Let’s Talk Shop

By: Charity Jackson

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Better fleet design

We are bombarded by “brands” every day. The good ones grab our attention and become memorable. When a customer first comes to us for logo design, we often recommend they walk the aisles of their local grocery store and simply pay attention to logos, packaging colors and fonts. 

 

Doing this helps them form opinions about what they like and don’t like. It also helps them understand what works and what doesn’t.

 

The customer’s original logo was given an updated look, while still incorporating his original windmill design. The design elements can be modified as needed for his new trucks, while still maintaining a consistent overall brand.

So what does this have to do with fleet graphics? Everything. Fleet graphics are a company’s best form of advertising. Multiple vehicles, on the road, exposing their brand to thousands of people.

 

Whether a customer has a fleet of vehicles ready to letter, plans to continually add to their fleet or even wants to make their one vehicle look like it belongs to a fleet, good design starts from the beginning. The design should easily translate to multiple types of vehicle and background colors.

 

Branding should also clearly convey the company’s product or service. It should be relevant to their industry and it should be easy to read on a moving vehicle.

 

This fleet of vehicles incorporates three different companies into one related design. An updated logo and consistent design elements tie the fleet together.

Coverage

Fleet graphics can range from simple door lettering to full wraps, and everything in between. Every customer will have some idea of what they’re willing to spend on their graphics. Often it takes presenting a few size vs. price options to find the coverage that will meet their budget.

 

If a particular vehicle within their fleet is on the road more often or visits heavily populated areas, then larger graphics may be considered for that vehicle, while smaller spot graphics are used on other vehicles in the fleet. Review the list of vehicles in the customer’s fleet, find out if they plan to do them all at once, determine a budget and then work with the customer to determine coverage.

 

Consistency

A fleet that we are currently working on involves many different types of vehicles and three separate but related companies. This customer wanted to update his previous company logo, freshen up the colors and incorporate a uniform look.

 

We’ve installed partial wraps on sales pickups, utility trucks, a crane utility truck, a semi-truck tanker and we’re currently working on replacing the graphics on his fleet of small tanker trucks. The core logo needed to be maintained on all the vehicles.

 

One of three full wraps, the bright green background on these trucks definitely grabs attention. The orange and black on the logo and minimal text pops against the background making for an effective and bold design.

The tanker trucks were originally painted with a gold metallic stripe. The first vehicles did not have any pre-existing gold on them so we were able to incorporate a gray wave design in the background. When we got to the tankers we simply dropped the gray background and worked with the gold stripe, still maintaining the colors and design of the logo.

 

The larger windmill, clean color scheme and larger “Propane” on the new design gave the company logo a fresher feel. Consistent placement of the logo elements and use of a background design tied together all three different companies, within one basic overall design.

 

Big & Bold

One of our first customers was a fleet account for a local winery. These box trucks have been wrapped and re-wrapped a few times over the years. Sometimes we’re given artwork or some ideas of what the customer wants, but we’ve also been simply given a wine that they want to feature and we get to come up with the design. 

 

This customer understands the importance of bright, bold images and maximum coverage on their rolling billboards. We try to capture the spirit of the wine by incorporating the design elements used on the wine label and other advertising. 

 

Two color, cut vinyl lettering has been the way we’ve lettered many vehicles over the years for a local carpet cleaning company. For their newest van we offered them a new design option, incorporating the same basic design as the rest of their fleet, but with a bigger background element and a little more color.

Another company that went big and bold now has three vehicles in his fleet and plans to add another vehicle with each new employee. These vehicles have a bold “gator” background with a bright, simple logo. The artwork is busy and bright, but it is hard to miss and achieves the look the customer was after. We can also easily incorporate this design on all future vehicles.

 

Grow With The Customer

Years ago we created a simple logo for a local carpet cleaning business. Before we bought our first large-format printer, everything was designed to be cut in vinyl. This wasn’t always a bad thing.

 

Full color printing is a great tool for any sign company, but don’t be afraid to stick with bold, single colors when it works. For our carpet cleaning customer, we continued with his simple scheme, but added a little more color to the design, went a little bigger with the logo and added a large background design.

 

The newest van incorporates all the same elements as the original van graphics we did, but the increased size makes a bigger impact. As this customer continues to grow his business, we’ve shown him that we can grow alongside him to continue to meet his needs in even more creative and effective ways.

 

Simple vector artwork, printed and contour cut, can be scaled to work on multiple vehicle types. These graphics are easy to read and convey the customer’s service clearly.

Another customer with box trucks has had us wrap three different trucks, one each year. For him it was important that we incorporate a photo of one of his salespeople surrounded by the furniture he sells. 

 

The first year it was the salesperson and her dog, the next year it was her and her son and the latest truck featured the son. The background design grew with the company, achieving the “family” feel he desired. The company logo, colors and contact information remained prominent in the design as well, creating an overall effective design.

 

A few years ago we created a simple full color design for a local plumber. The contour cut graphics, clean layout and concise content have translated well to multiple vans and pickups as the customer has grown his business. These spot graphics are all vector based and can be scaled to any size.

 

The owners of the propane company also own a portable toilet business. This company also had a pre-existing logo that needed some updating. We chose a bold, edgier design while maintaining his existing colors. 

 

The graphics were printed and contour cut and sized to fit the large doors of his truck. The next vehicle he’s bringing in has completely different doors, but by designing the graphics with this in mind, we’re able to easily move elements around to fit, while still maintaining the overall look of his new logo.