E1.12 | Improving the Patient Experience with Experiential Design

Richie Guerzon: Hey everyone. We're very excited about today's guest. He's a good friend of ours here at Ortho Sales Engine Eric Lipphardt is the founder and president of Rise Above Sign and Graphics. He earned a bachelor's degree in Business Administration and his MBA from West Virginia University. He has over 17 years of experience in marketing and business development and has held several C-level positions including Chief Operating Officer of Med Care Urgent Care and vice president of Business Development and Marketing for Med Express
Urgent Care. He has also served as business consultant for American Family Care. Today, he serves corporate nonprofit government and healthcare clients nationwide with its full service creative studio. Eric, welcome to the show.

Erich Lipphardt: Thank you, Richie. It's good to be here. Appreciate you having us on.

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, absolutely. So why don’t you tell the audience a little bit about you.

Erich Lipphardt: Sure, you know hi everybody. It's good to be on here. I spent a good bit of my early career in healthcare so it's nice to be able to talk with this group because while my specialty was urgent care, I do have some relevant experience in the health care space that you would probably share. I spent a good time the majority of my history and background was in branding strategic marketing and managing creative departments in the Urgent Care space. When I was with Med Express, we put a lot of attention on the patient experience and tying together all of our processes, our culture and the physical environment. So, as I moved through all of those, I was fairly fortunate had a great time building that brand doing some other things and ultimately, I moved on and at some point I decided I wanted to try and find the intersection of my passion. So, I really had a strong passion for the creative world and through all those experiences really fell in love with signage and graphics in particular. So, I started my own company to try and help more companies with their efforts on building a better experience with graphics. So, let me use my business background creative background get my hands dirty and things like that. So now fast forward at Rise Above we're helping some Urgent Care clients and some orthodontic clients that were helping with that and that we're having a lot of fun.

Richie Guerzon: That's great. So I know today we're going to talk about specifically experiential design. So why don't you tell us what that is? What does that mean to you, when you're explaining that to someone?

Erich Lipphhardt: Sure, you know, I think there's lots of different as with anything, there's a ton of different industry terms, right? So sometimes we talk about experiential design and environmental graphics and I think at the meat of we'll probably be talking about how orthodontic practices can marry the visual experience the visual and physical experience in their center with their culture their mission their vision their values and their processes. Environmental design, environmental graphics is all about using your space to extend the experience. And so, what we really try to talk through is, you know, so many times branding and logo are considered synonymous and we like to help people understand that there's a difference in that branding is the intersection of promise and delivery.

Richie Guerzon: So, the branding I love that term, it's an intersection between promise and delivery. I think that is so important for people to understand that yeah.

Erich Lipphardt: Yeah. And so, I think the basis for environmental graphics is it’s really well documented that exceptional customer experiences come from engaged employees thoughtful process and satisfying facilities environments and most of these practice owners are going to have good solid control over how they're engaging their employees and their processes and a lot of times folks want some help with how to improve the overall appearance of their site or make graphics better for their overall patient experience and that's what we want to talk about today.

Richie Guerzon: So why is experiential design important for an orthodontic practice?

Erich Lipphardt: I think there's a couple reasons. One, there's kind of the consumer side of this and there's also the employee engagement side and there really is some good documentation and studies out there, you know orthodontist probably like statistics. I was getting reading through some things I have here in came across a report from the Gensler Research Institute. Yeah, and just a couple things really stuck out to me that I thought might be important to this audience. This one is people are 10 times more likely to share an experience where there was a unique design versus the alternative.

Richie Guerzon: Oh, so if it was cookie cutter, it's kind of just bland, I forget about it.

Erich Lipphardt: It really speaks to just how much the physical environment means to a consumer. So, you know get into one of the things they talk about is there's different elements of this; beauty, authenticity, inspiration, sense of welcome and novelty. We all want to have a nice place but there's really some science behind it showing how it really complements the overall experience and helps drive customer satisfaction.

Richie Guerzon: So, the spirit the actual physical environment can help improve customer satisfaction. That's sort of surprising. A lot of times is taken for granted.

Erich Lipphardt: Yeah, I think so and you know if you think about it, it's a lot of times people are familiar with touch points. So, we often think of touch points in real finite ways, but it's really quite wrong, you know, so one of the things we'll be talking about is how can you evaluate your space but there's touch points everywhere, right? So, it starts in the parking lot starts from the parking lot as you're walking up to a facility the approach to the facility moving into the facility and then of course every step throughout. So, I think as we get into some of this there's probably a couple of directions we can talk about today. There's simple practices and water some simple things we can do right now to just move forward or make some general advances to other practices. You might be trying to think about how to redefine themselves or take a step back and really reposition, you know, here we are look while we're on here right now is we're all taking advantage of some downtime due to the pandemic right now to think one of the best things we can be doing is planning. So even if people just start thinking about how could I improve the patient experience with graphics with the experiential design and messaging it's in the center? It's a good thing.

