TABLE OF CONTENTS
Industry News
[[HOT TOPIC]] Neon vs. LED: Is the War Over?
Last month, SBI Update spoke with Ron Wallace, Vice President of Marketing at SloanLED, about the current state of the battle between neon and LED in the sign industry. Surprisingly, to some, Mr. Wallace voiced an opinion that tensions
between the two factions had simmered down over recent months.
To gain perspective, this month we hear from Tom Kerley. Mr. Kerley is the owner of Kerley Signs in Landover, Maryland, is the Secretary and Treasurer of the Northeast Sign Association, and a Regional Director for the ISA (International Sign Association). He is also the author of The Neon Installation Guide. That said, we informed Mr. Kerley of Mr. Wallace’s notion that the “war” between neon and LED has cooled
off. His response?
“Oh, that’s interesting.”
And he continued:
“The only people making it a war are the LED people just trying to bad-mouth neon. And you can’t replace neon. It’s just not the same thing. I’ll make a neon sign—if given the opportunity to make it correctly—that’s going to light for ten, twelve, fifteen years. The LEDs won’t last that long. They go 100,000 hours. 100,000 hours is twenty years. Well, they’re juicing the voltage, so that means it’s now 50,000
hours. This is what people have said in the industry.
I had the opportunity to talk to a consultant in this area who said the problem is that LED decreases in brightness substantially after a few years, much more quickly than neon. Neon—done and pumped properly—doesn’t fade quickly. If you narrow the orifice when you bend the corners and it’s very narrow, then you need a bigger transformer to push the neon. But nobody tells anybody that. You buy neon, you buy price.
I had one
national manufacturer tell me that selling channel letters is like buying a loaf of bread—it’s a commodity. And that is the truth in a lot of cases. But I think that in the little eight-inch, nine-inch, ten- or twelve-inch letters, LED is like going to heaven. I understand that Wal-Mart is using the new GE LEDs in their big four-, five-, six-, eight-foot letters—they need their head examined! Why would anybody pay $30 a foot for LEDs that I can buy for $4.50 a foot?
Do I think the LED
people are going around and saying, “Oh, neon starts fires.”? Well, I did a neon installation manual with a fire on the cover, and that helped the LED people a lot. But as far as the industry is concerned, I did that to warn these “uneducated” installers that they’re doing it wrong.
Of the 833 custom sign companies in the ISA, 503 have from one to six employees; 156 have from seven to twelve; and 109 have thirteen to twenty-five. So 659 of the 833, or about 85%, have less than
twenty-five employees. I don’t about you, but I have nineteen to twenty employees, and I don’t have time to be playing with permits and trying to get help from the government. We need money and help. So, I think it’s the same way with LEDs—they’re going to believe anything they hear from some super salesmen at a sign supply company: “LED is the next best thing since sliced bread!” Well, he’s saying that because that’s what he stocks. But I do believe that people see through this. I’ve done
maybe six LED jobs, and every one of them had troubles. And I hear this over and over again through some of the suppliers.
I worked with a major manufacturer on the West Coast who did an LED set-up for me, and I did theirs, and two years later I needed parts, and the parts changed. But in the neon industry, you can get a multitude of parts from fifty manufacturers that are all interchangeable. Yet, with LEDs, if you buy from Sloan or GE or Osram, etc., you have to use and get their parts
for repairs. But four or five years from now the voltage will be different, the parts and connectors will be bad. And that’s the biggest problem with LEDs—the connectors. They get water in there, or the temperature changes—man, you got me all excited!
You have GE with a huge amount of marketing, selling $30-a-foot LEDs and convincing people that it’s going to last twenty years. I don’t know how they know it’s going to last twenty years, since twenty years hasn’t gone by to prove it.
But there is a way for LED and neon to coexist. Look at Actown. They make the transformers and ballast, and now they’re selling LEDs. If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em. There is an application to succeed for both. For neon to stay in the game, we need to show some documentation of how good neon is, and how it lasts a long time, and really doesn’t use all that much more electricity.
Look, I don’t want to bad-mouth LEDs, because I think they’re needed. It’s good to have competition
because it keeps you on your toes. But neon is old, it’s reliable, it’s a standard in the industry, and it won’t go away. And done properly, it doesn’t start fires. I was told by some key people in this country that there has never been a documented fire from a properly installed and maintained neon channel letter sign. Which would make sense, because if you do it by the book, it’s pretty hard to burn it down.”
Whether covert or out in the open, competition and tension remains between
neon and LED manufacturers, designers, and proponents of each. Will one clearly win out over the other? Can the two technologies truly coexist? Only time will tell.
Keep an eye out for the next Hot Topic discussion in the October edition of SBI Update, when we take a look at the growing division between sign makers loyal to independent shops, and the encroaching presence of franchised sign manufacturers.
SGIA Helps Aid Katrina Victims
The unfathomable devastation caused by hurricane Katrina along the Gulf Coast hit home with all Americans this month. With some 15,000 of its members planning to be in New
Orleans September 28th through October 1st for the SGIA ’05 conference, the sign community watched with anxious, yet weary eyes as the storm unraveled.
