Category Archives: Vehicle wrap printing

Design Your Own Vinyl Graphics Online With Custom Car Wraps!

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Design Your Own Vinyl Graphics and Vinyl Decals Online In Minutes!

Ready to design your own vinyl graphics online? You can use Custom Car Wraps online vinyl graphics design tool to create your own vinyl decals. Add any photos, pictures, text, or logos on a vinyl decal and we’ll print it and ship it right to you! It’s that easy. You can also add backgrounds, colors, and monograms to your decal. Get a great look on your car or truck, advertise your small business, or go full on vehicle marketing with our fleet graphics. You’ll be amazed at how easy it is to design your own vinyl graphic online with Custom Car Wraps!

What Are The Advantages of Vinyl Graphics?

Vinyl graphics are the essential cornerstone to vehicle advertising and vehicle marketing. Able to withstand the rigors of the road but also able to maintain a colorful print over multiple years vinyl is the #1 choice for vehicle graphics. Most full vehicle wraps are made out of vinyl and typically vehicle graphics of smaller sizes are as well. Any covering over a vehicle’s natural paint job and body helps with wear and tear on the road, many fleets and delivery businesses will use vinyl graphics in place of custom painting or lettering because of the additional protective layer. The proven application and installation methods of vinyl graphics through associations like the PDAA help add a legitimacy to the vinyl graphics process.

Who Typically Uses Vinyl Graphics?

Because custom vinyl prints can vary in size and the complexity the number of businesses, organizations, and individuals that use vinyl graphics is actually enormous. Even some bumper stickers are considered vinyl graphics! Most vinyl graphics larger than small size decals are used as ads or as a promotional tactic. This can range from florists advertising on their local fleet to a campaign on city buses for a new release or event to a standardized set of graphics for a national or international fleet. The low price point and durability makes any graphic printed on vinyl a natural choice. Its not uncommon to see a fully vinyl wrapped exotic vehicle promoting entertainment events; wraps are just one type of vinyl graphics.

How Can I Design The Best Custom Vinyl Graphics?

No matter what type of vehicle advertising you are designing you should follow the same general guidelines: use high quality images and keep it simple. Designs with strong centralized logos or images and a clear readable text work best. Imagine some of your favorite vinyl graphics and you’ll quickly realize how easy it is to hit on the perfect design for your or your brand. Some local businesses also use wraps as a head turner with stylized or patterned backgrounds instead of a single color or relying on the vehicle’s natural paint color. If you plan on using any background images, or any logos or photos, make sure they highest quality version of the images that you have available!

Its Time to Design Your Own Vinyl Graphics!

Go give our customizer a try and see how easy it is to design your own vinyl graphics online for free. If you have any questions or want us to take a look at your design feel free to contact us! If you are looking for fleet graphics and fleet wraps then check out our fleet program to get more information. If you want to see our custom vinyl graphics click here!

New Feature Release: Design Your Own Boat Wrap!

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Design Your Own Custom Boat Wrap:  We Just Released the Boat Wrap!

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Wrapping your boat is becoming more and more popular these days. In fact, boats were our #1 most request vehicle to add! When you buy a boat, you as a customer are spending a lot of money on that boat, plus you have to figure everything else that comes along with buying a boat: a truck to haul it with, a trailer to haul it on, and a place to keep it.  Even if you plan on keeping your brand new boat at the marina, it still isn’t cheap. After spending all that money, do you don’t want your boat to look like all the rest? No way!  Every boat has a unique name, but the ones that stand out from the rest have a unique custom design.   A great way to make a great boat into an awesome boat is with custom boat graphics and a boat wrap is the only practical and cost effective way to do it.  Even the largest vinyl boat wraps are more affordable than you think.

How Do You Get Your Boat Wrapped?