Richie Guerzon: So, let's take a step back because branding and having that culture defined is the critical first step, right? So why don't we talk a little bit about what when you're talking about branding with a client one of the things they need to have, what ducks in a row we need to be taken care of before we even start with that experience

Erich Lipphardt: Sure, you know, I think a lot of times we often overlook branding in general because we've always jumped into you know, there's logos there's advertising and there's branding right after the logo is an identification of your brain advertising is how you promote your brand what you want to brand is really this emotional connection that consumers have with your product or service. So, you know as a practice one of the things that we've looked at one of the reports, there's a Harvard report. It's getting data now is probably 10 years old or so now but talking about the there's primarily three types of business disciplines. Okay, so it operates on the assumption that a business can focus on operational excellence product leadership or customer intimacy. All right, and that's the idea that you can never be good at all three and successful at best. Maybe you can do to but the most successful companies really Zone in on one. So, the classic examples of operational excellence is Walmart and what we know about how they've focused in on Logistics to be successful. Yeah that my leadership. You know, one of the glowing examples is Apple. Customer intimacy, Walt Disney World, you know, there's a few companies who have put as much attention into the customer experiences as Disney World.

Richie Guerzon: I have been watching the Disney Imagineering show, have you seen that?

Erich Lipphardt: At Med Express we did some Disney training because we really wanted to bring that into the fold so a lot of our management team of Executives did Disney training to bring that to life?

Richie Guerzon: So which one of those three did Med Express focus on?

Erich Lipphhardt: We focused on customer intimacy and I think that's what's kind of relevant to this audience. And yeah, you know, what I think about is the reality is an orthodontist can focus on any of those that might have a focus on operational excellence. They might be a product leadership or they might be customer intimacy. The reason I think custom intimacy makes sense in this space is the Sea of sameness that exists.

Richie Guerzon: So I talked about recently how a lot of these practices, really orthodontic industry is heading down that road of being a commodity and commoditization is really one of the biggest threats to an orthodontic practice. So, we really need to make sure that we're controlling what our differentiators are and really sharing that message with the customers because you do not want to be in that sea of sameness that you're talking about.

Erich Lippardt: You know, when you think about it in those terms, you know, you want to think about your service provider that happens to provide braces, right and it is the experience that is the difference. So how people promote you how people are satisfied with what you're doing. So, it's in that customer intimacy vein that all of this comes out and the idea is that you're going to orient your physical space your environment etc. in an attentive way to what that consumer is expecting demanding hoping for and it takes it takes a step back you want you want to take a look at lots of different angles on how you can do things to fit within your budget to fit within your brand and things like that and you know, just coming back around to what you mentioned about brand a lot. A lot of this will depend on if you've got some of those precursors in place, you know, if you're a practice you haven’t really put thoughtful attention into your branding package your logo design your underlying mission vision and values when those are kind of some first steps you want to take because just slapping up a stock photo on a picture it can spruce up a place but it's not really going to help you deliver on any strategic objective. The idea would be that you're trying to position your facilities to attract star Talent. Yeah, it's got that angle but also to educate inform entertain your actual customer population as well.

Richie Guerzon: So what are some first steps if someone is not sure about their branding they're not sure about their vision, their mission, what are some exercises maybe they could take right now with their staff while we're all virtual that something you think they could work on during this time when we're not physically in the office?

Erich Lipphardt: I mean, I've encourage anybody who is possibly not well defined in those areas to put focus there. And if you don't have any experience having defined mission vision, values or working with branding, you know consult somebody who can help with it. It's really, you know, I've always said don't have a mission statement on your wall because it's the thing to do have a mission statement on the wall because it's the right path forward. Their guiding principles, I’ve always said mission and value statements are kind of like your GPS and a set of guardrails, right? They're going to be your roadmap for where you're going and how you're going to do it and they're going to give you and your teams protection as you're forced with making decisions along the way so it's really important to get those now down and this is a great time, you know engage your employees in it at the most basic simple level right now. You know, we're all concerned about expenses and nobody wants to go hiring Consultants immediately right now. Dialogue can do an amazing thing. Talk with your employees about what's working. Talk with your employees about what they see within the patient experience. What have they heard and trying to capture some of that so you can move in that direction.

Richie Guerzon: Maybe we could do they could even do a survey if we have a list of the patients and start getting some data because everyone sitting home at their on their phone, on their computer.

