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Today we have a picture of a custom sign we recently finished for Heartland Animal Hospital.

This sign is a great illustration of our ability to produce custom shapes to our signs. This particular sign is 13' long and just under 4' in height. The material used is a 4mm Dibond® material. Click here for more info on DiBond®

What is unique about this sign is the combination of print and graphic applications. It would have been real easy to have just printed this sign, cut to shape and send off to our client, but that is not how we work. After conversing with our client we determined that the best fit would combine a digital printed background of beige and a light navy border. The graphic and text was produced utilizing 3M high performance opaque and metallic vinyl films.

The reason we went this route was to improve on the sign life, retain an eye catching appeal with the metallic highlights, and to reduce costs. Doing all this required several mock ups and conversations with our client. In the end we were able to produce an outstanding sign while saving our client a few hundred bucks.

Banners can be a nice alternative...

In today's world businesses are really tightening their marketing budgets, often looking for alternative sign and print options that can produce similar results to the higher-end desired products.

Pictured here are some #signs from the Minnesota State Fair. At a glance the large blue overhead sign appears to be a nice hard sign panel. However, it is not. It is actually a custom sized large format digitally printed banner. With accurate dimensions and our precise printing and finishing, custom banners like this can often substitute a hard sign under light duty exterior situations.

This particular banner has been in use now for approx. 5 years. What keeps this huge banner working so well is that fact that it is only up for 2-3 weeks out of the year thus minimizing the amount of wind stress and harsh elements mother nature dishes out to us here in the Twin Cities.

Another key factor here is proper installation. I will say it again - proper installation. You can produce signs and banners using the finest materials but without a good installation you are sure to witness sign failure. This banner has been screwed directly to the building face. No ropes. No fancy adhesives tapes. With screws you can see just how tight and flat a banner can be installed.

Next time you are in need of some economical exterior signage, consult with a sign professional and ask if a banner can fulfill your needs.

Dimesional Signs

Dimensional signs are really any sign that has a 3D appearance. This could be the individual raised letters that you see above a retail store. The logo on a wall at an office reception area, or even blade signs hanging in front of a boutique.

Dimensional signs come in all kinds of shapes, sizes and materials. We have produced signs in everything from sandblasted cedar wood to etched brass and just about everything in between.

Pictured here is a portion of an exterior building sign we produced late this past fall. It incorporated a custom painted aluminum panface with 1/4" thick custom cut and painted aluminum letters and tenant suite signs. The advantage producing this sign with the raised suite signs is twofold: it adds a bit more visual appeal and allows the building owner to easily replace a sign should a tenant move out or need to update there information.

Not only does this sign look great but it functions creatively well and will allow the building owner, and tenants, to save hundreds of $$$ on future sign replacements.

At Big Idea, you get what you pay for.

Window lettering in the winter

Working in the State with the Northern most point in the lower 48 requires us to deal with winter. In the sign world this can pose some real problems, not so much with hanging signs but more specifically with applying adhesive backed vinyl graphics and lettering outside.

Pictured here is some exterior window lettering we did before Christmas. With the single digit temperatures we had some cold weather obstacles to overcome. The main issue was with the adhesive-back vinyl that we use, it requires temperatures well above freezing before application is recommended. This is obviously a non issue several months out of the year. However, in God's country waiting for warmth in the winter is not always possible. The business shown here needed to have hours and they needed them now.

We have been working with cold weather graphics for nearly 20 years and have developed some tricks to help get graphics like these applied even during the below freezing days of winter. Though we always recommend waiting for the warmth, you can get vinyl like this to stick but there are some steps that the end user must follow in order for the lettering to stay in place. Note too, there is a degree point were the graphics just won't stick, usually around 0° and below.

Feel free to contact us for more information on getting graphics to stick during the winter months.

Traffic Signs from Big Idea

Traffic and directional signs may not be the fanciest signs out there but they do have a very important role.

Here we are pictured in our shop assembling several large traffic signs. The primary material we use here at Big Idea is a thick, highway-grade aluminum. The surface is coated with a prismatic reflective yellow vinyl for added visibility. The lettering and borders are designed from client specifications.

When creating traffic or direction signs it is important to understand the viewing audience. Signs viewed at 70 mph use a different design concept from those signs used in a parking lot. Likewise signs for fowl weather viewing should incorporate different design elements than signs for an interior parking ramp.

Nearly all of the exterior traffic and directional signs we produce have three similar elements. A strong, lightweight, non-corrosive substrate, a reflective background, and high contrasting san-serif text and graphics. With these 3 elements, and a good designer, you are sure to find signs that are easy to see and quick to read.

Photo Shoot

Here is a shot of one of our friends, Eric Olson. Eric is an established professional Walleye angler. You can find more about Eric here.

Pictured here is Eric modeling some sponsorship gear. This shot was taken by our owner Davin, good friends with Eric, on the Friday after Thanksgiving. "25°f and 64 mph on the open Mississippi River is wind chill"!