Boat_Wrap 7 Custom Boat Wrap Design Concept[/caption]The process of creating custom boat graphics and getting a vinyl boat wrap is really easier than you might imagine. The first step is to create a quick mockup with our boat wrap customizer, and follow our four (4) step design process. Once you have your concept boat wrap design made, just search your area and pick from a list of available local wrap shops to request quotes from.  If you have a business and wish to do a little advertising while out on the water then your business logo and name can easily be designed to fit your boat. If you want to add colors or images, just convey your thoughts to create the custom boat graphic you desire – the possibilities are endless! Your local wrap shop will be happy to assist you with the enhancements to the design and to create the professional look that you really want.  Any ship of any size can be wrapped, from a dinghy to a cruise ship, and generally the cost goes up with the square footage.

Design Boat Wraps with Cool Effects in Minutes

Design Wraps with Cool Effects in Minutes

Once you and your wrap shop have finalized the design, the wrap is then printed and installed within days. Very often, you don’t even have to take your vessel in for this service if it’s not convenient, this process can be done wherever the boat is. Why waste money on having professional artists or painters come in and try to accomplish a job that will take them days, weeks, or even months? You can have the design of your choosing created, printed and installed within a day with only a portion of the cost. If your boat already has existing detailing, a custom design graphic can be put on over almost anything without the hassle of removing the existing one.

Choose the Wrap Shop from the Available List

Upon finishing the design on custom-car-wraps.com, choose as many local wrap shops as you want and let them advise you with their expertise and give you more ideas for your boat wrap. Whether you want to promote an event such as a fishing tournament or a wake-boarding competition or simply (like myself) want to get rid of the fading color on the sides of the boat from sun and salt, a vinyl wrap professionally installed will do the job and will be a smart investment that will last for years.

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Example Custom Boat Wrap for Wake Board Boat

 

Why Wrap a Vehicle; Why not Paint it

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Why Wrap a Vehicle; Why not Paint it

It is common practice for our customers to request quotes for the price of wrapping a vehicle from local wrap shops.  What is unusual is that when the quotes come in, the customer reacts something like , ‘Maaco  was only a few hundred dollars for a paint job’ or ‘That’s a lot less than painting!’  So we became curious, why do some of our customer think a vehicle wrap pricing is reasonable, while others scream bloody murder over the cost compared to painting?  We found the simple answer to be that painting varies just as the quality of a wrapped vehicle varies.

We are no expert on vehicle painting but it is our understanding a vehicle should be sanded, painted and primed before it is actually painted.  Just like other processes, the quality of the paint can make a huge difference.  The vehicle is usually out of commission for two weeks.  That being said, we have recently learned you can skip the first steps and go right to the painting to decrease the cost.  So, a $500 Maaco paint job can seem like a great deal, but not include all the extras and look awful in a few years when it needs to be redone. And, how are you going to paint your logo and artwork?

If you have been considering a vehicle wrap in lieu of a paint job, consider why you might choose a wrap.  A car wrap is removable.  Wrapping a vehicle means you can include various visual tricks you can’t achieve with paint. This might mean logo vehicle branding or digital logo images.  Wraps last about 5-7 years and are completed in just two days.  The box truck wrap can go over rivets, too.  Wrapping, once removed, does not lower the value of your car. So go ahead and design that wrap on custom-car-wraps and get the quotes from your local wrap shops.

Full van wrap

SEMA Vehicle Wrap News

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SEMA Vehicle Wrap News from Las Vegas

SEMA is the world’s largest automotive specialty-equipment trade show. The automotive industry comes to SEMA to see new trends and the most tricked-out cars on earth.  Various initiatives in the vehicle wrap were announced and some major companies in the car, truck and overall vehicle wrap industries showed off some of awesome samples of unique wrap applications.

Avery Dennison, Epson and SkinzWraps

Avery Dennison, Epson and SkinzWraps teamed up to wrap a million-dollar Bugatti Veyron, the world’s fastest street-legal car, in a look as powerful as the car itself. The first-ever wrap of a Veyron was presented it at the Epson booth at SEMA in Las Vegas last month. The car and the wrap attracted a lot of attention at one of the largest conventions in the United States.

