Arrows, wayfinding panels and location markers that move people from the car park to the door. Corflute on stakes outdoors, A-frames and freestanding panels indoors, reflective faces for after dark.
Event directional signs are the arrows, wayfinding panels and location markers that move people around a site: car park to gate, gate to registration, registration to the room or marquee they need. They work as a chain rather than as individual signs, which is why they are ordered as a numbered set and planned against a site map before anything is printed.
Made by Melbourne Trade Signs, a large-format print and signage company on Unit 6/43 Orbis Drive, Ravenhall VIC 3023, in Melbourne’s west. Printed in-house and installed Australia-wide. Phone 0415 743 691.
The common mistake is treating them as an afterthought and printing a dozen identical arrows the week of the event. Directional signage fails quietly. Nobody complains, they just arrive late, ask staff for help, and miss the first session. A sign every decision point, consistent colour, one message per sign and an arrow large enough to read at walking pace is most of the job.
We print the whole kit at our Ravenhall workshop, so a run of thirty signs across four different formats comes out of one building on one schedule. There is no minimum. Our own installation crews can set signs on site as well, which matters on festival grounds and multi-venue conferences where a hundred signs have to go up in a morning.
Directional signage is chosen by ground surface and duration rather than by look. Grass takes a stake, hard floor takes a frame, walls take a panel, and the length of the event decides the material.
| Format | Material | Goes where | Multi-day life |
|---|---|---|---|
| Stake sign | 5mm Corflute | Grass, garden beds, verges | Weeks to months |
| A-frame | Corflute or ACM insert | Footpaths, foyers, hard floor | Reusable, insert changes |
| Wall panel | 3mm ACM | Corridors, entries, lift lobbies | Years if kept undated |
| Fence banner | Mesh or PVC banner | Temp fencing, hoarding, rails | Months outdoors |
| Reflective sign | ACM with Class 1 film | Car parks, access roads | Years, headlight readable |
| Floor graphic | Laminated floor vinyl | Indoor hard floors | Days to a few weeks |
| Hanging sign | Corflute, double sided | Marquee frames, trusses | Event duration |
The set matters more than the individual size. Keep one size for all arrows so guests learn what to look for, and reserve larger formats for orientation boards at the gate where people stop to read.
These are the versions we build most, and the conditions each suits. Almost every kit ends up as a mix, because a site rarely has one ground surface from the gate to the door.
A 5mm Corflute panel with a galvanised wire H-stake pushed into the ground. The cheapest way to sign an open site and the fastest to install. Flutes must run vertically for the stake to slide in. Soft ground after rain is the weak point, so a second stake steadies larger panels.
For hard floors where nothing can be driven in. A plastic or steel A-frame takes an A2 or 600 × 900 mm insert front and back, folds flat for storage and can be weighted. The right answer for foyers, footpaths and any indoor venue that will not allow adhesive or fixings.
Class 1 or Class 2 retroreflective film on ACM, which returns headlight beams straight back at the driver. Essential for evening events where the car park entry, the drop-off zone and the exit route all have to be found in the dark by people who have never been there.
Toilets, accessible entries, first aid, water and emergency exits. These use standard pictograms rather than styled type for a reason: they must be recognised instantly by people who are not reading English or not reading at all. Keep them a consistent colour across the whole site.
Printed PVC or mesh banner with eyelets, cable tied to temporary fencing. Mesh lets wind through, which is why it stays put on long exposed runs where a solid banner would tear its eyelets out. Suits queue lines, festival perimeters and fenced approach paths.
Laminated floor vinyl with a slip-rated surface, applied as arrows or footprints along a route. Useful in conference centres where walls are glass and nothing can be fixed to them. They are a short-term item, holding well for days to a few weeks on clean hard floors.
Printed both faces so the sign reads from either approach direction. Standard for aisle markers, marquee entries and signs hung from truss or scaffold. Corflute blocks light through the flutes, so the two faces never ghost through each other and can carry entirely different messages.
We supply directional sets numbered to a site map, so the crew installing them is not guessing. Leave dates and year references off the artwork and the same kit runs the following year, with only the small number of signs that genuinely change being reprinted.
Open grounds with no existing signage and a crowd that has never been there before. These kits run to dozens of Corflute stake signs covering entry, ticketing, stages, food, toilets, first aid and exits, plus larger orientation boards at each gate. Because they are outdoors for several days, 5mm board matters, and spares are worth ordering for the ones that get run over.
