这是一个小故事——也许是微观的视角——关于一家小型设计公司如何与标识公司合作。我们的客户对设计、品牌和营销的需求往往与需要创造性和成本效益高的标牌解决方案以及最终的最终制造相交叉。
We are a married team of two running Barking Pixel Design, a boutique design communications studio in Peterborough, Ont. We prefer to work mainly with small to medium-sized businesses, but we treat our projects with big-brand mentality and methodology. We keep our clients’ goals and objectives at the forefront, creating original concepts for a wide variety of design and marketing challenges.
我们是一个由两人组成的已婚团队，经营着位于安大略省彼得伯勒的精品设计交流工作室Barking Pixel Design。我们更喜欢主要与中小型企业合作，但我们以大品牌的心态和方法来对待我们的项目。我们将客户的目标放在首位，为各种设计和营销挑战创造原创概念。
When we graduated from our graphic design programs—Kerry from Durham College in Oshawa, Ont., in 1999, and me from St. Lawrence College in Kingston, Ont., in 1996—we had little idea of how involved we would become in signage design and its various applications more than 25 years later.
1999年，Kerry从安大略省奥沙瓦的达勒姆学院毕业，1996年，我从安大略省金斯敦的圣劳伦斯学院毕业。当我们从平面设计专业毕业时，我们几乎不知道25年后我们将如何参与标牌设计及其各种应用。
Below is a snapshot of how we have worked with some trusted sign companies over the years.
以下是我们多年来如何与一些值得信赖的签约公司合作的快照。
Barking Pixel of Peterborough, Ont., recently collaborated with longtime partner The Media Works on a pylon sign for local company Nightingale. Images courtesy Barking Pixel
安大略省彼得伯勒的Barking Pixel最近与长期合作伙伴The Media Works合作，为当地公司南丁格尔设计了一个挂架标识。图片由Barking Pixel提供
A boutique design communications studio, Barking Pixel was established by married partners Clinton Clarke and Kerry Brennan.
Barking Pixel是一家精品设计交流工作室，由已婚伴侣Clinton Clarke和Kerry Brennan创立。
Building and maintaining industry relationships
建立和维护行业关系
After many years working in a digital and print environment, we started taking on full “rebrand” projects, which typically involve updating or developing a client’s logomark, website, and marketing collateral. As our business has grown, this package has evolved to include vehicle signage, wayfinding, and storefront/custom signage.
在数字和印刷环境中工作多年后，我们开始进行全面的“品牌重塑”项目，通常包括更新或开发客户的商标、网站和营销宣传资料。随着我们业务的发展，该套餐已发展到包括车辆标识、寻路和店面/定制标识。
In the Peterborough and the Kawarthas region, about 100 km (62.1 mi) east of Toronto, there are a number of local sign companies. Many of our clients would often have existing relationships with signage suppliers who did work for them in the past, but when it came time to requiring new signage as part of their rebrand efforts, a number of the shops did not have the marketing or design experience to bring a proper creative vision to life. This is usually why a new client would reach out to us for help.
在多伦多以东约100公里（62.1英里）的彼得伯勒和卡瓦萨斯地区，有许多当地的标识公司。我们的许多客户通常与过去为他们工作的标牌供应商有现有的关系，但当需要新的标牌作为其品牌重塑工作的一部分时，许多商店没有营销或设计经验来实现适当的创意愿景。这通常就是为什么新客户会向我们寻求帮助的原因。
As a result, we have aligned ourselves with reliable suppliers to help us with fabrication, who understand our efforts and why the work we do as a graphic design company is so important to our clients’ marketing investments. These companies take pride in their craft, like to collaborate closely with designers, and offer some form of trade discount to compensate for project management and bringing them the work.
因此，我们与可靠的供应商合作，帮助我们进行制造，他们了解我们的努力，以及为什么我们作为一家平面设计公司所做的工作对我们客户的营销投资如此重要。这些公司以自己的工艺为荣，喜欢与设计师密切合作，并提供某种形式的贸易折扣，以补偿项目管理并为他们带来工作。
We have relied on a variety of shops over many years. All of them have individual capabilities and specialties to accomplish different types of fabrication.
多年来，我们一直依赖于各种各样的商店。他们都有各自的能力和专长来完成不同类型的制造。
For vehicle wraps and any kind of cut vinyl graphic, we almost exclusively work with AGL Graphics and Signs, who have been operating in Peterborough for more than 30 years. They produce great results that last, and we work hand-in-hand with them, providing client-approved, colour-accurate design proofs which they use as their guide for installs. We deliver resolution-ready, scaled production files (typically at 100 dots per inch [dpi]), which are then printed and installed by their graphics production team.
