ASI Raleigh
Case Study
How ASI Raleigh used SignAgent to drive business growth and increase profitability
THE CLIENT
ASI Raleigh
ASI Raleigh — the largest of 20 ASI locations across the United States — is a full-service operation that supports the planning, engineering, and implementation of signage projects for North Carolina's leading brands.
ASI Raleigh's 45,000-square-foot manufacturing facility can accommodate any size interior or exterior project. The company offers design-build services in a wide range of sectors, including multifamily, corporate, senior living, healthcare, and retail.
THE CHALLENGE
Learn how this project became the impetus for major revenue growth.
In early 2022, Christine Sorrell, Creative Director at ASI Raleigh, was facing a complicated project — The Broadview — a luxury student housing complex in the heart of midtown Nashville. This extensive project spanned 11 storeys and contained more than 1,000 interior and exterior signs.
The project's scope involved designing, fabricating, and installing a cohesive signage package that aligned with The Broadview's brand, integrating seamlessly into the property's aesthetic and functional spaces.
Designing and planning a project of this scope using traditional methods — a spreadsheet cross-referenced with PDF location plans — is challenging. Getting client approvals can also be difficult, taking weeks to review, with results that often contain multiple errors that result in wasted time and materials. Christine and the ASI Raleigh team needed a better process.
THE SOLUTION
ASI Raleigh had some earlier experience with SignAgent: a previous designer had used SignAgent to partially position signs on location plans, but didn't include any images or designs. Christine saw the potential to program sign designs, messaging, and locations into SignAgent in order to take control of this complicated project. She was also interested in using SignAgent's view-only capability in order to improve collaboration with her client.
THE RESULTS
Faster delivery and a better client experience
The Broadview was one of the first projects that Christine designed and planned using SignAgent. She jumped in with both feet. With no programming experience, and the occasional assistance of SignAgent's customer success team, she was quickly on a path to realizing SignAgent's full potential to improve workflow efficiency and accuracy.
Even considering the need to learn to use the platform, using SignAgent to manage sign designs, messages, and locations led to immediate efficiency improvements and reduced frustration.
Christine said, "It would have taken me and an entire team of designers hundreds of hours to program this project. At the time, I was the only design-build designer on our team. Using SignAgent, I was able to complete the design and planning in under 70 hours!"
Christine also estimated that SignAgent's client review feature saved them a substantial amount of time. The Broadview's team was invited into the SignAgent project as read-only viewers, allowing them to instantly visualize and review each sign in the package.
The client loved that they could work their way through the sign list and location plan, using the hover/preview feature to "tour" through the floor plans and review the sign designs, content, and locations. The client review was completed in under two weeks.
According to Christine, they raved about the process. Not only did the client provide fast, accurate feedback, ASI was also able to implement the required changes in just a few hours; the old method would have taken more than 100.
THE BOTTOM LINE
Using SignAgent has facilitated significant business growth for ASI Raleigh. Before SignAgent, as the location's sole design-build facilitator, Christine was able to complete three to four projects a year with a total yearly revenue of $300,000.
Today, as the creative director of a newly established three-person department, Christine and her team complete more than two dozen significant design-build projects a year totalling over $1.5 million in annual revenue: A 500% increase!
SignAgent has become a full-circle project tool for ASI Raleigh, covering everything from take-offs to installation and improving both internal and external collaboration. Project failures have decreased by at least 10%. In 2023, the company's installers began using tablets to complete their field work using the SignAgent Mobile App.
“With SignAgent, we improved our operational efficiency and our customer experience,
but more importantly, we were able to establish a new design department that now generates significantly more revenue by taking on eight times the number of projects.”
Christine Sorrell
Creative Director
ASI Raleigh