Our shoot consisted of some technical Evinrude shots, tackle & lures, sponsor gear, and of course fish. Though it was a cold challenging day for a shoot, the 24+ Walleye/Sauger day made it all worthwhile.

Photo Shoot

Part of our day here at Big Idea was spent on a product photo shoot. The subject was the EZ Gripper vinyl installation tool.

Here you can see this tool in action, gripping a large format digital print. Notice how taught the vinyl is. This tool is a rather unique device that really helps a person installing large vinyl graphics, keeping the graphics tight and straight for an easier application.

We had a lot of fun on this shoot and a special thanks to our hand model, Ben for helping out.

Billboard worth sharing

This billboard was not produced by Big Idea though we felt it was worthy of sharing with our audience.

Store Front Identity

Here we are spotted putting the finishing touches on a sign cabinet installation we completed last week in the Highland park area of St. Paul.

This sign cabinet is a custom made light-box that was designed to match our clients logo colors. With the nice paint job and translucent vinyl logo and lettering, this sign will surely be noticed illuminated or not.

Budget Sign Deja vu

What a great picture!
Do you recognize who is in this picture? Let me give you a clue, they use to work together... still don't know?

Pictured here is the owner of Big Idea Signs, Davin Brandt, and former owner and founder of Budget Sign in St. Paul, MN, Wayne Blossey. Davin Worked as general manager for Wayne and subsequent owners of #Budgetsignshop in #stpaul, MN for nearly 16 years. Today was a sort of reunion in the field.

This picture was taken today after a couple of site signs were installed for Wayne's Church, Arlington Hills Lutheran Church. "Big Idea signs sure gave us great designs." The signs serve as a community notice for a Christmas tree lighting event held Dec. 5th.

"It was sure great to see Wayne again, it reminded me of the good old days we had together installing signs all over the #twincities." Davin was pretty excited about this project and is anxious to see Arlington's awesome tree lighting this year.

Construction Site Signs

Pictured here is a unique construction site sign we installed today in the Frogtown area of St. Paul, MN. just prior to Mayor Chris Colman's address to the crowd and media.

What you see here, at this ground breaking ceremony, is an example of our direct, full color MDO sign board. This install utilizes our metal post and bracket above ground sign system. This system enables the construction site crew to maneuver the sign to different locations as needed during the construction project. It is also the installation method of choice during the winter months due to deep frost in the ground.

This sign is currently facing North during this ground breaking but will soon face south, toward the intersection of dale & University. Feel free to visit the site to see for yourself the high quality print process we are so often complimented on.

Step and Repeat Backdrop banners

Pictured here is a backdrop banner we recently produced for a Red Carpet event. This type of banner is what we call a step and repeat banner. The idea here is to repeat a logo or series of logos so that during photo or video coverage a logo is always visible somewhere around the subject in the foreground.

This particular project was approximately 8' x 8' in size and digirally printed on matte finish vinyl banner stock. It was produced for Dr. James Beranek of Beranek Optometry in Hollywood, FL. He is the producer of a pretty neat annual event: Eye Believe - a benefit for The Children's Diagnostic and Treatment Center.


More info on step and repeat banners can be found at: http://www.bigideasign.com/banners.html

Helping Joseph's Coat

Here is a picture that our owner, Davin Brandt, takes great pride in. This was a project he coordinated with Joseph's Coat to help increase the curb side exposure and appeal. Being a non-profit organization, the cost for this needed to be fine tuned. He was able to exceed there expectations and came way under budget for them.

What you see here is the Joseph's Coat logo created using colored 3M translucent vinyl film. This adhesive-backed film was applied on site, by Davin, one color at a time. The result is a wonderful work of art that has a stained glass look on bright sunny days. What you don't see here are the two-toned accent stripes that are on the remaining 5 windows as well as another identical window logo.

Joseph's Coat is one of the local St. Paul charities we support here at #Bigideasigns. Their main objective is to dispense donated clothing, household items and hygiene products to those less fortunate than most of us. They do this for free. The staff of only 3 is supported by about 100 volunteers whose main purpose is to sort through the donated goods each Tuesday and Thursday. At the time of this post, Joseph's Coat is helping approximately 500 adults and 80 children each shopping day ( Monday and Wednesday). That is nearly 1200 people each week. Did we mention that these individuals and families get to shop at Joseph's Coat for free? We invite you to visit their website at: www.josephscoatmn.org for more information.

Table banners

Here we show you an example of a banner table wrap we recently produced. The banner served two functions. One, was to hide and secure the property that was shelved under the table. Secondly, it provided a great way to help brand the business space.

Table banners offer a great option for inexpensive branding of your business or products and services. this example was used in a restaurant environment, but can work equally effective for events, trade shows, radio broadcasts, festivals and fairs and so on.

With standard reinforced sides and grommets as our standard finishing, our banners come ready to install making life a bit easier on your next project.