The Super Sport Veyron was wrapped with Avery Dennison’s best-in-class vehicle wrap material, MPI 1005 Supercast Easy Apply RS, which was printed on an Epson Stylus Pro GS6000 printer. SkinzWraps designed the graphics and installed the material on the car.

Many car enthusiasts, restylers and customizers are using digital graphics and wraps to reflect their individual style. The beauty of a car wrap is that, if the customer gets tired of the wrap or graphic design, it can easily be removed and the paint on the car will look the same as the day the wrap was installed.

“Wrapping the Veyron, with its complex curves, showcases the conformability and printability of our newest product for vehicle wraps, Avery MPI 1005 Supercast Easy Apply RS,” said Todd Hain, Marketing Communications Manager for the Avery Dennison Graphics & Reflective Products Division.

The Bugatti Wrapped at SEMA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Velvet Car Wraps

Velvet Cars / Floc1, Inc. announced the availability of velvet car wraps. They teamed up with the guys at Wrap Experts at the Sema show with a velvet wrapped Fisker Karma. They were awarded the 2012 SEMA Global Media Awards Winner for the innovative application of this unique wrap products. Actually, according to Robby from Wrap Experts, “we are so honored to have been recognized with 4 SEMA international media awards”

According to Frank Fuzzy, President of Velvet-Cars, the velvet wrap is designed to attract the eye and protect your vehicle. Velvet Elite Wrap 9100 brings a totally new visual and tactile experience to the automotive industry. It is your escape from boring, conventional standard paint or very expensive custom paints. Your vehicle becomes an emotional factor… it is beautiful, unique and suddenly so different to drive. Our new product offers one of the nicest customization options possible in the world. Our films are removable, they do not damage your vehicle, and, on the contrary, they were designed to protect its exterior.

Velvet Wrapped Fisker Karma

 

 

 

 

Design a Car Wrap On Line

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Go on line and design your car wrap!

Advertising through time has become more innovative. Technology has made ads more available to many people with the use of TV ads, radio, and the internet. All these methods produce positive results but they often cost more and can be quite heavy to small businesses. Vehicle wraps however is a unique way of promoting your products by using vehicles as mobile billboards. It is quite easy, custom-car-wraps.com lets you design a car wrap on line, make a choice out of a bunch of wrap shops in your area, have it printed and laminated on any type of car. This method is becoming more popular these days because it is less expensive than any other forms of advertising.

The design of your mobile billboard should be attractive in order to be noticed by people. Through the design your car wrap on line with custom-car-wraps.com you have to determine what type of vehicle you would want to use so you can create a design that would fit the shape of the car, truck or trailer. The design can either be fully covered or partial depending on your preference. Choose from a list of wrap shops in your area and ask for bids based on what you have designed. Once you have the best bid, ask the wrap shop to assign it over to an artist so it can be enhanced graphically and per the contours of your exact vehicle. During your design of the car wrap on-line, make sure to use bold and brilliant colors so you will stand out among many vehicles moving around. Use simple fonts as much as possible so your logo can easily be understood even with a slight glance. Remember that the vehicle will be moving most of the time so make sure it is clear, attractive and luminous so it can also be seen at night.

 

