Throughout July, www.signweb.com will feature unique case studies that supplement Signs of the Times’ coverage of vehicle graphics in that month’s issue. Hopefully, this project whets your appetite for the vehicle wraps to come.
Restaurants on four or more wheels have become increasingly popular (when a trend shows up Cincinnati, where Mark Twain famously said everything happens 10 years late, it’s officially everywhere). They offer a large “canvas” for cost-effective branding, and tracking the whereabouts of a mobile restaurant provides incentive to engage customers through social-media outlets.
Custom Vehicle (CV) Wraps, which operates four facilities in Northern California, decorated a 1986 GMC catering truck for 51st State, which will take its mobile kitchen that offers “American Regional Cuisine” throughout San Francisco’s Financial District. CV’s Michael Hufana said prepping such an aged vehicle required considerable work: “We sanded and ground down blemishes, applied Bondo body filler for minor dents and stripped old grease and oil that had accumulated from the truck’s exhaust fans. The job took a week to finish, and warm weather made it even more challenging.”
Wrenay Gomez Charlton, who owns Wrenmade (San Francisco), a studio that caters to small businesses, developed the design. To fabricate the graphics, CV Wraps printed the wrap on Avery’s MPI 1005 Supercast air-release media with the shop’s Mimaki JV-33 solvent-ink printer. Avery’s DOL 1060 glossy-finish overlaminate protects the wrap.