5 Easy Ways to Market Church Events
5 Easy Ways to Market Church Events:
1- Make a Banner: Banners are inexpensive ways to promote an event at your church. I make lots of banners for 
area churches of all denominations and many times I will donate my time to install them if they are reasonably close to my shop in Staunton, Virginia. I make simple banners in my shop using pre-cut and hemmed rolled one-sided banner stock material, a white 13 oz. material that has a glossy sheen. I design the banner layouts on my computer design software and use a vinyl-cutting machine to cut the graphics that I later apply to the blank, white banner. The banners come with pre-spaced grommets that allow for hanging on poles with hooks or attaching to walls and other flat surfaces with screws and fender washers. For more detailed banners or ones with more than one or two colors, I send them off for digital printing. In my small shop, banners may take longer 
to complete than some of the other shops in my area. If people are in a big hurry, I usually suggest they contact “All Phase Graphics” in Staunton, or “Viking Forge Design” in Waynesboro. Both these shops have in-house digital printers and may produce banners faster than what I can do. If you plan ahead, it takes about 1-2 weeks to get a banner order out during normal production levels at my shop.
2- Use a Marquee Sign: I often sell church signs that have a marquee sign component. A manual marquee is a sign that has tracks for changeable letters and churches can create and display custom messages advertising upcoming events to the public. The proper letter heights for your site can be calculated by considering 
viewing distance and speed limit. Most letters are in the 3″-8″ range for the church marquees I have made, and the letters are typically black on a white background. A church situated on a high-traffic highway may be more inclined to invest in an electronic marquee which has many advantages over the manual marquee signs that I can produce in my shop. I recommend churches interested in electronic signs contact “Holiday Signs” in Chester, VA.
3- Use Memorial Bricks to Fund a Comprehensive Marketing Campaign: I sold a sign to a Baptist church a few years ago by recommending they conduct a fundraising campaign first by selling memorial bricks. These are engraved bricks that can honor living or deceased church members and friends and are set in a foundation at the base of the church sign, or anywhere on the church campus where people can appreciate the memorialized members.
The church raised enough money to purchase a new sign and they had a friend lay the brick at its base. Money raised this way could also be used for a comprehensive marketing campaign for a church event or events.
4- Make a Yard Sign: Churches can use the yard-type signs used by realtors and contractors to post information about upcoming events. These signs are generally smaller than banners, so they would be most effective for churches in residential areas versus those on main highways. I would suggest investing in a metal sign with a metal frame and utilize rider panels to gain more space for the message. If you’re on a tight budget, you can also use corrugated plastic material for the signs and these can be installed in the ground using inexpensive wire stakes. But remember this important rule: you get what you pay for!
5- Use a “Burma Shave” Series of Signs: If you have enough road space, you might consider designing a message that you can write over a series of yard signs. This type of set-up is always more effective in grabbing attention to your event!
Contact Mark Hackley, Augusta Sign Company, 540-943-9818
Applying Gold Leaf to Carved Signs
presented my proposal, she elected to go for the gold! Gold leaf is an ancient art form. “The Temple of Solomon was profusely gilt,” says Homer in his early writings. Gold leaf was widely used in old Roman art, architecture, furniture, and carved lettering. Gold leaf is actual gold that is beaten down to a fine sheet and applied to surfaces with “size”, a special type of “glue” that the thin metal sheets stick to. To make the sign for the horse farm, I first ordered the cedar panel and had the letters and borders CNC-routed from my customer-approved design. Once the letters and borders were carved, I sanded them with fine-grit sandpaper to smooth out any course grain in the lettering. Once sanded, I cleaned and primed the entire two-sided sign with a quality oil-based primer that seals the wood and provides an adequate base for the finish coat, which in this case was a brush-painted Hunter Green sign enamel. It helps to tint your primer to the shade of your finish coat, so I added some black tint to make a gray primer coat. I use the 2-2-2 method in my finishing of wood signs: 2 coats primer, 2 coats background finish, and 2 coats for the graphics, which for this project meant two passes of gilding to catch any missed areas and pinholes.
Once the gold was applied and cured for several days, I burnished it with a cotton ball and completely waxed the entire sign using Nu-Finish synthetic auto wax, available in most auto parts stores. The post was constructed from a 6″ X 6″ X 13′ long Southern Yellow Pine column with a beefed-up area at the bottom of the post, suggested by my customer’s architect. The sign post was colored black to match the black iron scroll bracket, which was a stock item from my supplier. I used stainless steel eye-bolts and quick links to attach the sign to the bracket. The sign was planted in a 3 foot deep hole and surrounded with fast set concrete.
STAUNTON, VIRGINIA Mark Hackley, owner of Augusta Sign Company formerly of Waynesboro, Virginia has moved his sign shop to Augusta County, Virginia, near Staunton. So 
signage with his colleague Allen Gray around 1983. He then formed Kullman Signs with a friend, also on a part-time basis, around 1985. By 1987 Mark had formed Western Signs and Graphics and took out his first newspaper ad in the Laurel Leader. By 1988, Mark was married and he moved his business, still called Western Signs and Graphics, to Waynesboro, Virginia. He worked from home on a part time basis while working for Keeney and Company Architects of Charlottesville for about a year but before long, Mark began renting space above the former Doll Hospital on Wayne Avenue in Waynesboro later in 1988.
where he remained for one full year. The business began to grow and Mark soon expanded to a larger facility in Crimora, Virginia, where he rented industrial space from Gary and Linda Scrogham of Scrogham Enterprises.
most sign buyers!