Sign Fabricator Matt Schulze of Selective Structures was interviewed by Neil Bell on the Bell Board Podcast.  We’ll run excepts from the interview this week.  Today Matt talks about the importance of building your signs digital ready

You’ve made the point to me many times: even if a sign is going to be static, why should operators build it digital-ready from the start?

I spoke at the OAAA back around 2009, right when digitals were taking off — maybe 2006 or 2007 — and I begged the industry to only build digital ready. The only time I ever saw it be truly inefficient was a full-flag 60-foot V cantilever sign around 2007 that would have cost $40,000 to convert. That’s the only case where I said, ‘Make sure you’re going digital before you build.’ But for most signs, it’s not that much more.

Wind load requirements are so much higher now than they used to be. The only time you see a significant cost difference is on a full cantilever, where you have to upsize the column, foundation, uprights, and torsion bar for the extra weight. We build every sign digital-ready on both faces — not just one — because who knows who’ll own that sign in 30 years? They’ll just set the panels on and go.

And here’s something not everybody thinks about: when you go to sell your company, it matters if your signs are digital-ready. The less money the buyer has to spend, the better chance you have of getting your asking price. Buyers care about things advertisers don’t.