If you were to ask any business owner that operates a retail store, or a food and drink establishment such as a restaurant, bar or even café, what the most difficult aspect of their business is, most of them will say that it’s getting new customers into their place of business.

It doesn’t matter if the clothes store run by Julia has the most amazing designs and styles ever at the best prices, or the food over at Steve’s eatery has the most delicious options, they are all still going to need a way to attract attention to their establishment.

How to draw attention to your business

When it comes to small businesses, grabbing the attention of people passing by is vital. Simply waiting for people to stop and pop into your business is not enough. You could be waiting forever. If there is nothing appealing or attractive about your place of business, why would anyone stop by?

It’s the front of your store or restaurant that people in the street will see. They won’t have much of a clue about the quality of your products that you have inside, it’s what they see for that brief moment in time which will determine if they are going to enter or not.

The importance of good signage

One of the most important things that all businesses need to consider is the signage that they have outside their store or establishment. Is it clean and presentable? Does it convey the right message? Is it something that will attract people’s attention?

If you were to stand in the middle of the road (obviously away from the traffic) and compare virtually identical looking shops, which of the following would be more likely to grab your attention? The one with the dirt covered sign that you can barely see, or the bright neon glowing sign, similar to those that you can find over at Neon Mama, who provide a huge range of quality neon products. It is pretty certain that the neon sign is going to be the one that gets your attention.

What is neon?

Neon gas was discovered back in 1898 by two British chemists – William Ramsey and Morris Travers. It was derived from a sample of argon, from which they also discovered xenon and krypton. Using a technique of freezing the argon with liquid air, the evaporated gases were collected, and then exposed to high voltage which resulted in the gases turning bright red.

Just a few years later in France in 1902, a French engineer and inventor named Georges Claude created the first neon light. Experimenting with neon gas, as well as others such as krypton and helium, he discovered that these gases, when an electrical current was passed through them, would create an array of colours. 

It was 10 years later in 1912 that the first neon lights were used for marketing, when a barber shop in Paris purchased a neon sign from Claude. Over the following decades, neon lights were used all over the world for advertising and signage for businesses.

What makes neon great for signs?

Neon lighting in signage is a great solution as it is one that creates a lot of attention, and will instantly grab the curiosity of people in the street. Back in the 1960s, neon signs were at their peak and were found and used all over the world, from Las Vegas, to Tokyo and London. Their bright dazzling colours, combined with the warm and cosy glow that they make, meant that they were much more effective than simple white lights for lighting up a sign outside of a store.

Even today when LED lighting has become the most commercially used type of lighting, it is still a pale comparison alongside a neon light. The colours that LED can produce are nothing compared to the pallet of neon, which as well as being much more aesthetically pleasing, are also much more eye-catching and offer a touch of nostalgia.

The importance of attracting customers to your business

Without customers, your business would soon close. It can only operate for so long before it becomes too costly to run. Unless your business is generating income and bringing in customers, it doesn’t have much of a future.

Good signage is vital to attracting customers to your place of business. If you are running a clothing store in a high street full of other clothing stores, how are you going to differentiate between you and your competition ? You might offer a higher quality or merchandise, or better prices, but how are you going to convey that message to the general public?

Your shop window, as well as the main store sign, are vital for this, and one way that you can stand out amongst the crowd is with neon lights. You can get a number of smaller neon light displays created specifically for display in your windows. They can announce to passersby about any sales or promotions you might be running, or maybe just to announce that you are open.

You need to stay a step ahead of your competition, and neon lighting can provide that advantage. You want your business to be the stand out establishment in the high street. Don’t let your competition steal a lead on you. Take action first, and grab the attention of everyone in the vicinity.

A few final thoughts

Customers are the lifeblood of retails shops and other businesses such as café bars and restaurants. You need to do everything you can to grab their attention, and get them interested in what you have to offer. There are various things that you can do to achieve this, such as running sales or promotions throughout the year. You could even have a person in the street outside your establishment handing out flyers.

However, when the sun starts to set, and the lights in the streets and stores are all switched on, nothing is going to grab the attention of passers by more than your brightly coloured, beautifully presented neon light signage.