KrogerTag:

Posted on by Regan Dickinson Posted in Case Studies & Profiles
Leave a comment

Printing the Town’s Grocery Store at Spectra Imaging

Inkjet Wall Mural

Spectra Imaging in Louisville, Ky., has a way with walls. When the opportunity to provide wall graphics rolls around, as it does quite a bit, Spectra Imaging takes it to the next level.

One of Spectra’s most recent projects involved turning blank walls into a grocery store for Junior Achievement’s BizTown in Louisville.

BizTown is a 7,000 square foot town where kids learn about life in the real world, like budgeting and finance, as they buy goods and save their money at the local “bank.”

Inkjet Wall GraphicsKroger sponsored two rooms and sent Spectra Imaging photos taken at one of their stores to replicate on the walls. Spectra put the files together to create one seamless image that would cover the walls from floor to ceiling in both rooms. Spectra also routed out dimensional letters and logos for the rooms.

“The walls are fairly textured so I asked my LexJet rep, Sammi Calabrese, what would work best. She told me that an adhesive vinyl would be more likely to peel off the walls, so she recommended we use something designed for rough and textured walls,” says Brian Rogers, owner of Spectra Imaging. “The project turned out really cool.”

Spectra used LexJet Simple MTS Adhesive Vinyl for the application. Simple MTS Vinyl has a more aggressive adhesive for textured walls and surfaces that don’t form a secure bond with conventional removable adhesives. The vinyl can also be easily removed for up to a year after installation.

Posted on by Regan Dickinson Posted in Case Studies & Profiles
Leave a comment

Practical and Promotional Window Graphics

Window Graphics by Spectra Imaging on LexJet Vinyl

It’s always nice when you can kill two proverbial birds with one proverbial stone. In the case pictured here, the stone used was LexJet Simple Adhesive Vinyl SUV – Gloss, and it was thrown, so to speak, by Spectra Imaging, Louisville, Ky.

The practical issue Spectra Imaging set to solve for this Kroger wine and spirits store was to hide the wine racks that sit across the windows. It’s just not a particularly pleasing presentation.

Applying Vinyl Window GraphicsBrian Rogers, owner of Spectra Imaging, says when the stores first started opening a few years ago the windows were covered in black window tint to hide the racks. The problem with that was that it appeared the store was closed, at least to the casual passerby.

Spectra Imaging did a test project in Lexington shortly thereafter, and it solved all the problems: it hid the racks and brought more business in the doors. “The first week after we put the graphics up in Lexington my contact there said sales went up about 37 percent. We’ve produced several window graphics for them since then.”

This is the latest version, found in La Grange, Ky. Rogers said he chose to use an opaque vinyl, rather than perforated window vinyl since you can still see the racks at night with the lights from the store backlighting them.

“This store was brand new and the windows weren’t tinted, so all you saw were the back of the racks. To get the project started I took a picture of the windows, came back into Photoshop, dropped the images into the windows and emailed it to them,” explains Rogers. “If they want to make changes I can do that in Photoshop quickly. Then, when they sign off on the design, we lay out the panels, print them and laminate them. It took us about six and a half hours to apply the panels.”

Posted on by Regan Dickinson Posted in Case Studies & Profiles
Leave a comment

Dimensional Multi-Media Branding Masterpiece by Spectra Imaging

Dimensional multi-media display

Brian Rogers, founder and CEO of Spectra Imaging in Louisville, Ky., used practically every tool available to the modern print shop to create the three multi-dimensional, multi-media panels with accent lighting pictured here for Kroger at the University of Louisville Business Center.

History display for a universityThe Business Center is a collection of multiple rooms, each sponsored by a different company. In this case, Rogers wanted to create something dramatic for Kroger that would detail the grocer’s history from the first store it opened in Cincinnati in 1883 to its present position as the fourth-largest retailer in the world.

“Kroger will sponsor the room for four years and they want to show what can be achieved if you work hard and apply yourself. The president of Kroger, for instance, started out as a bag boy and worked his way up,” explains Rogers.

There are three different panels in the room: the main panel on the front wall is 240″ x 8′ and the other two panels on the sidewalls are 4′ x 8′. Rogers could have printed all the graphics, logos and photos and applied the prints to the walls or onto offset panels, but this treatment ensures the drama Kroger wanted to create.

All the panels are 1″-thick Gator Board with a faux brick wall printed on LexJet 8 Mil Production Satin Photo Paper, mounted with LexJet GraphicMount White Adhesive and laminated with D&K 6 Mil UV Textured Vinyl PSA.

Dimensional lighted signage for interior displaysRogers took a photo of a brick wall downtown to make the flat print more dimensional and, yes, dramatic. “I wanted something with a lot of character, depth and contrast to make it look more realistic. We had a lot of people coming into the room during the installation and they were surprised it was a print,” says Rogers.

All of the graphics on top of the brick background print were cut out on Spectra Imaging’s CNC router and offset an inch off the background panel. Most of these panels were printed using the same method and materials used for the background print.

Additionally, the Kroger logos and the skyline silhouette are halo-lit with rope lighting from Bird Dog Distributing. The rope lighting uses LEDs for the light source and has the ability to be set in different directions so that you can control where the light shines: to the front, back or sides. Recesses were cut in the back of the Kroger logos and skyline and the rope lighting was placed inside those recesses.

“There was a lot of engineering involved in this project to get all the pieces put together properly. First, I sketch it out so that everything falls in place. When I designed this, I took the brick photo full size and enlarged the other accent images to the proper sizes and dropped everything on the brick wall. Then, those individual files come off the brick wall and are routed and printed. Each individual image needs to be printed at the same dpi to ensure consistency and the right size,” explains Rogers.

The installation took about seven hours. The largest main panel had to be assembled on-site; the Gator Board “skyline,” for example, was in three pieces and applied to the back panel. Overall, this was a very time-consuming project and well worth the effort, acting as a showcase of Spectra Imaging’s talent and effectively communicating Kroger’s dedication to the community.