Sandwich Board Signs: Where to Put Them and What to Say

What Is a Sandwich Board Sign?

A sandwich board is a two panel, A shaped sign that stands on the ground and shows a message on both sides. The two panels lean against each other like a sandwich, which is where the name came from, and the same sign is sold as an A-frame or a sidewalk sign.

The Signicade frames are hollow plastic rather than folded metal, which keeps them light enough for a staff member to set out each morning and rigid enough to stand in a breeze. A Standard Signicade is 46 inches high, 25 inches wide and 3 inches deep folded, at about 19 pounds.

Two things are worth knowing before you shop. The graphic is smaller than the frame, always, so the numbers on the box are not the numbers on the artboard. And the graphic attaches in one of two ways, either bonded to the frame face as adhesive vinyl or dropped into a channel as a coroplast insert, which is the decision that most affects how you will live with the sign.

Which A-Frame Should You Buy?

Buy an adhesive vinyl frame when the message will sit for a year, and a drop-in insert frame when it changes with the season or the week. That single question separates the three frames we stock more cleanly than price does.

The Deluxe frame comes in white or black, and black is the one to pick if the storefront is dark or the graphic has a lot of white in it. The SimpoSign II is the lightweight option: easier to carry out, and worth pairing with ballast if the spot is exposed.

Those are the three panel sizes we stock, 24 x 36 and 22 x 28. We do not stock 24 x 24 or 18 x 24 frames, so if you already own one, order the panel on its own as an any-size coroplast sign, which prices by the square foot and cuts to the size you give us.

What Should a Sandwich Board Say?

One message per face, in letters at least 3 inches tall. A sidewalk sign is read at walking speed by someone who has not decided to read it yet, so it works like a billboard, not like a menu.

Four rules do most of the work.

One offer, not a list. "Brunch until 2, pancakes 8 dollars" beats every item on the menu, because a list at walking speed is a blur. If two things matter, put one on each face.

High contrast. White on black, yellow on black or dark type on a light photo all survive glare, shade and the low sun at the end of the day. Mid tone on mid tone does not.

A reason to turn in now. Today, tonight, this weekend, while they last. A permanent statement of what you sell is what your storefront sign is for.

Room around the words. The frame lip covers about half an inch of the panel edge, and a crowded board reads as noise. The most effective sidewalk sign on any block is usually the emptiest one.

Hand lettered chalk still has a place. It signals that a person is inside and it changes in a minute. Printed panels win when the message repeats, when the artwork carries a logo, or when the board sits in full sun, because chalk bleaches and a UV printed graphic does not.

Which Businesses Get the Most From a Sidewalk Sign?

Any business whose customers arrive on foot and decide in the moment. That is the whole qualification, and it is why the same sign works outside a bakery and outside a tax office in February.

• Coffee shops, cafes and bakeries, for the daily special and the thing that just came out of the oven.
• Restaurants, for happy hour, brunch and event nights.
• Boutiques and retail, for a sale, an arrival or an open patio.
• Salons and barbers, for walk-in availability today.
• Real estate offices, for an open house and the direction to it.
• Churches and event venues, for service times, parking and where to enter.
• Market and fair vendors, for booth pricing and what is in season.

A sign outside a strip center or a shared lobby is doing a different job: it tells people you are in the building at all. That board can carry your name and an arrow and nothing else, and it will still be the best money on the list.

How Often Should You Change the Message?

Change a printed insert with the season and a chalk message daily. The people who pass your door every morning stop seeing a board that has not changed in a month, and they are the audience that was worth reaching.

This is where the drop-in frame pays for itself. Replacement coroplast inserts are $85.59 for one and $106.99 for the pair on a Deluxe Signicade, so a full seasonal rotation costs less than the difference between frames. With adhesive vinyl, replacement graphics are $74.89 and $96.29, and the old graphic has to come off the frame face first, which is a job rather than a swap.

A workable rhythm for most storefronts: one printed insert per season that carries the brand, plus a chalk or marker board for the day. That way the sign always looks deliberate even on a day nobody remembered to write on it.

Do You Need Permission to Put a Sign on the Sidewalk?

Usually, and the rule is local. Cities and counties set their own sidewalk sign codes, and the common conditions are a size limit, a placement limit, a required clear path for pedestrians of about 4 feet, and sometimes a small annual permit.

Two more permissions people forget. A landlord or shopping center often has its own sign rules that are stricter than the city's. And a sign on private property, your own patio or forecourt, is usually a different and easier question than a sign on a public walkway.

Check before you buy rather than after, because the answer occasionally decides the size of frame you order.

What We See in the Shop

The most common file we send back is a sandwich board designed at reading distance instead of walking distance. It looks balanced on a laptop and disappears on a sidewalk, because the type that felt generous at 100 percent on screen is an inch tall on a 36 inch panel.

The second is a border drawn at the panel edge. The frame lip covers the outer half inch of the graphic, so a one inch keyline comes back looking like a half inch keyline, uneven down one side. Let the background bleed off the edge and build any frame effect two inches in.

The third is one face ordered for a two way sidewalk. We ask about it on nearly every proof, because adding the second face later means paying for a graphic on its own rather than as part of the order, and the sign spends its whole life showing a blank panel to half the street.

What to Send Us

Send a print ready PDF at the insert size with 0.125 inch bleed, CMYK, 150 dpi at full size, fonts outlined, logos in vector, and every word a full inch inside the panel edge. Adhesive vinyl and drop-in coroplast take the same file.

Send any image, Canva export, PDF or logo through AI image to print and we make it print ready, covering size, bleed, resolution and color, for $14.99 once per item. If you want a designer to build the panel from scratch, Design it for me is +$29.99 with two revisions included. Every order includes a free digital proof, production is 3 business days once you approve it, and the graphics are printed in the USA and shipped with the frame anywhere in the country for a flat $10 per order. Keeping the sign upright through a windy afternoon is a separate question, and it is covered in wind-resistant sidewalk signs. The rest of the rigid range sits on the signs and boards hub.