How Businesses Can Use Signage To Help Slow the Spread

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Reopening for business adapt to new normal in the novel Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic. Rear view of business owner wearing medical mask placing open sign "OPEN BUSINESS AS NEW NORMAL" on front door.

As businesses navigate reopening or remaining open amid the COVID-19 pandemic, there are many new procedures and practices they must figure out and implement. Many of these, such as social distancing signage and its placement, businesses may never have even considered before.

Here are some guidelines for how to best implement social distancing and other COVID-19-related signage in your business.

Types of COVID-19 signage to consider

As you seek to ensure the safety and health of your customers and employees, there are two types of signage that you may want to consider placing around your store: signs displaying your store’s guidelines (such as social distancing rules and mask requirements), and signs helping your customers keep these guidelines, such as helping direct the “traffic” of customers within the layout of your store, or helping them stay six feet apart.

Depending on the layout of your store, you may find it possible and beneficial to implement “one-way” aisles, with arrows on the floor directing customers which way to walk through each aisle, helping customers to maintain safe distances from one another.

Making guidelines clear from the entrance on

It is crucial that you think through where you will display signage that displays social distancing rules, mask requirements, and other guidelines, so that every customer that visits your business will be sure to see it. If your business has a policy, or you are currently under certain government guidelines or ordinances, it is crucial that you communicate these clearly to your customers even before they enter your business, to maintain safety and to avoid conflict.

Standing signs can be one of the most visible options, especially when placed prominently in a walkway, such as just inside the entrance of your business, or interspersed through major aisles throughout your business. Make sure that at least one standing sign is placed outside of the entrance to your business in a prominent location, especially if your business has guidelines such as a mask requirement, that must be addressed before entry.

For the sake of clear communication as well as addressing issues with customers, it is a good rule of thumb to try and place signage such that the store’s guidelines are visible from most places within the store at all times. In other words, it is beneficial for employees to be able to point out signage clearly indicating the store’s guidelines from anywhere they may need to confront a customer for not following them.

These signs can also be used in employee common areas to remind them of employee restrictions, such as mask wearing, social distance, and hand-washing rules.

Helping customers social distance in line

One of the most important places for customers to maintain social distance is in lines, either before entering your business or while waiting to check out. While standing signs can be used near lines to remind customers to socially distance, the most effective way to encourage and assist social distancing in lines is floor signage.

Floor signs, placed six feet apart in areas where customers will line up, serve two purposes: They can remind customers of the social distancing requirements, and can assist customers in keeping that distance from one another, removing the guesswork.

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