对于车辆包装和任何类型的切割乙烯基图形，我们几乎专门与AGL图形和标识合作，他们在彼得伯勒已经运营了30多年。他们产生了持久的良好效果，我们与他们携手合作，提供客户认可的、颜色准确的设计证明，他们将其用作安装指南。我们提供分辨率就绪、按比例缩放的生产文件（通常为每英寸100点[dpi]），然后由他们的图形生产团队打印和安装。
In the last couple of years, we have also started working with PrintHub, which has grown substantially in Peterborough. They produce just about anything for print and signage. The capabilities of the company continue to grow, and the sales and production staff are dedicated to their customers and trade clients, with quick turnaround. We no longer have to seek out trade suppliers in Toronto to produce certain types of printing and signage—such as SwissQ and computer numerical control (CNC) capabilities for Alupanel and Coroplast signage—which avoids extra shipping costs. Printing direct-to-substrate has been amazing, as vinyl applications, when applied directly, tend to weather after a number of years. We recently completed a large wayfinding and signage project for a trailer and cottage resort in Buckhorn, Ont., which involved about 200 pieces. PrintHub produced these for us, and the client was able to install them with our guidance.
在过去的几年里，我们还开始与PrintHub合作，该公司在彼得伯勒发展迅速。他们几乎生产任何印刷品和标牌。该公司的能力不断增长，销售和生产人员致力于为客户和贸易客户服务，并能快速扭转局面。我们不再需要在多伦多寻找贸易供应商来生产某些类型的印刷和标牌，如SwissQ和Alupanel和Coroplast标牌的计算机数控（CNC）功能，从而避免了额外的运输成本。直接印刷到基底上是令人惊叹的，因为乙烯基应用程序，当直接应用时，往往会在几年后风化。我们最近在安大略省巴克霍恩完成了一个大型拖车和小屋度假村的寻路和标识项目，涉及约200件。PrintHub为我们制作了这些，客户能够在我们的指导下安装它们。
Often, the firm will rely on different sign shops for the fabrication of different components of a project.
通常，公司会依靠不同的标识店来制造项目的不同组件。
Since we work with print projects almost daily, we often rely on Trent University’s Campus Print to produce many items for our clients, including short-run digital prints, stickers, brochures, envelopes, banner stands, smaller signage, posters, and promotional items that can be laser-etched, as they have a Glowforge in their shop. The team is great to work with and their turnaround is always quick. They run a couple of Epson and Roland large-format inkjets, as well as a number of Xerox Production Series printers in their shop, which help them achieve accurate colours. They also do bindery, stitching, folding, and trimming, which is great for many of our short-run needs.
由于我们几乎每天都在进行印刷项目，我们经常依靠特伦特大学的校园印刷为客户生产许多物品，包括短期数字印刷品、贴纸、小册子、信封、横幅架、较小的标牌、海报和可以激光蚀刻的宣传品，因为他们的商店里有一个Glowforge。这个团队非常适合合作，他们的转变总是很快的。他们在商店里经营着几台Epson和Roland大幅面喷墨机，以及一些Xerox Production Series打印机，这有助于他们获得准确的颜色。他们还可以进行装订、缝合、折叠和修剪，这非常适合我们的许多短期需求。
However, our longest relationship with a sign company—spanning almost 15 years—has been with The Media Works, of Norwood, Ont., just 20 minutes east of Peterborough. A custom-build shop with a long family history of signmaking, they have specialized in pylon signs, awning builds, channel lettering, and fascia signage, as well as many other unique projects, for more than 50 years. They also offer support for other sign companies, including custom builds, LED retrofits, repairs, installation, and maintenance throughout central and eastern Ontario. They have been of great support for our design firm, as they help with some of the more technical acumen we lack, along with permit drawing requirements. They take care of the permitting issues for projects—which can sometimes be complicated—and turn our vision and ideas into reality for our clients, which is for sure a win-win.
然而，我们与一家标识公司最长的合作关系——跨越了近15年——是与安大略省诺伍德的The Media Works的合作，该公司位于彼得伯勒以东仅20分钟的地方。这是一家拥有悠久招牌制作家族历史的定制商店，50多年来，他们一直专注于挂架招牌、遮阳棚、通道刻字和招牌，以及许多其他独特的项目。他们还为其他标识公司提供支持，包括安大略省中部和东部的定制、LED改造、维修、安装和维护。他们一直在大力支持我们的设计公司，因为他们帮助我们解决了一些我们缺乏的技术敏锐性，以及许可证图纸要求。他们负责项目的许可问题——有时可能很复杂——并为我们的客户将我们的愿景和想法变成现实，这无疑是双赢的。
Concerning trends in signage and design
关于标牌和设计的趋势
Over the last 10 years or so, we have noticed a steep trend in mostly smaller sign shops and design studios overusing stock art elements, while offering “branding” or “logo creation” as part of their services alongside signage applications. This partially has to do with how graphic assets are so easily available online through websites such as FreePik, iStock, or Unsplash, and are now being used exclusively with no original creation to meet clients’ marketing objectives.