Erich Lipphardt: Yeah, there's a fantastic opportunity. You know, if you if you can void other resources survey your patient base about the experience make it focused about the experience. Let them know you're interested in providing the experience and that their feedback is valuable and then tie that together with some collaboration with the team as a fantastic thing to be doing right now.

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, so when you have one doctor, one office, it's a lot of this mission and values really coming from the heart of that doctor. Would you say what would you what would your recommendation be besides?

Erich Lipphardt: Absolutely. Absolutely. And you know, that's one thing one thing we've learned and talked about a lot is that there's almost a debate or an argument about what that brand culture and personality should be and then really what's important is that it's a line and authentic. You know so many times you might have a practice that is the owner is fun-loving and loose, wants to define their brand as really hard driving and sterile. It won't work and just the opposite is possible to someone where leadership is really kind of detail oriented but wants to play the fun card and your branding it's not aligned, There's no rulebook that you're supposed to look fun and have a ping-pong table in the back. There's evidence that says when its aligned you can be successful because it's that alignment that brings the team the culture and the consumers together. So, when you're getting into The Branding what I really recommend particularly for smaller practices, of course, it's going to be what are those values of that owner and embrace them. Embrace what your values and your mission are and publish and promote them and focus on them help people understand the why when you're dealing with employees. Employees need to understand why so as you start to define what that mission is and what your values are regardless of what the popular trend is if it's aligned and you educate and inform you will be able to have cohesion.

Richie Guerzon: So you're saying regardless of what the trend is, you shouldn't just be fun loving because everyone is fun loving, alignment is more is more important?

Erich Lipphardt: Yeah saying, we're hip and cool when you're not, it's not going to work for you and that's okay. What you want is authentic alignment so that you can achieve the cohesion needed to be consistent and then you're going to obviously focus that on the target population you're going on.

Richie Guerzon: I can't imagine it would be so hard not to be aligned and come in every day, your the orthodontist with that practice, and you're basically putting on a face. That's not you, you had to be an actor. It's kind of ironic. The easier more natural thing to do is what the correct thing to do is just be authentic and be yourself and align the practice with that.

Erich Lipphardt: I do think it is important because if you're trying to really to move the needle if you're trying to make a difference using environmental graphics and branding in your patient experience, you need to have that defined in order to craft an appropriate strategy to develop how you're going to do things would be great. Some of this we can talk about is simple way find, right? So, room ones room one, I can help you figure out how to make a really cool sign that says Room 1. That’s a small element of a global picture and we're really fortunate we just finished up a pretty impressive installation here in Charleston with an orthodontic group. They've got an orthodontic practice in their sort of the Prototype a new Concept Invisalign store. It was a great example as far as I'm concerned about kind of what we're talking about today. We just they've really drilled in done a nice job with their branding identifying who they are and then it's cascaded throughout. So we've got just some straight-up branding utilizing their logos for signage throughout but also Wall Graphics doing some dimensional letters real careful thoughtful attention to their directional signage. It's all consistent all measured as well and how it's helping the patients understand different points touch points throughout their interaction is throwing welcome signage up front. There's a tooth brushing station and communication going on there through signs and things like that over it was a great example. So we have a lot of fun with it.

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, but I mean we did a lot of that artwork. So, it was a great collaboration. We appreciate the compliment on the branding. It was awesome. And I think it really is very well aligned with the doctor there that office reflects that doctor’s personality and values he has and it's especially important if you're even considering whether if you're ever going to scale your practice and open another office if you have all this nailed down, and you got it right you can just replicate it instead of having to start all over again figuring it out. You're growing you want to really get it right the first time if that's at all possible.

Erich Lipphardt: Consistencies huge and scalability. All right, what one or more that consistency in what you're doing? So, you kind of identify create that identity make sure that it's authentic and aligned with reality and then you've got the context right? So, you've got your frame, you got your baseline prepare of your branding then jump into what I'd recommend people do is an audit, right? So, you want to kind of audit your brand and you can jump into auditing your facility both exterior and interior. And that's where you're going to start to find opportunities.

Rich Guerzon: So, let's walk us through what you would do in an audit. I guess you are starting from I just got out of the car in the parking lot?

Erich Lipphardt: That’s what we do when we do audits for folks we have some tools and we would literally, you know, a lot of folks think for us it's a survey like we're just going to go take a measure of a wall space. But if we're doing a project like this, it's going to start with creative briefs and some brand auditing just like some of the stuff we talked about. So, we really are diving into understanding more about what assets are available. Now, what is known about the brand kind of like what we just talked about but then moving into an interior and exterior audit, yeah at the simplest best way if I'm going to give this audience some advice and they know what they can do be a patient right put yourself in the shoes of the patient and start in the parking lot. You know, I used to scream all the time if their cigarette butts on the internet entryway, that's a damage on our brain, right? We want to pay attention to all those things in the context of exactly what we're talking with the graphics and I think about on the exterior is your practice and your entrance clearly visible.