With priorities paling in comparison to the massive property destruction and loss of life, the SGIA cancelled its annual conference for the first time since the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington D.C. in 2001.
“Scheduled for New Orleans later this month, SGIA '05 was well on its way to being the best SGIA Convention in
recent memory,” said SGIA President and CEO Michael Robertson in a statement. “The quality and quantity of exhibitors and attendees was staggering.”
Follwing the show's cancellation, the SGIA made it possible for exhibitors and attendees, if they so chose, to donate registration fees and other costs spent toward the conference to the American Red Cross as aid to the Gulf states of Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi. As of September 7, SGIA ’05 participants had donated some $12,400 in
prepaid registration fees.
“We're fortunate not only in that we've recovered from the financial loss associated with canceling SGIA 2001, but in that SGIA now has limited business interruption insurance coverage,” said Robertson. “As a result, the Association is in a stronger position than we were four years ago. But, as before, our most valuable asset is the SGIA community and its strong support. Once again, SGIA members are helping each other move forward.”
To provide the sign
community with an event despite a cancellation under such tragic conditions, the SGIA has organized the SGIA Digital Expo, to be held at the Phoenix Convention Center in Phoenix, Arizona from Dec 8 - 10. For more information, go to http://www.sgia.org/feature_articles/execsum_sept2005.cfm
“I'd like to thank everyone who has been contributing SGIA'05 registration fees, time, effort and/or materials to
support the relief work,” said Robertson. “The devastation to the Gulf Coast region by Hurricane Katrina left us all stunned, and those directly affected by the storm are foremost in our minds.”
HP Ventures Into Super-wide Format With Scitex Acquisition
HP (Hewlett-Packard Development Company) recently announced the signing of an agreement to acquire essentially all of the assets of Scitex Vision, a
market leader in super-wide digital printing based in Tel Aviv, Israel. The purchase was valued at $230 million, paid to parent company Scitex Corporation Ltd.
“The purchase of this business from Scitex Vision further accelerates HP’s push into the rapidly growing digital printing market," said Enrique Lores, Vice President and General Manager, Large Format Business, HP. "Wide-format signage is one of the fastest growing opportunities in the market. Currently, 17% of printing in this
area is done digitally, and we expect that to double within the next five years.”
The transaction is subject to certain closing conditions to be completed within the next sixty days, whereupon the business acquired from Scitex Vision will be fully integrated into HP’s Imaging and Printing Group.
“Joining together Scitex Vision with HP will bring substantial benefits to our customers, the wider marketplace, and our employees,” said Scitex Vision CEO Dov Ofer. “Our technology will
reach a broader audience as it becomes available more widely, and our employees will enjoy professional opportunities as the business grows within a leading global organization.”
Controversial Business Model From Freeprinters.com
After reading some recent analyses from the NPES (Association for Suppliers of Printing, Publishing and Converting Technologies), Freeprinters.com founder and
President Dennis Walthers pushed forward with a business plan that could stir controversy in the sign industry. He and his company see the “print-on-demand” model as a true challenge to commercial printing.
“Stats from the last two years have shown that more than 60% of commercial printers feel that within the next two years, more than half their printing jobs will require 24-hour turnover or faster,” said Walthers. The NPES predicts that leading up to 2007, revenues from digital printing
would continue to grow.
In light of such forecasting, Walthers and Freeprinters.com continue to offer wide format color laser printers free of charge to U.S.-based businesses in hopes of bringing down the cost of printing capital for small commercial printers and shops.
According to its Web site, “The mission of FreePrinters.com is to provide a cost effective way for U.S.-based businesses to procure high performance printers for their color printing needs. As technology continues
to develop, the demand for color printing continues to rise. The Free Printer program is a unique and innovative approach to providing businesses with the latest technology in printing while being easy on the budget.”
Participating businesses receive automatic monthly or quarterly shipments of ink cartridges at rates that represent up to 35% savings over most retail prices for similar products with no additional shipping charges.
Founded in 1998, Freeprinters.com is bases in
Flower Mound, Texas. For more information, check out www.freeprinters.com.
Breakthrough OLED Achieves Highest Power Efficiency and Longest Lifetime
German design company Novaled GmbH has developed a red top emission OLED (organic light emitting diode) that produces ten lumens per
watt at 500 candelas per square meter, with a projected lifetime of more than 100,000 hours.
According to Novaled, the OLED combines the highest power efficiency and longest lifetime for a top emission OLED using transport layer doping technology. The company says the power efficiency for the very deep red color translates into a current efficiency of fourteen candelas per amp and an operating voltage of 3.0 V while increasing available light up to 50% over other forms of
lighting.
“The Novaled PIN OLED top emission performance opens the way to large OLED displays,” says Jan Blochwitz-Nimoth, Chief Technology Officer of Novaled. “Novaled is actively working on green, blue, and white top emission emitter systems as well.”