在过去10年左右的时间里，我们注意到一种急剧的趋势，即大多数较小的招牌店和设计工作室过度使用库存艺术元素，同时在招牌应用程序的同时提供“品牌”或“标识创建”作为其服务的一部分。这在一定程度上与图形资产如何通过FreePik、iStock或Unsplash等网站如此容易地在线获得有关，并且现在只在没有原创的情况下使用，以满足客户的营销目标。
This is a dangerous trend—as well as a sign of the times, where budgets are limited—but it is also a major disservice to clients’ business objectives when not using professional design and marketing services to create original art for signage or logomarks, or at a minimum, modifying the found stock art. For example, a real estate agent or homebuilder will realize the same house roof graphic has been used for another business just down the street, which has happened on multiple occasions. Further, artificial intelligence (AI) has opened up an entirely new set of challenges (or perhaps possibilities, depending on how you look at it).
这是一个危险的趋势，也是预算有限的时代的标识，但如果不使用专业的设计和营销服务为标牌或标识创作原创艺术，或者至少修改现有的库存艺术，这也会对客户的商业目标造成重大损害。例如，房地产经纪人或房屋建筑商会意识到，同一个屋顶图形被用于街对面的另一家企业，这种情况已经发生过多次。此外，人工智能（AI）带来了一系列全新的挑战（或者可能的可能性，取决于你如何看待它）。
As a design studio, we do occasionally rely on stock resources for idea-gathering or to help formulate concepts, but we would never resort to using stock art off-the-shelf to call our own or hand off as new to a client. In many cases, stock resources being used verbatim to cater to the need of a quick, profitable sale and production often results in lackluster projects, and we have seen and had many new clients come to us to fix these problems.
作为一家设计工作室，我们偶尔会依靠库存资源来收集想法或帮助制定概念，但我们永远不会求助于使用现成的库存艺术品来称之为自己的作品或将其作为新作品交给客户。在许多情况下，为了满足快速、有利可图的销售和生产的需要而逐字逐句地使用库存资源往往会导致无精打采。
This is not to say all sign shops operate this way. Obviously, some larger shops within larger cities have graphic designers and marketers on staff, who draft detailed, comprehensive options for their clients’ signage needs. What tends to set us apart—and the reason why clients end up working with us to develop new signage or storefront designs—is we go the extra mile to fine-tune important subtle design details or concepts, such as colour decisions, typography, and layout element ratios; offer marketing and design rationale of the executions; and often assist with the final finessing of the written messaging.
这并不是说所有的招牌店都是这样经营的。显然，大城市中的一些大型商店有平面设计师和营销人员，他们为客户的标牌需求起草详细、全面的选择。使我们与众不同的是——也是客户最终与我们合作开发新标牌或店面设计的原因——我们在微调重要的微妙设计细节或概念方面付出了额外的努力，如颜色决策、排版和布局元素比例；提供执行的营销和设计原理；并且通常有助于书面消息的最后处理。
After researching many shops and their public postings over the years, either via their website, Facebook, or Instagram, it now seems prevalent for small and mid-sized shops to churn out as much as they can, as quickly as they can. We hope this will change.
多年来，通过他们的网站、脸书或Instagram研究了许多商店及其公开发布的信息，现在看来，中小型商店以最快的速度尽可能多地生产似乎很普遍。我们希望这种情况会改变。
In awe of the possibilities
对各种可能性充满敬畏
Today’s sign industry has so much to offer its clients, and our word of advice would be to encourage design companies to build signage into their business offerings. It never ceases to amaze us just how much potential there is now when it comes to the various types of creative signage solutions and materials that exist today, compared to even 20 years ago. Although we are a small design studio, and many of our jobs are relatively simple in nature, our clients are always surprised and very grateful for the extra detail and effort we put into the projects—mainly due to our graphic design experience, knowledge, and capabilities. We make our projects feel unique, personal, and polished.
今天的标牌行业有很多东西可以为客户提供，我们的建议是鼓励设计公司将标牌纳入其商业产品中。与20年前相比，如今存在的各种类型的创意标牌解决方案和材料的潜力之大，从未停止让我们感到惊讶。尽管我们是一家小型设计工作室，而且我们的许多工作性质相对简单，但我们的客户总是对我们在项目中投入的额外细节和精力感到惊讶和感激，这主要归功于我们的平面设计经验、知识和能力。我们让我们的项目感觉独特、个性化和精致。
As our business continues to grow, we will keep offering signage solutions as part of our core services. Working together effectively with our suppliers, and often as the silent salesperson on their behalf to effectively secure new sign projects, is a great dynamic that benefits each other’s businesses.
随着我们业务的持续增长，我们将继续提供标牌解决方案，作为我们核心服务的一部分。与我们的供应商有效合作，通常作为沉默的销售人员代表他们有效地确保新的标识项目，是一种有益于彼此业务的巨大动力。
Clinton Clarke is the co-owner and operator of Barking Pixel Design, a boutique design communications studio in Peterborough, Ont. The company works with various local sign shops to serve clients in the Peterborough and the Kawarthas region.
Clinton Clarke是安大略省彼得伯勒精品设计交流工作室Barking Pixel Design的共同所有者和运营商。该公司与当地多家招牌店合作，为彼得伯勒和卡瓦加斯地区的客户提供服务。
Barking Pixel provides design compositions to clients, to show what their new signs will look like in comparison to their old ones.
Barking Pixel为客户提供设计构图，展示他们的新标识与旧标识相比会是什么样子。
