wonder if the exterior signage was not facing the freeway or if it was not visible at all if there would be any problem with the location of the business?

Let us know what do you think.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

It may be new media, but the old rules of wayfinding and marketing still apply

06 Jan 2011

Remember the dream of the $100 laptop, now known as the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project? While still very much an existing program, it has attracted its share of controversy. Some opponents argue that a better way of accelerating development in poor countries is not to distribute free or low-cost laptops but rather to focus on more scalable projects such as the provision of clean water or vocational training to women. Still others question the motivation of Western countries imposing their solutions to complex problems that may not be appropriate for non-Western cultures.

The challenges facing the digital signage and digital media aren’t all that different from those facing the OLPC program. If you’ve paid even marginal attention to the digital signage industry over the last few years, you’re probably familiar with the unbridled enthusiasm we all experience with every announcement of some new technology or application that’s supposedly going to revolutionize marketing, advertising, and yes, even wayfinding. Whether it’s the much-heralded “Twitter Wall”, the wild success of Groupon, or the launch of the “first Foursquare application for digital signage networks,” the promise has remained the same: it’s a brave new world, and those who are willing to jump in, no questions asked, will emerge the winners.

Well, not quite.

Yes, the technology is truly dazzling and has opened up the industry to a slew of new players bursting with creativity and vision and a willingness to make mistakes (lots of them!). What many players – new and old – in the field often forget, however, is that while the technology may be impressive, what remains after the novelty has worn off is what audiences have always craved and will continue to crave: useful content.

If you’re designing and buiding a digital signage network for a hospital, for example, consider first and foremost who will be using the system, how they’ll be using it, and why. Only after that should you decide which medium would best convey your message. If your facility caters primarily to elderly residents, think about how user-friendly the system should be – larger fonts, bright colors, easy navigation – to minimize confusion and frustration. The medium may be different, but if it’s for wayfinding purposes, the old rules still apply: the message must be clear and logical and takes into consideration the architecture and flow of the facility itself.

If you manage a student union building at a university, think about what information you want to convey to the campus population and how they want to receive that information. You may need to think about addressing two different audiences: students and faculty who are on campus around the clock, and visitors, parents and other guests who will be unfamiliar with your campus layout and/or culture. If your visitor must navigate a sprawling campus over several miles, make sure that your network has plenty of wayfinding options, from color-coded, interactive maps  to large, easily visible signage (digital and traditional) throughout your campus.

And if you’re a restaurant owner who wants to invest in an iPhone app to attract more business and showcase to your customers how cool and hip you are, think again about those customers and what you can offer them. A well-developed iPhone app that won’t crash and bug a user’s system can cost a significant chunk of change, and although apps are all the rage at the moment, consider that the majority of downloaded apps are games, followed by “music, then media and social-networking-related apps,” with “location-based services” bringing up the rear. Oh, and most of the growth in app sales and downloads can be attributed to one demographic: young males. If you’re an old-fashioned, homestyle coffee shop that primarily serves families and church-going seniors, you may just be wasting your money.  Technology, digital media and digital signage have enabled businesses and organizations of just about any size to be able to improve customer outreach while also keeping costs low. On the other hand, the purpose of using most of this technology in a business environment remains the same: creating content and messaging that meets the needs of the customer, whatever they may be.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

Wayfinding, Information and Identification Signage Featured on baddesigns.com

04 Jan 2011

One of the most commonly shared human experiences is the anxiety of not knowing where to go or what to do when you arrive at a key decision point. Even with GPS-enabled devices to help guide us, we still rely on wayfinding signage that is clear and easy to see and interpret to get us to our final destination.

The popular website “baddesigns.com” is a nice little website that features a variety of consumer-focused experiences with products and with operating instructions. If you’ve got five minutes to spend over lunch, take a look at what people say are badly designed products and what makes these products hard to use.

After reading a few of the posts, it becomes obvious that companies creating products and product instruction manuals make assumptions about consumer knowledge and operational comfort that sometimes miss the mark for everyday users.

Signage does not escape the “bad designs” commentators’ roving eye, and that is a good thing. As architects, environmental graphic designers, and sign companies take the lead in implementing the new 2010 ADA Guidelines, it is very important that we keep the common user in mind. Here are five best practice tips you might want to consider when designing your next wayfinding plan:

  1. Keep the message simple
  2. Make the pictogram clear to see
  3. Don’t let your design concept impede communication
  4. Don’t be cheap – use durable materials and finishes
  5. Walk the site with someone and see if they can find their way

Tell us what you think and share your best practices or wayfinding experiences.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

ADA Signage Guidelines: 2010 ADA Standards for Accessible Design

23 Dec 2010

Earlier this week, the U.S. Department of Justice announced the signing of the final regulations revising ADA guidelines, including ADA Standards for Accessible Design. This announcement represents the long-awaited adoption of the 2004 ADAAG and its impact on architectural and ADA signage. If you have been in the signage industry for any length of time, you’ll know that we were regulated at the federal level by the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 12181).  Specifically, Title III – Public Accommodations, affects signage.  It prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability and requires places of public accommodation and commercial facilities to be
designed and constructed for accessibility by handicapped individuals.  For our area of expertise, this primarily affects raised copy and Braille requirements on signage and specific mounting heights for legibility. In 2004 the ANSI A117 Committee made recommendations to the Department of Justice to update the original standards.  Finally, these recommendations have been signed into law.