New Paint Job? Replace your Color with a Wrap

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Vinyl Wrap instead of Paint

A brand-new Porsche Cayman is being turned from classic silver to bright green with a matte black hood . Just steps away, a 1972 Chevy Impala convertible is being covered in mirror-like chrome. There’s no paint involved, the cars are being wrapped in big sheets of vinyl. And on the wall above where the wrapping is being done is a sign that says this: “Paint is dead.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Commercial vehicles wrapped in vinyl to become rolling billboards are fairly common these days. But this year has seen a boom in private cars getting wrapped in vinyl. No splashy logos, often no graphics at all. Just color and special effects such as carbon, matte black or anything that makes the car stand out. A BMW is wrapped in matte orange, an Audi wrapped in a gray metallic vinyl, expensive cars are not being re-painted but wrapped. “The finish is flawless,” said Smith, an expert at a local wrap shop. “You don’t have to worry about the paint running, about it being wet-sanded badly.” Like most others that are in the wrapping vehicles, the bulk of their work is wrapping commercial vehicles, turning them into moving billboards. But more and more, wrap shops are wrapping private vehicles in vinyl. Sometimes it’s for a look you can’t get with paint — consider a chrome Mercedes or a Saab covered with white alligator vinyl. Other times, it’s to preserve the original paint’s integrity; “You can’t take a Ferrari off the lot and paint it green,” said one installer, you’ll knock a lot of dollars off its value.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anything is Possible!

The owner of the Porsche wanted a green one, Smith said, but that would take close to a year to get. So he bought a silver one and is having it wrapped in green. The key is that the silver paint is still intact, underneath. 3M, one of the largest makers of vinyl wrap, guarantees that it won’t leave any glue or residue during the first five years.  After that,” Smith said, “it starts to get a bit permanent.” The price is dependent on the square feet being covered, but vehicles are in the $3,000 range. That’s more than some paint jobs, less than others.

“We haven’t scratched the surface,” Smith said, using a questionable phrase for someone in his business. “We can do refrigerators, boats, bikes, jet skis …”. He actually put one on a refrigerator — his own. Smith covered his refrigerator with a black matte finish because his wife was tired of the kids’ fingerprints on the shiny surface. “Within three to five years,” Smith said, “wrapping a car will roll off everyone’s tongue as often as painting.”

Soni had a couple of reasons to have his leased BMW 135i covered with matte orange. He owns The Party Shop and when he opens up a few temporary Halloween stores this fall, he’ll have the phone numbers put on his rolling pumpkin.

 

 

 

5 Reasons to Wrap your Vehicle Instead of Painting

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Earlier this year, TKO Graphix wrapped a Toyota Hybrid for Indy School on Wheels. The vehicle was a raffle prize, which was driven to events and publicly displayed for several months. There was ample opportunity for the finish to be damaged, but when the winner took possession of the vehicle, they had a brand new bright and shiny prize. When the wrap — promoting School on Wheels — was removed, the vehicle’s unblemished finish remained intact.

Why Wrap, not Paint?

Cost – If we eliminate discount paint jobs, which often reduce pricing by eliminating proper preparation, wraps or decals may be more cost effective. In this HowMuchDoes.com article, painting a car may range from under $1000 to $8000. Decaling or wrapping a car can run $500 to $3000+.

Resale Value – Protecting the manufacturer’s original finish maintains the resale value of the vehicle, and the saleability of basic colors is much higher than exotic colors. Do you love bright chrome yellow? Does your company use pink vehicles? Vivid colors may limit potential buyers in the resale market. Buy a white vehicle, wrap it to your heart’s desire, and have a white vehicle, again, when it’s time to resell. As Listverse explains—

“Ever drive’ down the road and notice most of the cars you see are colored in four colors (mostly black, white, silver, or gray)? Part of the reason why is resale value — people who want to resell their car later know they are far more likely to find a buyer if the car is one of these common colors.”

Options — Tired of the bright chrome yellow? Remove the wrap and re-wrap it. Let’s try a matte black finish, or maybe camouflage?

Time — Especially if you have a complicated multi-vector design — a wrap can be done in days; paint may take much longer.

Coverage — Using paint limits vehicle advertising to the painted surfaces. By incorporating window film in a wrap, the entire surface of the vehicle may be used for promotion.

Vehicle graphics don’t replace the need for paint, and aren’t always the best option. However, vehicle graphics should be considered. Research the options and make the best decision based on use and needs. Before painting a vehicle, compare vehicle graphics to painting – you may be pleasantly surprised. We’d be happy to share ideas.

What are the best vehicles to wrap?

