A lot of display graphics, be they indoor or outdoor, are designed to be ephemeral. They go up for a set period of time, such as during a holiday or other festive season, and then they’re taken down. Sometimes, though, a display is so well-received and liked that a client asks to keep them up longer than they intended.

Such was the case with a series of outdoor displays that Image360 Fairfax (Va.) created for the Mosaic District, a large high-end mixed-use community in Fairfax. It’s a combination of residential units, retail locations, and a movie theater. Their marquee building has a large, glass atrium and in May of last year, to celebrate LGBTQ+ Pride Month, they asked Image360 Fairfax to create some graphics with a Pride theme. “We got the request on a Friday afternoon,” said Bob O’Hern, President of Image360 Fairfax. “Monday morning, we started on the designs. I’d gone out and got measurements of all the glass, we got to designing it, worked with the client on approval, and by close of business that Friday, everything was installed.” The property owner is one of O’Hern’s biggest clients. “I do a lot of signage for them, but was natural for them to come to us.”

The project included a variety of die-cut Pride-related graphics printed using an HP Latex 360 on Avery Dennison 3620 removable window graphics. It spanned at least a hundred linear feet on one front and about 25 feet on another. “They left the graphics up for far longer than Pride month,” said O’Hern. “They were up through the summer and in September they came down.” Ultimately, the Mosaic District left the graphics up longer than they had intended simply because their visitors liked them so much. “Several of my clients who knew that I worked on it contacted us and let us know how attractive they felt that it was and how it really added to the environment in that space,” added O’Hern.

One of the keys, it turns out—and here’s a pro tip for outdoor display designers—was that the graphics were highly Instagrammable. “They were good backdrops for selfies, which is part of the concept of what we wanted,” said O’Hern. “We wanted to make it so that visitors to the property could engage with it, interact with it, and share their experiences.”

Design-for-selfie has become a top consideration for O’Hern and his team when developing these kinds of graphics. “You want to space things out with an appropriate backdrop, you need to think of the sight lines and the lighting—is this an area with good sunlight? Is it an area with good street lights? What’s going to be in the background if it’s not a solid wall? So we have to have to consider all of that,” he said.

Image360 Fairfax is one of the older locations in the franchise, having been founded more than 20 years ago. O’Hern came aboard six years ago, having been a long-time veteran of retail and manufacturing industries. He had been with Ritz Camera for 20 years and a local blind and window shutter manufacturer and retailer for two years. Image360 seemed to him to be a good fit based on his background. “I was looking to run my own business and it’s a mix of my past experiences,” he said. “It’s working directly with customers and it’s a blend of manufacturing, installation, and sales. Since I’ve had the shop, I’ve more than doubled sales in seven years.”

Image360 Fairfax specializes in everything from lobby signs for healthcare providers and other office and business clients, to window graphics, wall graphics, and installed signage. “Some of our larger clients are property management companies, so we do signs for large properties, as well as for a number of their tenants that are referred to us who need various kinds of signage.”

It was this mix of clients that helped Image360 get through the pandemic year. “We actually increased our sales about 13%,” he said. “We were printing floor decals, masks, and required signage. Then, towards the end of 2020, we reprinted a lot of those when all the guidance changed. We also did a lot of the acrylic sneeze guards for clients. And there was enough regular business that we retained.”

Another factor that has helped with Image360 Fairfax’s success is that Fairfax and its environs is a high-growth area. “Businesses are moving into the Northern Virginia market,” said O’Hern. “Even in bad downturns, there’s tremendous growth going on here.” Clients are also doing major rebrands—projects that often involve lots of signage—and clients are also opening new offices and retail ventures. “In this market, people have continued to grow and expand and that’s helped me continue to grow the business,” he added.

One thing O’Hern has seen post-pandemic is fewer interior office display graphics, as a number of his clients have not fully returned their workforce to the office. “We’re doing far fewer signs for workstations or cubes,” he said.

He has also upgraded his printing equipment to open up new opportunities. The recent purchase of an HP Latex 700W now allows Image360 Fairfax to print white ink—an ability that may sound like a minor thing but really opens up new opportunities. “We’ve only had it for two months and we’re already starting to expand our capabilities,” said O’Hern. “We’ve already used it on several projects that we wouldn’t have been able to do before or we would’ve had to have done in a different or more time-consuming way.”

O’Hern has also found that interactive, personal service has become a competitive advantage. “Clients are getting more sophisticated with the ability to get a number of the signs that we make over the Internet, so it’s really honed our ability to provide customer service and be a partner,” said O’Hern. “We don’t just want to be a commodity provider. We want to help clients with solutions to their needs and help their visual graphics really stand out from their competitors and be a good reflection of the company.”