Now that the announcement has been made by the DOJ, what happens next?

The new regulations will be known as the 2010 ADA Standards for Accessible  Design, which encompass the 2004 ADAAG including signage. The details of the new standards must still be entered and published in the Federal Register, and all effective dates are based on the publishing date in the Federal Register. The new standards will take effect 6 months after the publishing date in the Federal Register, in which compliance will be permitted but not required.Compliance of the new 2010 standards will be required 18 months after the date of publication in the Federal Register, and at that time will apply to new construction and alterations. A general “Safe Harbor” is also specified, “…under which elements in covered facilities that were built or altered in compliance with the 1991 Standards would not be required to be brought into compliance with the 2010 Standards until the elements were subject to a planned alteration”. Although more detailed information is expected, the initial DOJ announcement information and related documents can be found at:

http://www.ada.gov/regs2010/ADAregs2010.htm

ASI has been a leader in providing ADA Update classes to architects and designers to help create a better understanding of how the ADA impacts the design, production and installation of signage.  Our class explains the differences between the 1990 regulations and the newly updated standards. ASI is an AIA Continuing Education provider and we offer a variety of classes related to signage and wayfinding.  If you would like a “lunch and learn” for your organization, please click here.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

Wayfinding Whitepaper: Pathways to Success with Wayfinding Signage

23 Dec 2010

We wanted to share the intrdocution and summary infromation for ASI’s latest whitepaper, “Pathways to Success: The Benefits of Wayfinding Signage,” which is being widely read among architects, designers and facility managers involved in the healthcare industry. “Effective and appropriate wayfinding solutions don’t happen by accident but instead require careful planning and forethought. In order to derive the greatest financial benefits, an organization must integrate wayfinding at the beginning of its facility’s design and construction process rather than at the end. Fortunately, modern wayfinding solutions – from flexible modular signs to interactive digital displays – excel in meeting just about every need an organization may have, whether it’s enhancing a visitor’s experience throughout a facility or reinforcing the organizational brand, or both.

You don’t need an intimate knowledge of the history and science of wayfinding to understand its critical importance in your life. Good signage can get you from Point A to Point B, but without a carefully constructed wayfinding plan, signage without strategy isn’t wayfinding – it’s visual clutter.

Imagine yourself standing in the middle of a hospital lobby, with corridors radiating in three different directions. You know where you should be – say, the maternity ward – but not necessarily how to get there. Hospitals in the 21st century, of course, are defined by change. Their architecture is in constant flux, with mergers, architectural renovations, construction detours, and even housekeeping emergencies effecting rapid shifts in the way traffic flows. You realize that wayfinding isn’t simply about signs but about guiding people smoothly and effortlessly through the confusing thicket of change and transition that makes up modern life.”

If you’d like to read the complete wayfinding whitepaper, click here to download the PDF.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

Wayfinding Signage for the Illiterate and Low-Literate

23 Dec 2010

In previous posts, we addressed the latest in wayfinding for underserved populations, namely those with low levels of English proficiency (“LEP,” or limited English proficiency). Another frequently overlooked but equally important group, however, include individuals of low literacy and how their needs can impact wayfinding signage. According to the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy, approximately 14% of Americans (representing about 30 million people) scored Below Basic in Prose Literacy, meaning that they possessed “no more than the most simple and concrete literacy skills.”

Another 29% (or 63 million Americans) were scored as Basic, meaning that they “can perform simple and everyday literacy activities.” Of course, some of the survey respondents also met the standards for LEP, so they may very well be literate in their own native tongue, but the data is clear that a significant percentage of even the native population have only the most limited literacy skills, and many are unable to read or write at all. Healthcare administrators and staff understand that hospitals themselves are intimidating enough without introducing the complexity of navigation into the mix. Far too many modern hospitals represent tremendous challenges to
both new visitors and even their own staff who are trying to locate themselves and their destinations in the vast, sprawling campuses of today’s healthcare facilities. Good wayfinding techniques which take into consideration not only where the “key decision points” are but the ability of the average person to decipher the choices presented to her and quickly make the best one as defined by her need, are often forgotten in the wake of mergers, acquisitions and construction projects.