New Web Site Launch for Awning Industry
Centrafi, Inc. of Duxbury, Massachusetts recently launched its new Web site for awning shoppers, called AwningsWarehouse.com. The site allows consumers to find localized
dealers offering the product they are searching for, and is a result of Centrafi having built a national network of reputable awning suppliers to share with users.
“AwningsWarehouse.com has been designed to be the ultimate consumer resource guide to the growing retail awnings industry,” said Patrick O’Connell, one of the site’s creators. “Covering everything from insider knowledge on types of retractable awnings to reviews of local installers, it is the consumer’s connection to the best
awning products and services across America.”
Find out more about this new business in the Web Picks section of the upcoming October 2005 issue of Sign Builder Illustrated.
New Appointments
Mimaki Inc. has appointed Mr. Hisayuki Kobayashi President of Mimaki USA. His previous role was Senior Managing Director of Mimaki Engineering in Nagano, Japan. Former Mimaki USA President Mr. Masaaki
Fujita will now concentrate on worldwide marketing as Senior Managing Director of Mimaki Engineering Japan.
Super Vision International, Inc. appointed Mike Bauer as President and CEO effective January 1, 2006. Bauer has served as the company's Vice President of Sales and Marketing for the past year and was recommended by Super Vision’s current President/CEO, Brett Kingstone, to succeed him. Mr. Kingstone will remain
as President and CEO until Mr. Bauer takes office on January 1, 2006 and will continue as Chairman of the Board.
Cambridge Display Technology appointed Paul Jiggins to the role of Operations Director, responsible for the strategy and operation of the Technology Development Centre, which concentrates on P-OLED technology. In addition, Dr. Scott Brown will relocate to Tokyo and assume the post of
Executive Vice President of Cambridge Display Technology’s joint venture with Sumitomo Chemical.
Consolidated Graphics named James H. Cohen Executive Vice President—Mergers & Acquisitions, responsible for directing the execution of the company’s merger and acquisition program as it seeks to generate long-term growth in sales and profits.
Océ Imaging Supplies has appointed Andreas R. DeGroot Product Manager—Display Graphics, responsible for developing and implementing strategic programs to support the company’s growth in the display graphics market. Océ also named Mark S. Friedman Marketing Communications Supervisor, responsible for the
creation and execution of all communications programs for the company.
Meetings and Events
OCTOBER 2005
Oct. 11 - 12: General Electric’s Lighting Institute will hold a Retail Lighting Conference in Cleveland, Ohio. For more information, call 800/255-1200.
Oct. 12 - 13: The Illinois Sign
Association’s Fall Conference will be held at Grizzly Jack's Grand Bear Resort in Utica, Illinois.
Oct. 14 - 16: The Second Annual Hogtown Panel Jam will take place in Gainesville, Florida. To find out more, call 352/374-3819.
NOVEMBER 2005
Nov. 10 - 12: The Mid South Sign Association’s Fall Conference will be held in Columbus, Mississippi.
DECEMBER 2005
Dec. 1 - 3: The United States Sign Council’s Sign World 2005 will be held at the Atlantic City Convention Center in Atlantic City, New Jersey. For further information, call 215/785-1922 or browse www.ussc.org.
Dec. 8 - 10: The SGIA Digital Expo will be held at the Phoenix
Convention Center, in Phoenix, Arizona. For more information, browse www.sgia.org.
Sponsored Links
Adaptive Micro Systems LLC -- Milwaukee-based manufacturer of LED EMC on-premise advertising solutions. www.adaptivedisplays.com
ATG Electronics -- We manufacture what we sell! High quality LED signage lighting products. www.atgelectronics.com
Patriot Signage Inc. -- Manufacturer of yard signs for political/commercial/non-profit markets, jobs sites, and promotional displays. www.patriotsigns.com
Ability Plastics, Inc. -- Wholesale Architectural / ADA Signs to the Trade. Best Quality, Fastest Delivery Time. www.abilityplastics.com
For in-depth coverage of these topics and other sign industry topics, check out
www.signshop.com
ATTENTION SUBSCRIBERS:
Coming up in the October 2005 issue of
Sign Builder Illustrated,
feature articles on:
Banners
Digital Printing Inks
Paints
Screenprinting
Vehicle Graphics
Vinyl P-O-P
ATTENTION ADVERTISERS and
SUBSCRIBERS:
Coming up in the Novemeber 2005 issue of
Sign Builder Illustrated,
feature articles on:
Architectural Dimensional Signage
Electronics / Plasma
Extrusions
LED Channel Letters
Magnets
Transformers / Power Supplies
Contact your ad sales representative to reserve your space today!
As we shape SBI Update into the premeire
e-newsletter for the sign industry, we encourage our readers to send us feedback
on what you like, what you'd like to see, and any other comments you might have. To do so, send an e-mail to Associate Editor Chris Ytuarte at cytuarte@sbpub.com.
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Experience the Digital
Community Marketplace
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Hurricane Aid Through SGIA
