All over America, bare poles stand empty while their missing street signs hang in bedrooms and living rooms as decorations. Visit a college town and it’s even worse. For fun, sport or from simple boredom people are swiping signs at a higher rate than ever before. And if the street has an amusing or interesting name like Corona Street, Rolling Rock Drive or Ragged Ass Road, the sign’s a goner for sure.

The method of stealing street signs varies (but there’s usually some sort of alcohol consumption involved). Some thieves use wrenches or other tools to steal metal signs. With fiberglass signs, they just jump up and rip the signs down with their bare hands.

At first, stealing a street sign might just seem like a prank. But stealing signs can have serious consequences. The theft of a street sign is definitely a crime and can cause problems for emergency responders. If response teams have to drive to an area where signs are missing, they can’t respond as quickly or as effectively as possible.

Each city has different laws for stealing street signs or for owning a stolen sign. Street signs are considered city property and punishment for theft can include anything from a ticket to jail time. However, if the sign theft leads to an injury, then the thief may be brought up on criminal charges.

Replacing street signs is also expensive an inconvenient for the city – costing taxpayers thousands. Not only do they pay for the replacement sign, but also for the time and labor to install it.

Cities are always looking for ways to prevent street sign theft. Here are a few ideas.

• Use aluminum signs. Metal signs are stronger than fiberglass or plastic signs, making them more difficult to tear down without the use of tools.
• Invest in tamper-proof sign mounting hardware. Specially shaped nuts and bolts require a special tool and cannot be removed with a standard wrench or screwdriver.
• Tag the street signs with a tamper-evident asset tag.  A tag with the city information on it will help get the signs returned to the city and make prosecution of the thief easier.

Seton offers a variety of street sign theft-prevention items including Tamper-Proof Nuts and Bolts and Tamper-Evident Asset Tags. And for those would-be thieves out there, Seton has Street Signs that you can customize with any name or wording you want – no need to steal them!

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A slogan once used to promote Virginia Slim cigarettes; it can also be used to describe the history of the modern day bar code. This coming Saturday, June 26, marks the anniversary of the first bar code used in a checkout line in 1974. A pack of Wrigley’s gum was swiped across the first checkout scanner at a supermarket in Troy, OH.

What started as a mere idea in 1938 has now developed into a convenient way to track your assets. As we approach this day I’d like remind you that Seton offers many bar code labels such as DuraGuard, SetonGuard and QuickGuard to help you keep track your facility’s assets. They are ideal for equipment tracking, inventory control and help to deter theft of company items.

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What are the differences between Brass, Aluminum and Stainless Steel Tags?

Without knowing the differences between the 3 metals it may be hard to decide which metal tag would be best for your asset identification application.  Here is a brief description for each metal that will help you make an educated decision.

Brass - Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc. It is distinguishable by its gold color. Brass tags can be used indoors or outside, they have good scratch resistance and withstand a temperature maximum of 1,200°F.

Aluminum – Aluminum is a softer and more pliable metal. Aluminum tags can be bent by hand, making them excellent for use on slightly curved surfaces. Use indoors or outside. Aluminum tags scratch easily, but have good chemical resistance and can withstand a temperature maximum of 1,000°F.

Stainless Steel – Stainless Steel tags are tough enough for the harshest environments. They can be used indoors or outside and resist corrosion associated with moist air and water. Stainless Steel tags have a shinier finish than Aluminum and have excellent resistance to scratching and chemicals. They can withstand a temperature maximum of 1,200°F.

Seton carries a wide selection of Brass, Aluminum and Stainless Steel tags. Choose from stock or custom. Visit our Asset Tags section to find exactly what you need.

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Are your assets properly labeled and classified? Do you have an accurate inventory of all your physical assets?

If not, you may be in violation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

What is Sarbanes-Oxley?

The Sarbanes Oxley Act of 2002 has had a major impact on the level of disclosure required by public companies. It requires significant improvements to the overall monitoring and internal scrutiny of public companies’ corporate governance processes and financial reporting processes.

What is Required?

Publicly held companies have faced increased requirements for more accurate audit standards and internal controls on their fixed assets and their values. The act requires every transaction to be available for analysis and reporting. This includes the purchase and sale of assets. Though traditionally, many companies did not assign high priority to maintaining detailed, auditable records on fixed assets, this legislation changes the rules. Tracking fixed assets is now a critical part to every publicly traded company’s financial reporting.