As with LEP patients and visitors, hospitals are increasingly recognizing the need to make their facilities friendlier and more welcoming to illiterate visitors and patients. Some medical staff are independently taking it upon themselves to assist individual patients by changing the way they approach each medical visit, from rephrasing their questions to screen for literacy issues to providing aids such as videos and color-coded medication schedules.

Getting people through the door initially, however, is the first major hurdle, one that many illiterate and low-literate patients have a difficult time overcoming. One study found that “[p]articipants […] often mentioned problems finding their way in hospitals. This is not surprising considering that clinics and other health care sites may be marked with unfamiliar and difficult-to-read words such as ‘Gastroenterology’ and ‘Radiology.’”

Hospitals are taking certain steps to address it, with the push for greater adoption of the universal healthcare symbols recently unveiled by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Hablamos Juntos a great start. Other wayfinding options include interior and exterior digital signage, which can be updated as often as necessary and can include both audio as well as video; touchscreen kiosks; and even pre-recorded PA messages similar to what you hear at airports and train stations. Museums, zoos, and other educational institutions already make full use of these technologies to better assist their visitors and guests, and hospitals are slowly beginning to incorporate them into their own interior and exterior architecture and design.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

Custom Architectural Signage for Agave Library

23 Dec 2010

The design of the Agave Library for the City of Phoenix addresses issues of excellence and affordability in sustainable design and architectural signage. The library’s design, construction and material pallet is impacted by the tenants and design of a nearby planned retail center in north Phoenix. In the tradition of businesses of fledgling western frontier towns, whose dignified, yet paper-thin street facades belie their utilitarian construction, the Library’s ‘false front’ mediates between its two realities: one of a limited budget, the other of the civic presence expected in a public institution. With its torquing false metal scrim curving along the site’s eastern face, the Library’s ‘cowboy front’ gives scale, presence, and distinction commensurate with it position in the community. Constructed in the tradition of the old lathe houses of Phoenix’s Desert Botanical Garden using off-the-shelf galvanized hat channels, the scale and form of the scrim also recalls the tradition of drive-in movie theaters so common across Post-War American suburbs.
Working with Richard Jensen & Chris Balzano at Will Bruder + Partners, Ltd., ASI helped engineer, fabricate and install an interior and exterior signage program that would complement the environment and guide visitors to their desired destination. The custom interior signage solution includes hydro-cut etched/anodized aluminum panels illuminated with neon. The suspended signs use vibrant reds, blues, yellows and greens to draw the attention of library patrons to important destinations such as the check out desk, elevators and restrooms and audio/visual centers. The building’s “false front” came to life with the installation of a 90’-L x 25’-h reflective film installation. An installation that required over 600’ of film and 8 days to install. Due to the temperature of the steel during the Arizona summer, the film installation had to take place in the dark of night, with mobile spot lights providing light for workers. This completed installation truly became more than a sign but a sculptural work of art in the public realm.

To read more about the Agave Library project and to see more images, please click this link.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

Green: Everybody Wants It, But They Don’t Want to Pay for It

23 Dec 2010

“The only green that really matters in this environmentally-friendly revolution is the amount of green dollar bills it takes to be eco-friendly.”

— Anonymous

Green solutions can be a controversial subject to talk about, especially in the architectural and design industry. Long before green became the marketing trend and buzz word for the early 21st century, the architectural industry had long been working with a LEED mindset to reduce waste and be more efficient in production. The benefits were obvious – reducing material and construction waste and cutting down on transportation costs (shipping from long distances) made a positive impact on the bottom line of the overall cost of a new building or interior renovation.  The added benefits were easy to see – less consumption, less pollution, less waste in a landfill – all very
eco-friendly topics.

Following that business logic, it would seem that the majority of consumers and businesses would want to naturally adopt new products and services that are environmentally-friendly or green focused, right?

Not really. The truth is money still matters, and money is the really the “green” that everyone worries about when it comes to making  eco-friendly purchases. Consumers and businesses will make the choice to buy and implement green products and services when they cost the same or less than non-green products and services.

Everyone is driven to show value, watch the bottom line and prove an ROI for choices made. Therefore, we expect given these market drivers and the current economic state, green is still a nice to have if it can be justified, but not a mandatory.  We wonder in good times, would the demand change?

Taking a turn, we all debated about the latest story that continues to make headlines – SunChips are now packaged in the first compostable bag.  While litterers can instantly feel better about themselves now that their trash will decompose, interestingly enough consumers were turned off due to the loud noise the bag made. Further, all U.S. all bags are being converted back to the traditional packaging except for one SKU.

So price for this new packaging is the same for the consumer, it is an improvement by having a more eco-friendly offering – however the majority of consumers reaction is not willing to accept these trade-offs since the bag is noisy.  This is an interesting debate, regardless of the noise in-convenience, shouldn’t we all need to accept a packaging option that is better for the environment – its chips – minimal impact!  However, it would be a simple conclusion that SunChips will not mandate the new packaging “because it is the right packaging for the environment” fear of loss of sales.

