HOW-TO

By MArk roBerts

Customization

Spirit Products for School Sports Teams Get educated on getting involved with local sports teams.

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f you’re looking for easy sales, then look no further than your local schools and sports teams. Just like any competitive sport, the rivalry between school teams is fierce and serious. Gone are the days of simple “computerplotted” silhouette decals on white. Today school and league teams are actively looking for fullcolor graphics and photographs on their decals, signs, and banners. We’re enjoying our tenth year of marketing these products to local teams. Currently I’m

servicing three high school and eleven league football teams with my digitally printed window decals, yard signs, banners, and magnetic decals—all printed on my Roland VersaCAMM VP-540 printer/cutter. With good designs, these products sell themselves. The profit margins are nice too. I have six prices for my entire product line of team spirit products—$3, $10, $12, $15, $30, and $50. After setting up the Roland VersaCAMM VP-540 printer/cutter in the shop, I noticed that the improvement in quality over the resin-printed decals was extraordinary. There’s better shading, improved tones, and much easier set-up for printing and cutting. Through this methodology, we now offer car decals, magnets in three sizes, yard signs, room signs, and other by-request novelty team signs and products.

photo yard signs One hot product we introduced this year is the photo yard sign. These signs have a photographic base consisting of a striped-andnumbered football field. The parent must supply a high-resolution photo file or print of their player, dancer, or cheerleader for us to use in production. Step one is to eliminate all the information around the perimeter of the player or dancer. We accomplish this by placing the file into Photoshop and using the Quick Mask tool. We then paint all around the player or dancer’s image. Next we press the “Q” key to turn off the Quick Mask. This reveals the classic “marching ants” surrounding the image of the player or dancer. Now it’s easy to place this closely cropped Yard sign combining a photograph with a striped field.

signshop.com

April 2012 // Sign Builder Illustrated

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