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DuraGuard Asset Tags from Seton are ideal for asset and equipment tracking, inventory control and to deter theft.

They are made from a multi-layered metalized polyester material with a gloss finish and contain a universal adhesive that is easy to apply with no roller needed.
Use DuraGuard Asset Tags on computers, electronics, equipment and other clean, dry surfaces. Other specs include:

• Protective topcoat that keeps the tags resistant to abrasion, handling and solvents
• Custom wordings, company logos and designs can be added to the tags
• Tamper resistant and have a minimum application temperature of 50°F
• Service temperature range of -40°F to 293°F and an average outdoor durability of 3-5 years

Order your DuraGuard Asset Tags  and get 20% Off by entering ES0198 at checkout. Thanks for shopping at Seton.com!

Offer expires March 20, 2010.

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Bar Codes play an essential part in tracking many different types of assets.  There are different types of bar code symbologies for different types of bar code applications.  It may be difficult for the general customer to decide what the best option is for their company’s asset management system.  Here is a quick explanation of the most commonly used bar code symbologies.

Code 39:

Code 39 is the most popular bar code symbology used for ID, inventory, tracking and labeling. It is also specified in many military and government specifications. Code 39 (or Code 3 of 9) is the most common bar code in use for custom applications. It is popular because it can support both text and numbers (A‹Z, 0‹9, +,-, ., ). It can be read by most types of scanners/bar code readers. Characters available for encoding include uppercase letters and numbers. It can be printed in a wide variety of sizes and dimensions. Code 39 is self checking and not prone to substitution errors.

Code 128:

This type of bar code is used mostly in the shipping and electronics industry and on labels. This code is variable in length, alphanumeric, and continuous where all spaces are part of the characters. Each character consists of three bars and three spaces. For general-purpose use, Code 128 is usually the best choice. This is a very compact, high density symbol. Because of its high density – the number of data characters per inch of bar code or width of the bar code – it makes very efficient use of space. Encoded characters include numbers, letters and special characters.

Code Interleaved 2 of 5:

Interleaved 2 of 5 is the most popular bar code used by shipping and warehouse industries. It is also used in the medical field.  You’ll see these bar codes on ground shipping boxes from the major shipping companies. The code is variable in length and is numeric only. The data to be encoded must contain even number of digits as each two digit numbers is uniquely represented by a set of bars and spaces in the bar code. The character ‘0′ may be added to the beginning, if the data does not contain an even number of digits. The bars encode the odd digits, and the spaces encode the even digits. Prone to substitution errors, you should always use a checksum. Checksums are additional characters appended to bar codes to guarantee good reads.

Seton offers a wide variety of bar code labels and asset management products to meet your company’s specific needs.

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Every company, no matter how large or small, has assets.  Phones, computers, mobile devices, office furniture, production equipment, tools, software, books.  It could go on and on!  Without a method of tracking these assets they can easily be lost or stolen.  Lost assets cost money.  According to a 2008 article in InfoWorld, the cost of stolen laptops to businesses ranges from $70,000 to $1 million annually.  Ensuring that all company assets are where they should be is a great way to keep costs under control.

Seton offers a wide selection of asset tags, asset management software and hardware to meet your specific needs.

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Shop seton.com  for the largest and most comprehensive selection of safety, labeling and signage products and get 20% off orders of $199 or more. 

Choose from a wide assortment of labels, decals, asset tags, pipe markers,  OSHA signage and much more.

Just enter Service No. ES0188 in the service number field during checkout on seton.com.

But hurry, offer expires February 6, 2010.

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What has almost 1000 pages and is practically bursting at the spine with an incredible selection of products? The 2010 Seton Source Book!

Seton’s Source Book is an annual offering of all of Seton’s products in one handy (and large!) catalog. And, it’s called a “Source Book” for good reason. The 2010 Edition has every pipe marker, asset tag, safety sign and warehouse product that you’ll ever need to address the unique requirments of your business.

From Custom and Specialty Labels to Traffic & Parking Signs, Workzone Safety Equipment to Seals & Locks, the 2010 Source Book is the singular source for all that is safety, labeling and signage products.

We’re sure that once you see the new 2010 Source Book, it’ll never leave your desk. Want a FREE 2010 Source Book for your company? Order one HERE.

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