Richie Guerzon: That is a very simple one right there that I see violated all the time.

Erich Lippardt: It happens often. You can't do much about ingress, egress, right? If you've got a space as Ingress and egress challenges, you're not going to give the department of highways to fix that for you tomorrow, but you can find creative solutions to help customers navigate your space more simply. It could easily sound like it's unnecessary. But what an easy thing you can do to make the experience easier for the patient. So, you started off on the right foot, you know other things that exteriorly, you know, just some stuff isn't even science. How do your facilities? Look, when's the last time you clean your windows? When's the last time you clean the exterior of a building? What presentation is your facade giving current and potential patients in the sign as you've got these identifying you. Is your logo 30 years old and it was never all that great and maybe you should put some attention to it, down to is there opportunity for illuminated or not illuminated signage that helps identify your brain identifier location and attract customers. As you're going inside, you know, I stick to keep being the patient sit down the in your waiting room in your reception area. Whatever it is you call it and go through the process of what's it like to sign in. What's it like to check in? What's it like to get registered? What's it like to sit in? What do you see? What do You observe? how do you feel? Because you want to start with that position of what is my patient experiencing? You're going to get the fun part of looking around to look for ideas, right? You're going to simultaneously be surveying surfaces opportunities. So, what walls floors glass suspension opportunities exist for the different things you can do because some of what you want to do is branding, some of what you want to do is wayfinding. Some of it is going to be to inform or entertain some of it might be an opportunity to be interactive and kind of complement the overall process, but you want to be observant and pay attention to where those opportunities are. So, you know from an audit standpoint. The simple thing I can say now is be a patient hop in their shoes and live the go to the restroom. Yeah, what's it like to go to the restroom. Could not find it if somebody didn't tell you where it was.

Richie Guerzon: That's a good question. If someone didn't tell you where it was, could you find it? That's very often violated. That's the worst thing you want to do. You really need to use a restroom. You don't know where it is and theres no one to ask.

Erich Lipphardt: Then you can dive into it's another great opportunity like we were talking about earlier to get involved with your staff and talk about the processes. One thing that I really liked is there's a simple sign that we did it says, there's a tooth brushing station and a practice we worked at and there's already toothpaste on the toothbrush has right. So, there's a sign there that says hey there's already toothpaste on the toothbrush has just received notice little things like that where in our daily world. We know our world very well, but our customers don't understand our world. So, you move through that on if you want to take the time to really think about okay, are we clear and we made things clear with everybody throughout the various stages of their experience, you know one tip that I would say if you're doing this on your own if you got a floor plan fantastic if all you've got is a napkin in a pen draw your floor plan. Take in the aerial view of your floor plan and think and turns of your patient’s journey. How do they arrive? How do they process? What is their visit experience? How do they exit your facility, you know get a few different angles and perspectives on the patient experience to help you think through ways you could use graphics on it Etc.

Richie Guerzon:: I mean even down to the forms they're signing, and if it's a paper form does it look profession? Is your clipboard 20 years old? What app are you using it on your tablet, if you're using the tablet? Are you branding yourself? Then there's a lot of opportunities there. So, what do you think are some of the most popular options right now?

Erich Lipphardt: You know, I think what we're seeing a lot of is really I think I touched on a little bit ago, but there's probably four main ways people are using graphics right now in their environments, branding environments. So, that's equally as much focused on the employees as it is on the customers but using physical space to publish and promote those values, mission vision we talked about. Excuse me. You know, I think a lot of times that can be in break rooms and can also be front and center but we're seeing combinations there wall graphics kind of a multimedia approach. We've been seeing some really cool stuff where there's wall graphic combined with some dimensional lettering.

Richie Guerzon: Oh, so you are putting them together in one piece?

