Issue link: https://nbm.uberflip.com/i/1482193
G R A P H I C S - P R O. C O M N O V E M B E R 2 0 2 2 • G R A P H I C S P R O 8 1 I'm sure in many other cities, engraved plates are required. e school of thought is that if a label is painted you lose the information and safety it provides, while an engraved plate can still be read even if it's painted over. BULK One of the great things about offering a product like these solar tags is that we can produce many of the tags in bulk to meet the needs of multiple contractors. So, while we may get an order for 50 of a particular plate, we'll go ahead and fill a sheet, storing the extra for the next order or having them ready for an inevitable rush job. ey're also typically produced on red/white, white/black, or yellow/black engraving stock so we can purchase the sheet stock in bulk, saving costs while eliminating extra inventory that comes with personalized items. Even when a tag needs to be custom- ized for a particular job site, there's still a general layout that we can build upon. We keep this template on file and then change out the specifics quickly. Map plates are customized tags for each job. ey show where the shutoffs and spe- cific equipment are located on each unique project. We either get a PDF from our cus- tomer showing the map specifics, or we get the whole plan set and have to extract what we need. Since it's something we do frequently, we're able to offer a custom product at a reasonable price. EFFICIENCY We've also picked up a few tricks over the years to streamline the process. Different counties and cities have specific ordinances regarding how the engraved plates are attached. Some require the plates to be epoxied on, but most of our contractors prefer double-sided tape. We use a thin, strong tape that we get from Bron Tape. We realized how time-consuming it was to apply double-sided tape after they were engraved and cut apart, so we started taping long lengths of the plates before cutting them apart, but this wasn't the most efficient process either. So, now