Graphics That Pop

Mags Schultz, owner of Magzy’s Kettle Corn Ltd. (Quispamsis, NB, Canada), offers popcorn products that are popped over an open flame. For approximately two years, OrangeSprocket (Fredericton) has handled Magzy’s brand development, which has included logo, website and package design that feature a burly, bearded Viking character (a cartoon rendering of Mags himself) who merrily offers a heaping bowl of popcorn.

Mags decided to take his message to the streets, and OrangeSprocket developed the wrap design. Bill McGrath, OrangeSprocket’s CEO, said, “Vehicle-wrap designs probably only represent about 2% of our business, but we take the same approach of building brand integrity and awareness with them that we do with other media. A wrap is a billboard on wheels, and it has to have wow factor.”

To create exacting detail for the wood-panel backdrop, Orange-Sprocket visited numerous old barns and wooden structures to render an accurate texture. The company also conducted a photo shoot to accurately depict the popcorn-bearing kettle. After having created pencil sketches, they transformed the raw images into vector art using Photoshop and Illustrator. McGrath noted that creating the colossal image file requiring burning into onto two DVDs.

Making the project a family affair, Mags hired his father Robert’s shop, Schultz Signs (High River, AB, Canada), to produce the wrap – his first full wrap in its approximately 30 years of business. Schultz Signs printed the wrap’s 20 panels that decorate the extra-large, Ford E250 cargo van on its Mimaki JV3 at 720 dpi with SS2 solvent inks with 3M’s Controltac vinyl and perforated-window film. To coat the film, the shop used 3M’s 8519 luster-finish overlaminate with a 63-in. Drytac JetMounter laminator.

Robert said coordinating the panels and minimizing seams across the lengthy van required careful maneuvering with 3M Gold nylon squeegees. Showing a talent most end users don’t own, Mags put his childhood, vinyl-application training to work and installed the wrap by himself over 16 hours.