M&M’s, a long-established confectionary brand, has established a retail store at 1600 Broadway and incorporated enough iconic spec¬taculars that even King Kong couldn’t miss it.
The sign package includes two, large, full-color, LED videoscreens and a mechanically controlled blade sign filled with giant M&M’s, of which two M&M’s shells rotate. And finally, a giant light cabinet introduces Red Kong®.
D3 (Dynamic Digital Displays), NYC, fabricated the LED screens, and Landmark Signs installed them. One, 32 x 32-ft., 12mm-pitch, LED videoscreen sits on the corner of 48th St. and Broadway, and the other, 50 x 60-ft. LED cabinet was mounted on the corner of 48th St. and 7th Ave.
As a further, M&M’s-brand enhancement, Chute Gerdeman Retail (Columbus, OH) designed a blade sign and a vinyl-graphic sign cabinet. Spectrum Signs fabricated and Service Sign Erectors installed both spectaculars.
ST will cover the elaborate interior and exterior signage detail that was lavished upon this store in the October issue, but here’s a brief overview of the store’s exterior signage.
The Spectrum-fabricated blade sign comprises five of the most popular M&M’s colors. Two M&M’s characters rotate within it. All poly¬carbonate M&M’s shells were back painted with individual, M&M’s colors and mounted within the blade sign. The trademark M was formed from a white vinyl cutout and applied to each M&M’s shell.
The second spectacular, a 33-ft. high x 15-ft.-wide sign cabinet, with a printed-graphic vinyl face, introduces Red Kong, a whimsical takeoff on King Kong’s Empire State Building demise. The image depicts a gigantic, Red M&M climbing up the building, clutching a bi-plane in one hand and desper¬ately hanging on with the other.
Steve Boreman, senior designer at Chute Gerdeman, noted, in a wink to NYC, “We thought a humorous reference to a great NYC myth would be a perfect acknowledgement for the store’ presence in Times Square.”
Spectrum fabricated the sign cabinet as a series of modular aluminum, sheetmetal sections that outline a dimensional Empire State Building. A printed vinyl graphic applied to each section builds up to Kong’s climatic skyscraper moment. Cove lighting enhances nighttime viewing. For added drama, one light scans the scene like a searchlight to highlight Kong’s final adventure.