A Leeward Productions Extra

Individually Personalized and Serial-Numbered Custom Aluminum License Plates Imprinting

Variable data and serial numbering for custom
auto and golf cart license plates is now here

Thanks to the variable-data capability of the production line used to produce our full-color aluminum license plates, each tag can be lettered with its own unique alphanumeric serial number, name, title, or motto, etc. Variable data and serial numbers can be sequential/ consecutive or arbitrary/ nonsequential according to your preference. Available only from Leeward Productions, due to our exclusive relationship with the U.S.’s predominant supplier of state-license-plate-grade printing solutions and serial numbering systems to prison industries.

Examples for license plate use include:

• Serial numbering for retirement-community golf carts, or government and corporate vehicle fleets.
• Variable-data imprinting of company job positions, department titles, or store locations for use on car/ truck fleets, such as to help identify employees on job sites.
• Individually personalized employee or student names for special awards.

Also, license plates can be used, reused, and reassigned to different vehicles for more flexibility than permanently applied vinyl decals.

Also useful where numerous small signs may be needed, such as:

• To mark uniquely designated areas within industrial facilities indoors or out. (The heavy-duty state-license-plate-grade construction is made to take a beating from the elements.)
• For fenced areas where a unique, permanent notice or sign is needed for each.

Requirements:

• Overall plate layout and graphics must be identical for all plates.
• Same reserved area must be used for the variable-data imprint on all plates. Up to two variable-data fields per plate can be designated.
• Any font can be used that we have available in our library, one per variable-data field. (Our library is large — ask what we have available, and in most cases we will probably have what you are looking for, or something very similar. If not, we can purchase the font and add it to the cost of your order.)
  
  Kerning and tracking are not supported, however, so we recommend using only a font that looks decent without them. Unlike with other artwork on the plate, where all fonts must be converted to outlines before printing, “live” fonts are used for the variable-data fields. Fonts with kerning tables will work fine, but kerning pairs (whether built-in or manually applied) as well as any tracking applied to variable-data text in your layout file will be ignored. For serial numbers we recommend a monospaced font — where all characters take up the same horizontal space — particularly if the plate layout relies on consistent spacing between the numbers and any adjacent graphics for a balanced appearance. If you are laying out the plate on your end, use a dummy entry for the variable-data text area — our variable-data software will perform all the substitutions. (The longest entry among the variable data items to be printed is recommended for use as the dummy text to make sure the layout can accommodate it.)
• Text size, alignment, and fitting. Text can be any size, and align either flush left, centered, or flush right. All text within a variable-data field must be the same point size and alignment. We will test that the longest entry fits the available space, and can size the text accordingly. If you are laying out the plate graphics yourself, we strongly recommend that you test beforehand on your end using one or more dummy entries with the intended font. Any overset text for the actual imprints will be automatically truncated during output. If the longest entry requires a text size that’s unsatisfactorily small, the tradeoff is to abbreviate the longest entry(ies) so the field’s text size can be larger and all entries still fit.
• Solid/flat colors only for the variable-data imprint. Rest of plate can use blends, gradients, or other photographic effects. The flat color can be defined as either a spot/PMS or process color in the layout file, although PMS colors are converted to process/ CMYK color on output.
• Submission format for variable data. For plates using a single variable-data field on the plate, the process is easy. Simply submit the entries in a common electronic text format such as email or Microsoft Word using a single carriage return between each entry, and we will do the rest.
  
  Variable-data output can span multiple lines on the plate, but entries should still be submitted separated by a single carriage return, using unique separator characters between each intended line of output text for parsing during the import process. (Space-Semicolon-Space separator sequence recommended in such cases.) Alternatively, multiple-line field entries can be entered using a simple Excel spreadsheet template we can furnish. Variable-data text submitted to us via email or Word will be imported into the Excel template anyway on our end, so you can handle that yourself if you prefer.
  
  For plates with two variable-data fields that must be coordinated with each other, filling out our Excel spreadsheet template is mandatory. (Each variable-data field utilizes its own column in the spreadsheet.)
• Proofreading of submitted text is customer’s responsibility. No liability assumed for incorrect copy printed as submitted.