26:49*Erich Lipphardt: Sure, sure. So, you know, you might have a backdrop wall graphic that is a historic timeline of the evolution of the company with some dimensional letters for the branding and logo and maybe some acrylic prints that highlight your mission and values. A lot of times people have some fantastic photography that really speaks to their brand identity and you can mix that in as well in a signage and wayfinding is important think that's there's somewhat traditional in that respect but you know, you're welcome and reception area. You know, what you back? What's your patients see when they come in? Are they greeted by your brand? Can you put a logo on the front wall of your reception desk? Is there a space behind the desk four dimensional letters? We're seeing a lot of brushed aluminum. Again. It really everything drills back to the brain. You know, are you a your brand clean? We've seen a lot of laser cut white acrylic. It's just it's beautiful. Clean classy and polished we're seeing some of that brushed aluminum so many different ways we can do things anymore to create custom graphics dimensional graphics and things like that. Think about your room signage, you know, a lot of another thing that I'm trying to help people with what I'm seeing more of is things like changeable graphics. So, there's what's snap frames now. So, in your patient rooms right patient areas, you might want to be sending certain messages over time. So almost a seasonality calendar or routine change out. So, we use snap frames a lot. So, you can change the message you pay the by the hardware is a super easy to change our graphic. Then you just flipping it out with printed poster type Graphics, you know, you can get more messaging out and kind of stay fresh and current and recent they were than that. Trying to think. Educational informative stuff is getting pretty cool with this for an orthodontic practice. Pardon my ignorance on some of this but the braces they've got opportunities for the color of their rubber bands and there's a pretty cool color wheel that this practice did we're hanging on the walls of custom-made. It's an acrylic. It's a route of acrylic piece on Chrome standoffs, but all the colors available in those rubber bands is there since it's really nice in the crates and interaction with the patient to do some things so.

Richie Guerzon: It’s nice that you have these opportunities to make something 3D and add some texture too.

Erich Lipphardt: Absolutely, absolutely.

Richie Guerzon: So, what are some other ways that you can do something really that's 3D and really pops for someone that's really going to make that experiential or experience for them amazing?

Erich Lipphhardt: Yeah. I think there's so many different things that get cool. We like to look out for corners, it sounds strange. But if you got if you got a corner or an angle with the floor, there's ways to mix floor graphics and wall graphics to tie together, you know, really kind of depends on the space and what your goals and objectives are. But if you're if you're kind of asking about what are some of the products we make?

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, like so what I'm thinking or something that's really going to make the room feel like it's if you're in the Amazon or something or it's like really playful and there's things like that or what kind of a 3D objects are you putting in the in the space or thing?

Erich Lipphardt: A lot of times you can do suspended signs or what we call blade signs and right angle signs. So, things that kind of disrupt or catch the eye is great and dimensional signage is fantastic. So. a lot of times you don't as well looking at our screen looking at your Ortho Sales Engine logo, right? So what we're looking at right there is a flat graphic and we can bring that to life with dimension. So, I can see multiple things here that can be three different layers. Where a first layer is that blue gear in the background, the second layer is a black disc in a third layer is that white tooth. But just as equally this could be a two-layer thing where it's blue than black with the whites cut all the way through to reveal the wall doing a negative space type of thing anytime you're getting various depths and layers of dimension it's powerful. And so one of the things I really encourage people to look at it as a lot of times mixing a wall graphic for messaging tone personality and texture and complimenting it with some additional dimensional graphics is really really cool.

Richie Guerzon: And you guys design all this for everyone too so you can sell it get ideas and put it all together.

Erich Lipphardt: We can, it's all over the board. You know, we did a great install organ with the design work you did. A lot of times Architects some of these guys too you know, you can do your own self audit get someone involved get a professional involved, you know, an interior designer often times. It is who's driving some of what we want a lot of times its people will turn the whole project over to us. A lot of times they'll have their concept or know what they're doing and asked us to embellish and hands bring it to life another time,
people say hey, here's what we want make this and we do that as well.

Richie Guerzon: So, if someone's out of state and wants to work with you on a big project, can you walk us through how that would work?

Erich Lipphardt: We do. We serve regional and national clients. We've actually done some we've done installations in Los Angeles, California. We did a really cool healthcare project up in Pennsylvania for Lancaster General Hospital. That's a division of pain medicine. We did a major pediatric project up there that was about 20 exam rooms of wall graphics and dimensional signage and things like that so we can handle project management and design right here in our shop. We do fabrication our shop depending on the project. We sometimes like my crew traveled to Pennsylvania for that install. We also have an installation network where we can do things, but it's also pretty exciting. We've got we've got a healthcare greetings in Urgent Care Group in Tennessee. We did some dimensional letters for them and we teamed them up for their own install. So, we provided them a template video instructions and things like that. So, we were able to ship direct to them and they installed themselves worked out actually save the money to anyone have to pay for install.

Richie Guerzon: So, you're willing to do that, you'll train someone and let them do it themselves if it's within their capabilities?

Erich Lipphardt: Sure a lot of different things some of what we need is fairly complex, but a lot a lot of stuff is just even our installers use really simple tools. So, a lot of what we do is we make templates to make our job easier and it would be easy for someone else's to do as well.

