Product Identification Graphics Create Opportunities Nancy Medinger sells printing to three of the country's top 50 convenience store chains. The sales representative for Crescent Printing, Onalaska, Wis., started by providing design services, promotional materials and direct mail capabilities. Recently, she added product identification graphics to the company's repertoire, a niche that has solidified her relationship with clients and boosted profits. Product identification graphics include nameplates, decals, tags, signs, panels and overlays. Manufacturers incorporate metal or plastic substrates, using a variety of printing methods such as lithography, flexography, silkscreening, and digital offset and laser printing. Designed for durability and longevity, these products are suitable for applications that traditional ink-on-paper products don't fulfill. "It's really a hardcore niche product," says Medinger. "You've got to get the right customer that needs it." The first ID graphic Medinger supplied was a several-feet-long magnet that attached to refrigerator doors in the stores' frozen foods section. Since then, she has sold plastic sign holders inserted between roller grills and printed plastic panels that slip into the front of cappuccino-dispensing machines. "I've already done the artwork [for the marketing collateral]," Medinger says. "So it's just being put into other applications and other places." Supplying these products not only increases revenue from the account, it makes it easier to penetrate additional accounts. "If you get into one convenience store, you can do another," she says. "We work with a lot of food distributors and convenience stores. It's a niche for us, so selling additional pieces is wonderful." The retail market isn't the only one in which distributors have an opportunity to sell identification graphics. Tom Barry, president of Yeuell Nameplate & Label, Woburn, Mass., says his company has manufactured identification graphics for a range of industries, from furniture and copy machine manufacturers to telecommunications providers. "A lot of it is dictated by consumer trends," Barry says. "Other times it's more business and industry driven. We adapt to whatever comes." He says one reason identity graphics are profitable is their potential for repeat orders: "The nameplate will last as long as the [end user's] product is available." Identification products are all around us, says Keith Rosenthal, vice president at La Crosse, Wis.-based manufacturer Mcloone. "Do you have a natural gas meter outside your home, with the little dials on it? There you go. Look at your air conditioner—the compressor that sits outside your home—there's a label on it. That's what we make," he says. "In hospitals you'll see wall plug-ins for life support systems. They might say 'Oxygen,' or 'Nitrogen.' We make that metal nameplate or that metal panel." Mcloone also provides Medinger with identification graphics for her retail clients. The decision to buy identification graphics has shifted from purchasing departments to marketing departments at many companies. Instead of viewing these products as commodities, marketing departments consider them integral to maintaining corporate identity. Distributors who provide marketing departments with a range of goods stand a good chance to capture this business as well. "You look at the nameplate industry as being a buying department responsibility," Medinger says. "I think some of that's going away because it's so much more intricate and more colorful. Everything has to match. It has to be branded." She also emphasizes the importance of convenience to her customers: "They don't want to take the time to research it, find the people and all of that, when we've already got a connection with them. They say, ‘Hey, take care of it.'" Distributors who do sell identification graphics should avoid a one-size-fits-all approach. "The most important factor in determining what to make is where it's going to be used," Barry says. Before the product can be specified, salespeople must find out if it will be used indoors or outdoors, and whether it will be exposed to extreme temperatures and chemicals. For instance, the panels Medinger ordered from Mcloone for the cappuccino machines were backlit by a light bulb. The manufacturer guided her to the best substrate so that the panels wouldn't melt. End users increasingly expect to work with one source for their printing needs, creating an opportunity for distributors who offer a diverse product line. Identification graphics is one more category distributors can offer to increase their value to a customer and ultimately boost profits. Have a solution? Click here to be featured as an E-Weekly Solution of the Week