Without effective business sign communication, motorists are business opportunities passing by.
In 1997, a landmark court case – Denny’s Inc. et al v. City of Agoura Hills, 97 CDOX 6341, Second Appellate District – involved businesses with tall freeway-oriented pole signs that considerably exceeded the city sign code’s height limit. Evidence presented by one of the litigants – Burger King – clearly demonstrated the interplay among signs, motorists and economic vitality.
Corporate studies found that nearly 60% of the Agoura Hills Burger King site’s business was attributable to its sign, which attracted not only local customers, but persons far from residence or workplace – a group representing approximate 35% of sales. The drop in patronage that would accompany loss of the sign equaled at least $3.2 million during the 15-year remaining leasehold.
Plaintiffs’’ traffic-pattern and consumer-profile research also disclosed the evolution of trade-area theories of business practices and economics. Traditionally, a “trade area” has been defined as a 5-10-mile circle, containing a fairly immutable mix of residential, commercial, government, recreational and industrial land uses. However, automobile use, population shifts and expanding job opportunities have fostered changes in consumer behavior, and therefore, in trade-area demographics and dynamics.
Agoura Hills’ litigation established that for freeway-oriented businesses, as much as 85% of customers live or work outside the local trade-area boundary – many as far away as 25 miles. This means the increasing mobility of American consumers generates new business stratagems based almost singly on travel patterns. In terms of signage, retailers must use legible, conspicuous, on-premises signs to attract consumers traveling between destinations.
The Agoura Hills controversy was a mega-case brought by mega-corporations. Still, I thought the case’s demographic lessons could be applied to traditional, trade-area small businesses, neither franchised nor “freeway-oriented.”
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