Richie Guerzon: What are some of the tools you have inside the shop that allow you to do some cool stuff?

Erich Lipphardt: We're pretty full service, you know we do a wide variety of things. We do Interiors exteriors vehicle wraps and things like that. So, we have we've got an art department and a production Department. We've got digital printers both solvents and I won't even dig into that detail. We got different types of inks that can run different kind of media's and then in our in our fabrication shop, we've got a big CNC router we can do laser cut materials.

Richie Guerzon: When you're saying laser-cut, what do you mean by that?

Erich Lipphardt: It's really so see a CNC router is actually a large machine that uses a spindle on like a router. Yeah materials laser is an is pretty amazing technology. Now, where were using lasers to cut and/or ech materials. So, laser cut is just an amazing finish like we do laser cut acrylic. It's beautiful. So, we got those capabilities and we do a little bit of it everything.

Richie Guerzon: And your wall murals, you have a medical grade version of those right?

Erich Lipphardt: Good question. We actually do there's so many of the reality is with wall graphics. I have to be careful to talk about here because we can there's hundreds of vinyl materials that can be used and there's lots of different approaches for how to produce them. You've got everything from permanent if you got something that you want to be there for 10 years. We would use a permanent adhesive. There's also removable adhesive. So if you just need something to short term.

Richie Guerzon: A lot of people don't know about that. You can have a removable wall graphic that can be used.

Erich Lipphardt: Absolutely. A lot of times we will advocate a really nice product called photo text. It's a texture. It's almost like a fabric vinyl, but it's got a repositionable and removable adhesive on it. So, it's semi permanent state and can stay forever. Let's say you're in a rented space or something like that. You got a painted wall material come down without damaging the wall, but we recently invested in Cannon and those have always been a big fan of Cannon for their color Management Systems. They came out with kind of a game-changing printer a couple of years ago called the Colorado and it's a new ink technology called UV gel. It's kind of it's this new ink that for us in our world we deal with latex and solvents and UV inks. It's kind of the best of all worlds, but one thing that ended up being at the time we didn't realize was going to be such a fantastic benefit is there now he's greenguard certified. So this is an ink that means it's almost indestructible. So, a lot of times we have some of our inks that if we're not careful they would scratch they have to laminate them. This ink does not need laminated and it's naturally scratch. This is because it's UV cured and processed and so because of that it is fantastic for healthcare facilities and it got the green guard certification because it can be cleaned. There's a lot of lot of times maybe not so much in for orthodontic facilities, but in other doctor’s offices and practices where there might be blood-borne pathogens and concerns like that. A lot of times practices have to be concerned about the ability to clean it and this product can be cleaned with mild detergents over and over and it's just fine. So, it's actually something we promote haven't thought about it for an orthodontic practice. Not sure if that's as attractive to them as it would be a physician's office, but it is a pretty cool feature of that.

Richie Guerzon: Does that make it more durable? I would assume so considering it goes through all that abuse of cleaning.

Erich Lipphardt: It’s amazing. In our world before we got it, you know, we had to laminate everything to protect it. We've done tests. We've literally taken car keys and tried to scratch it and we can't. We literally destroy the vinyl and cut it up before we can scratch the ink.

Richie Guerzon: Wow. That's a huge advancement. I can see why you like Cannon there.

Erich Lipphardt: For us, we kind of nerd out on some of this stuff. It's pretty cool.

Richie Guerzon: I was thinking about the graphics for the cars the wraps and that was something I didn't have a lot of experience with until one of our clients used them and we have clients that are doing Billboards on the highway and I think wraps are a great alternative in my opinion to a billboard because you do it once it's the cost of probably two months of a decent billboard and I know it lasts a while and it's traveling around all the time. So, people are seeing it everywhere. I think wraps are great.

Erich Lipphardt: It’s funny, I've got this kind of strange background because it was this corporate executive in healthcare and now I run this sign company, but the tie-in is as an executive when I was managing 60 locations and multiple States and regions. You know, we really try to figure out where we getting our best ROI right? And it was through absolute clarity in the numbers that I've always said signage and wraps are the top two Investments. You can make in your Marketing in in some by that I mean the investment you make being a one-time investment that carries a lifetime of value versus the ongoing incurred expenses of other advertising. It's just it's pennies compared to everything else. So, that caught my eye about signs and probably will always be there wraps. Of course, it really exploded onto the scene and now there's a lot of opportunity for them. Everybody's getting better and better with them and they are a phenomenal way to get you.

Richie Guerzon: They really need to be done right. I mean there's times you do wraps and you spend a ton of money with them what if it doesn't come out like it should and you're kind of stuck with it?