Indoor venues where nothing can be screwed to a wall and adhesive fixings are prohibited. A-frames, freestanding panels and floor graphics do all the work, directing delegates between registration, plenary rooms, breakout sessions and catering. Room allocations change between days and sometimes between sessions, so we often print a base panel with a slot for a changeable insert rather than reprinting the entire set each morning.
A property with a long driveway and no street presence needs signs from the road in: turn here, park here, ceremony this way, reception through there, and an arrow at every fork in the track. Usually eight to fifteen signs, Corflute on wire stakes because the ground is soft, with a reflective panel at the road entrance since guests arrive at dusk and leave in full dark.
Fun runs, market days, open days and finals that repeat on the same site each year with the same layout. The economics favour a durable ACM or reflective kit bought once and stored between seasons, rather than a Corflute set reprinted annually and thrown out each time. We keep the files, so a club can add two extra signs next season and have them match the originals exactly.
Directional artwork is mostly discipline rather than design. One instruction per sign, an arrow you can read from twenty metres, and the same colour on every sign in the kit.
Send the site map and the list of destinations and we will build the whole set, including mirrored left and right arrow versions, and number each sign to its position so installation is a matter of following the list.
A directional kit is a volume job, and because every format is printed and finished here, thirty signs across four formats stay on one schedule instead of four. Give us the bump-in date rather than the event date. Pickup at Ravenhall, delivery metro and regional Victoria, freight interstate, and our own crews can install on site where the ground is difficult or the count is high.
One sign at every point where a person has to make a decision, plus a repeat sign roughly every 50 metres on long unbroken runs.
Walk the route from the car park as though you have never been there. Every corner, fork, doorway and stairwell is a sign. Long straight stretches need a reassurance sign so people do not turn back thinking they have gone the wrong way. A site with one entrance and a short walk might need eight signs; a festival ground with three gates can need eighty.
5mm Corflute on wire stakes for anything up to a few weeks, and 3mm ACM where the signs stay out for a season.
Corflute handles rain without any trouble, since polypropylene absorbs nothing. What limits it is sun and handling: flutes crush, edges scuff, and colour softens over months. For a three-day festival that is irrelevant. For a sign that stays on a rural driveway all summer, ACM is the better spend because it stays flat and holds its colour.
Yes, and they are the single most useful upgrade for evening events. Retroreflective film returns headlight beams to the driver, so the sign lights up from 60 or 70 metres out.
Class 1 film is brighter and used on road signage; Class 2 is adequate for slow-moving car park traffic. Reflective faces only work where headlights hit them, so aim them square to the approach. They do nothing for pedestrians walking with phone torches, who need lit signage or a sign near existing lighting instead.
Yes, if the artwork carries no dates and no year, and the signs are stored flat and dry.
Corflute stored upright in a shed will bow along the flutes over a year. Lay it flat, off concrete, with the stakes removed. ACM survives storage almost indefinitely. We keep every file, so adding a few new signs next season means they match the originals in colour and layout rather than being visibly newer than the rest of the kit.
At minimum: accessible entry and parking, accessible toilets, first aid, water, and emergency exits, all using recognised pictograms rather than styled type.
These signs need to be found by people who are stressed, unfamiliar with the site, or not reading English. Keep them a consistent colour that differs from your event branding, place them at a consistent height, and repeat them more often than you think necessary. Venue and council conditions of hire often specify some of this, so check the permit before finalising the kit.
A-frames, every time, because nothing can be driven into a hard floor and adhesive fixings are usually prohibited by the venue.
An A-frame takes a printed insert front and back, folds flat between events and can be weighted so it does not walk across a polished floor. The downsides are real: they occupy floor space, they are a trip hazard in a crowd, and venues have rules about where they can sit relative to exits. Floor graphics are the alternative where floor space is tight.
Footpath and foyer frames that take a printed Corflute or ACM insert front and back. We supply frame and panel together, or cut inserts for frames you own.
See the detail →Hemmed and eyeletted PVC banners at any size, welded on our own gear — fences, walls, events and shopfronts.
See the detail →Feather and teardrop flags that mark an entry or a car park from a distance, with bases for grass or hard ground.
See the detail →The panel at the end of the wayfinding chain. Acrylic, ACM, foamboard or timber-look, sized from A1 to 1200 × 1800 mm with easels matched to the panel.
See the detail →Browse the full list on our A–Z of everything we print, or see how this fits into signage in Melbourne.
Send a site map or a list of destinations and the bump-in date. We will spec the kit and price it inside two business hours.