The other day, I bad a couple minutes to spare, so I thought I’d do so as a proper Lileksian: I decided I’d try out the new Relics Antique Mall on Battlefield Road here in Springfield. I had about 30 minutes, and I knew I would not have time to go through the whole thing, but I’d have the chance to review the self-proclaimed Largest Antique Mall in Missouri (larger than all the other largest antique malls in Missouri, and I think they all claim it). So I turn into the driveway by the huge sign and pull into the parking lot of a large warehouse-or-manufacturing-plant-looking building stuffed between a couple of warehouse and manufacturing style facilities.
The building has two narrow glass doors on either side with no other windows on the building. As I start looking for a parking spot, I see a small 9.5″ by 11″ sign on the first door I pass: Not an Entrance. No identifiers on it. The second door has a similar sign on it, but I didn’t see it clearly. Only that neither of the doors clearly said “Entrance” or “Relics” or offered business hours. They looked like the entrances to, well, an office building or a plant of some sort. Suddenly and sullenly, I was no longer in the mood for an antiquing expedition. And I left.
Because I didn’t know where the damn entrance was.
One thing that trips my Grrr wire (and, apparently, ranting fingers) is a commercial enterprise that won’t tell me where to go for commerce. Whether its nondescript buildings holding an office I need to visit or a yard sale that has ads in the papers and signs on the corners but nothing in the grass by the house to tell me that, yes, there are things for sale way up the driveway, I just say, well, since I have children in the car with me a lot of times, these days I just say, “Never mind.”
Spend a little money for clear lettering and signage where I’m supposed to come in, or I won’t. Spread a little light pollution, for Pete’s sake. Because I’m not going into undermarked doors like this one and chancing that the Millworkers Union might impress me as an apprentice.
That gets my Grrr, too.
Every business open to the public should invite strangers to arrive at and tour the facility and then describe how the layout and signage can be made more user-friendly.