Erich Lipphhardt: Design is critical with a wrap.

Richie Guerzon: Oh, that's true. I've seen some pretty horrible wraps right now.

Erich Lipphardt: It's similar for us and there's there's wrap jobs everywhere. So, material selection, ink selection and install are important but time and again what we really see is the difference in a good wrapper.

Richie Guerzon: That makes sense. How long do they last once they're installed on the car?

Erich Lipphardt: Good rhapsodies and good materials are going to have a nice five to seven year lifetime. It's funny. It kind of depends on what region of the country you're in. Here, you know here in South Carolina we've got devastating sun and salt so we really have to encourage people on the importance of care of the wrap. You've got to take care of a wrap and wash it like you wash a car. Yeah, your horizontal surfaces are going to get more damage. So, I'd encourage people not to let a roof or a hood go 5 to 7 years. It's worth and minor investment to replace it a couple of years in so that it doesn't end up baked on and cooked.

Richie Guerzon: And it does protect the paint underneath it too, right?

Erich Lipphardt: Premium materials like we will only use their materials. If you're working with a wrap shop that's worth their salt using good materials that were movable.

Richie Guerzon: So, after someone does kind of their own DIY audit, they have an idea what they what kind of changes they want to make with the practice. What would you recommend when they're choosing a company like you what are the things they should look out for to make sure they get a good company.

Erich Lippardt: Yeah. I mean, I think if that folks who are ready to enhance their facility with graphics and they first want to try and do their audit or get some help with it. You know, what you want to look for check people's portfolios check people's references. You want to find a lot of this design is critical so groups that have good design teams and a portfolio ythat looks professional is important to keep an eye on that. What type of company you need really depends on what you're doing. If you're just if you're just going after a simple logo, you can probably find any number of fabrication shops or sign shops. If you're looking for a real cohesive extended project. So to speak where you're going to do an entire facility, I would recommend getting with a group that specializes that way who can help you think through all the ins and outs so people would project management experience. If you can find a full service sign company, that would be one, Architects, agencies like you guys. I mean you guys what you offer is desirable as the go-between between an end client and someone like us. The agencies, Architects, interior designers or a credible qualified sign company. I would say I've tried to build my business on we built Rise Above on intimacy as assigned buyer. I was frustrated with the levels of customer service in the industry idea. There's a lot in our industry. That's just a couple steps away from an auto body shop and we really tried to cater toward our audience to be that service level. It's not saying you're going to call us find more creative the companies that seem to have a better firm grip on the creative side I think will be more helpful and attentive to an project like this.

Richie Guerzon: So, what if someone's totally started from there, they're opening a brand new practice or they're gutting it and starting from scratch. Are they generally working with the architect and interior designer and you at the same time? What are the differences between what interior designers going to be doing what architects are doing and what you guys are doing?

Erich Lipphardt: Sure. I think there can be crossover. We kind of worked in just about any a combination of that lot of times folks are using architect to get floor plan designs, you know, we work we work with both, you know, a lot of times Architects are getting involved in signage decisions, like wayfinding and directional signage. Yeah, so we work with architects in that regard that they kind of they know generally what the floor plan flow needs to be an award with us to help them figure out material selections and finishes. Interior designers often times know they want a certain style of artwork and want us to help with that so we'll help you know with production of gallery wrap can this is of either professional photos they've taken or helping them source photography or stock photography and things like that. It really could be any combination of Architects interior designers. A lot of times it works great.

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, that makes sense if they really know what they want. It does sound like it would be good if the creative team can do most of it themselves you can work with one or two people and get everything done really make that vision a reality for someone.

Erich Lippardt: Sure, sure. And you know some of this depends on if we are talking about one small practice or are you trying to transform a 30 unit Regional brand as well. There's going to be going to be a whole different approach and tactic to how you tackle that project.

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, what if it is a group and they kind of have an overall umbrella brand but they all have their certain personalities for each office. Probably a good time to work with someone work with you then make sure you kind of see the connection but the overall brand of the group is very clear.

Erich Lipphardt: Good point. You know healthcare is local, right? That's what patients expect so I'm a big believer, I’m a brand guy. So, I believe in branding when you got multi unit operators, I think it's even more important everything we're talking about today is even more important. Have a consistent brand execution throughout the facilities, but there's definitely all kinds of ways you can customize within that umbrella to give it that local feel. So, you know what you're doing and what you're doing in Denver versus Florida needs to have a consistent look and feel we all know that but there's going to be ways we could treat that to touch on that local audiences these yeah without violating the brand that message.

Richie Guerzon: So, if you have a limited budget right now, but you want to take some steps in the right direction, what would you recommend?