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The good news is that whatever kind of vehicle you wrap, it’s going to stand out. Period. Whether you’re in a Honda Civic or a custom Lotus, if it’s wrapped, you’ll definitely get extra attention. The best vehicle for you will depend on the needs of your individual business. Still, we love sharing our knowledge, so we broke down some of our favorite kinds of vehicles into a few categories to keep in mind when you’re shopping for your next wrap…..

Wild and weird

Chevy HHR, Toyota Scion, Honda Element. There’s definitely been a trend in square vehicles in recent years. Whether you love the angular look or you’re not a fan of the boxy shapes, you can’t deny that the unusual shapes of these cars stand out . Everyone has an opinion! In addition to being a little unusual, the broad sides of these vehicles give them a somewhat unique place in the world of vehicle wraps. You gain the fuel efficiency and maneuverability of a smaller car, but the broad canvas size of a mobile billboard! Definitely a win-win situation. Because they tend to have less curves than other vehicles, it becomes very easy to use the wide spaces for big, colorful graphics.

Curvy and Cute

Mini, VW Bug, PT Cruiser and of course the Fiat 500 and Smart Car. These rounded vehicles may be a little trickier when it comes to the wrap installation, but they pack a powerful marketing punch when they hit the road. Turning one of these cute cars into a vehicle wrap is a great way to harness their already potent attention grabbing powers. These are cars that either stand out for their coolness or because of some game associated with them. For example, remember all of those backseat games of “punch bug” (or according to my little cousin, its newer incarnation “PT cruiser bruiser”)? These car wraps look especially great when they’re wrapped in a full pattern. “Punch bug yellow!” how boring; try “punch bug leopard print!”

Big, Bold and Brawny

Sprinter vans, Ford F250, Hummers. Enough fooling around with those silly little vehicles, you’re in the market for something BIG. Sure trucks and vans are fairly common, but when you wrap an automotive giant like a truck with a full size crew cabin or an enormous Sprinter van your sheer size will definitely get you noticed. These vehicles offer the most space for larger than life graphics for your vehicle advertisement. One enterprising client told us that he’s planning on having his truck lifted to make it stand out even more!

 

 


Vehicle Wrap Care Instructions

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To maintain the appearance and increase the longevity of your wrap, the following is recommended:

Regular hand washing, avoiding abrasive chemicals with strong solvents

  • Avoid brushes, as they can dull the finish of the laminate and can cause scratching
  • Rinse off any residue thoroughly with clean water
  • Allow vehicle to air dry or use a microfiber cloth to dry

Pressure washing can be used when hand washing is not an option

  • Avoid excessive pressure that can cause damage to the graphics
  • Do not direct the spray at a sharp angle to the graphics
  • Avoid spraying directly at wrap seams
  • Trim back all lifted edges, and seal with an edge sealer or replace the section of the graphics if necessary
  • Water pressure – maximum 800psi to 2,000 psi
  • Water temperature – maximum 72 to 180 degrees
  • Spray nozzle spray pattern of 40 degrees
  • Minimum distance of nozzle to the graphics – 12 to 18 inches
  • Spray angle – 45 degrees, sweeping spray
  • Never use a Turbo pressure nozzle

Avoid Carmauba-based waxes, which are popular for vehicles without graphics because they can be buffed to a high shine. The buffing process needs to be rigorous and can cause damage to the graphics. Teflon or silicone-based polish used should be specifically designed for use on vehicle wraps. Most vinyl manufacturers recommend not using any waxes or polishes on matte, textured or other unique finishes and it is important to remove any residue (gunk) as soon as possible to avoid staining and other damage. Any cleaner used should be tested in an inconspicuous place first

For a gas spill be sure to wash off the residue quickly with soapy water; an isopropyl alcohol wipe down followed by a cleaning with a citrus-based cleaner will help remove oil, tar or asphalt that may build up to the graphics. Follow any chemical cleanings with a regular washing with water and a mild cleaner. Rinse with clean water and dry with a lint-free or microfiber cloth.  In short; KEEP IT CLEAN!