A Special Advertising Supplement to Shopping Center World

Federal Sign employed the use of color and 3-D imagery to create an AT&T sign that literally stands out.

Local markets reign...

For much of the century, Federal Sign evolved into one of the nation's leading sign fabricators - with the ability to manage national projects and respond to changing market demands. The company, notes Ruchin, spread out its dominance across the country as an executor of the smallest and biggest of projects.

"We've been in a lot of major cities around the country for 30, 40 or even 60 years in some cases," he says, explaining that the company often placed yellow-page ads for its services in those local areas. "Places like Dallas and Houston and other major cities. In a lot of those markets, Federal Sign was the main local sign company, selling everything from the national project to 'Joe The Barber' walking in and wanting a sign."

Part of the problem with a geographically focused business, says Ruchin, is that each local office acted as its own profit center rather than as an arm of the larger organization. "My first position for the company was as the district manager for the Pacific Northwest," he recalls. "And although we were part of the company's region, we were still focused on our own P&L. As far as national business, some of our offices had national accounts. But we were everyone's favorite sign company in the communities where we operated."

"That framework has changed dramatically over the past three to four years," he continues. "We departed from our geographical focus, eliminated our local and regional offices, and became one company - focused on our customers and on very specific kinds of businesses"

"What used to be a heavy concentration of custom-sign salespeople is now a much smaller number, with a much bigger professional staff of account management teams," says Stotmeister.

"The teams are charged with fulfilling the needs of multi-location retailer customers. This alignment takes Federal Sign out of salesmanship and more into professional program management, and we've organized ourselves accordingly".

Ruchin adds that, while the shift in business practice and philosophy affected the product, it also had reverberations on the pool of Federal Sign talent. "We not only got away from the one-of business, but our salesforce became more focused," he says. "We are not just one-person-deep now, but several-deep in the accounts we manage. And we are now able to give the extra attention and reporting to make us unique. When we went to our customers and saw the trends going on in retail, this (new alignment) was really a match."

"This alignment takes Federal Sign out of salesmanship and more into professional program management, and we're organizing ourselves accordingly."

Kevin Stotmeister

president

Federal Sign

...Until retailers multiply

With the emergence of shopping centers as one of the nation's favorite leisure activities, a force of nationally based retailers was not far behind. Ruchin notes that a retailer with multiple locations has very specific and far-reaching needs.

"Interfacing with a multi-location retailer is a relationship that literally happens on a daily basis," he says. "It's almost like being in the same company with different business cards. For example, Payless ShoeSource has a Federal team assigned to them that consists of sales, design, engineering and project managers who literally live the account every day."