Erich Lipphardt: You know, I think audit, seek inspiration, and plan. You know, you can you don't have to hire a consultant to do an audit do some of those things we talked about. Take a close look in the mirror right evaluate what brand assets you've got and how you're executing them now from your perspective, but also don't forget to get in the shoes of your customers and your employees.

Inquiry them if you can. Seek inspiration, I think that's an easy thing. We've all got time to Google right now. Go out to Google and do an image search of orthodontic practices branding. Google search interior design ideas for orthodontic practices and look and see what others are doing. You know, I can't so many times we've learned when we help people seek some inspiration. It's amazing the light bulbs that start to go off, right? Oh, I never thought I could do that. You know, don't try to reinvent the wheel today. You don't want to do what the next guy does but seeking at understand your situation, you know, a little situation analysis through a brand and physical audit. Seek inspiration, then you're kind of setup to say I think my gaps that exist right now in my patient experience are missing the boat here here and here. Here are some things I've seen others do that look really nice. How do we bring that together and do some things?

Richie Guerzon: So if you do the audit and you have the limited budget and you see the gaps, would that be your priority like fill the gaps first if you have to make a decision?

Erich Lipphardt: Sure, I think that could be done as long as you don't blow the context, you know, you don't want to look piecemeal, but if you've got if you've gotta generally pleasing aesthetic in your practice and you're just trying to you know from a cash flow standpoint maybe you want to take baby steps, you know, maybe you can't do maybe you see the entire vision but you can't necessarily afford to do all of it yet. Well, think about priority, sequence. Right? What would have the most impact off the bat and maybe move in that direction. Sometimes you can do the whole thing. Sometimes you can do to progression.

Richie Guerzon: And a customer could call you and talk through some of this and you could help them prioritize probably and choose something?

Erich Lipphardt: Sure, sure. You know, we're kind of like the rest of the country right now. We're slowing down a little bit. So, now's as good a time as any. I'd be happy to we like talking about this something if somebody wanted some ideas or things like that a lot of times that would be consulted or something like that. I would gladly help someone right now.

Richie Guerzon: So you'd offer that free consultation right now you'd offer that free consultation and normally you wouldn’t be right?

Erich Lipphard: Well, I will do a free discussion when folks or somebody out there has a couple pictures of something and they're trying to figure out something to do shoot me an e-mail. I'll be glad to give you some ideas.

Richie Guerzon: Great. Are you offering any discounts right now during this time?

Erich Lipphardt: We've got a pretty blanket 15% discount going on right now.

Richhie Guerzon: That's pretty aggressive. Especially to do a big project or a big sign.

Erich Lipphardt: We're hungry right now. So, we'd be happy to deal with just about any money.

Richie Guerzon: So, what's the best way to get in contact with you if someone's interested in talking?

Erich Lipphardt: Is there a way for me to I could give my email out, do you guys have a way to send my email?

Richie Guerzon: Just say it now and then we'll post it.

Erich Lipphardt: My personal email is elipphardt – e-l-i-p-p-h-a-r-d-t @ rise above partners like it sounds are is EA B. OV E. Yeah party any are s.com. And then the easy one is info@riseabovesigns.com.

Richie Guerzon: And we can go to the website right now and contact you there?

Erich Lippardt: Yeah, we've got contact forms and contact info there as well. We're all a little bit disparate. We've kind of as we're reacting this we're limiting the number of people that are actually at the shop. So, we got some of our management teams working from home and you know, we got our warehouse and fabrication facility and we got our management and design facilities. So, we're trying to keep people limited on each side of the walls there. So honestly right now sometimes the phone's not getting answered but we are like literally calling people back.

Richie Guerzon: Yeah, we're all playing that game right now. I've got someone that called me right during this so I need to call right back. Yeah. It was great hearing from you. I think we learned a lot about the experiential design and just aligning that brand with what is physically there the importance of that alignment and I bet there's some practice right now wondering if they truly are aligned with who they are and their values.

Erich Lipphardt: And then that's it, you know, take a step back and think what is your brand about? How can you ensure that you can execute what that is and then get a creative look. You know, I like to say does the video match the audio, right? Yeah. Is what you're saying about your brands a reality and make the video match the audio. First and foremost internally with your processes and your culture and then compliment that, enhance that with the physical environment and graphics and branding or environmental treatments are fantastic way to do it.

Richie Guerzon: Great. Well, thanks so much for all the advice has a great talking to you today and I will put all the information on it recap everyone if you want to get in touch with Eric and we'll talk soon. Thanks a lot.

Erich Lipphardt: Thanks Richie. Appreciate it.