As a product manager for Sun Chips, did you see that one coming? Even if you were on the sustainability team did you?   How will this lesson influence other companies, even pioneers in the industry who are trying to bring more “green” products to market respond?  It’s not enough to have a green offering, it must be one with minimal trade-offs and no one can guess where than threshold lies, since in the end it is not about the environment.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

Pictograms a Crucial for ADA Signage — Make Sure They Work

23 Dec 2010

Pictograms are among mankind’s earliest inventions. From the cave paintings at Lascaux and Egyptian hieroglyphics to the pictograms found throughout modern international airports, humans have been conveying ideas through images for thousands of years.

Good pictograms are literal and easy to understand regardless of language or cultural barriers. They convey a single idea. They can be understood on a subconscious level in the blink of an eye. Pictograms are an important aspect of most interior signage solutions and they are crucial to effective ADA signage.

Unfortunately, not all pictograms work as well as they should. To help you avoid choosing or using bad pictograms in your corporate signage design, here is a list of a few pictogram pitfalls:

Stick figures. If it looks like a 5-year-old did it, it isn’t right for your organization – unless you sell pretzel sticks or pipe cleaners. Pictograms need to be recognizable, but not so stylized that they bring undue attention to themselves.

Multiple ideas. A pictogram needs to represent one thing clearly. Trying to cram multiple pieces into a single pictogram is a recipe for confusion.

Lack of context. The pictogram above isn’t bad. In fact, it’s part of an award-winning set produced through collaboration between AIGA, the professional organization for design, and the U.S. Department of Transportation for use in airports and other transportation hubs. The issue here is what may make sense in the context of an airport setting may not make sense elsewhere. (For the record, the pictogram signifies “arriving flights.”)

  1. Stylized arrows. If you use wayfinding signage to point someone in a given direction, make sure they know they are looking at an arrow.
  2. Smiley faces. The largest retailer in America can get away with them; you can’t.
  3. Rainbow colors. Color is important. Color is good. Too much color is a mess. Pictograms should be one color.
  4. Remember, not all pictograms are created equal, so choose wisely when using them to enhance your ada signage.

Posted by asi | signage innovations

Social Media and Digital Signage – The Next Big Tech-Savvy Idea

23 Dec 2010

As if digital signage wasn’t sexy enough, along comes social media.

Many businesses long ago embraced digital signage and its appeal to tech-savvy consumers and audiences, but many more are just now beginning to understand its potential to drive sales and reinforce their brands. High-definition and LCD TVs and plasma screens, software-as-a-service (SaaS) platforms, and an almost unlimited universe of quality content now make it much easier and cheaper to use digital signage in venues as diverse as hospitals, colleges, restaurants, and retail outlets.

The latest innovation in digital signage, however, isn’t about hardware or even software, but a trend that’s been building for a few years in pockets of the Internet and which has exploded as the hottest new marketing tool: social media.

Okay, you’re not going to find Facebook splashed across your building’s electronic façade anytime soon, nor are you going to see a live Twitter feed on Times Square. (Well, not yet anyway.) But as a growing number of companies have discovered, a few social media tools have tremendous potential to engage even more deeply with an organization’s audiences and enhance their experiences with its brand by integrating them into its digital signage network.

What does this mean for companies and organizations still grappling with the use of digital signage and technologies in their facilities? What if they’re still trying to figure out the nuances and “rules of engagement” of social media on their laptops, let alone their digital signage networks and marketing strategies? What is the learning curve for a company that just rolled out self-service kiosks but who wants to also jump into the exciting new space of location-based social media? Are there instances in which social media might not be appropriate to include in a digital signage network?

The trend clearly may not be for everyone. For privacy reasons, a hospital probably cannot o broadcast a patient “check-in” information. Business-to-business companies may be more comfortable with traditional content being fed through their digital signage networks promoting their products and services or even the latest CNN broadcasts.

Still, as the technology improves and marketing programs evolve, companies will need to evaluate how they communicate to their customers. Once upon a time, customers detested self-service checkout lines at grocery stores and went out of their way to avoid them. Now that the technology has vastly improved, many prefer self-checkout and the technology has become ubiquitous in most major supermarkets.

The same will likely happen to many organizations and companies and their utilization of digital signage and social media. Gone will be the days when one marketing campaign sufficed across multiple channels. Instead, as content becomes fragmented into smaller and smaller segments in order to meet the needs of niche audiences, so will social media become an even more critical part of marketing, both online and in-store. Despite the exciting news coming out of Foursquare and other location-based apps, digital signage still has a ways to go before it can legitimately claim that it has mastered social media, but it’s undoubtedly only a few years away. If not sooner.


Posted by asi | signage innovations

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