How to attach plant stakes to Plants Map signs and tags

sign-and-tag-1

[Posted 10/26/14. Updated 8/28/19]

You’ve just received your plant signs and tags and plant stakes and now it’s time to assemble them and put them out in your landscape. Here are a few tips to help you to attach your stakes to your signs so that you will have permanent mounting and you do it without accidentally attaching the signs or tags upside down.

We ship Plants Map interactive tags and signs tightly wrapped in cellophane so that during shipping they do not get scratched or damaged. Plants Map stakes are wrapped in sets of 10 so that we can easily count them and so they fit in the shipping box neatly. Many of you order a mixture of short plant stakes and long stakes. It would be nearly impossible for us to pre-assemble your order and make sure we put the right stake with the correct plant label.

So, what this means is that when you receive your order, you’ll need to attach the stakes to your signs and tags. It’s easy, but if you are not careful, you could attach the tags and signs upside down.

VIDEOS:

The material that coats the tags and signs is very durable but when I start to assemble my plant stakes and signs, I normally lay a towel down on my kitchen table first.
I divide up my tags and signs into groups where I want to use long stakes and another group where I want to use short stakes and then work on a group all at once.
Next, I lay the signs out in a grid so that I can read them all. The text reads left to right and from top to bottom. Once I double-check that these are all grouped for a certain size stake, I will turn the tags and signs over in the horizontal direction so that the to of the tag or sign is facing away from me. I will do this for all of the tags in the grid
Then, I peel off the protective paper from the VHB double-sided tape on one stake and line it up with where I want to mount it on my sign. This VHB tape from 3M is extremely sticky and very, very strong. Once you press it onto a tag or sign, it is almost impossible to remove.
When I’m lined up where I want it, I press the stake and tape onto the back of the tag or sign. I will hold my thumb on the stake for about 5 seconds, pressing it down with a little force, just to make sure there is a good connection between the two. The instructions that come with the VHB tape say you should hold for 20 seconds but I’ve found that 5 seconds works good and sometimes I’ll hold the pressure a little longer just to be safe.
When that is finished, I’ll pick up that stake, turn it around and check that I lined everything upright and then set that aside and repeat the process for all of the tags in my grid. Then I’ll change to my other group where I’m planning to use the other stake length and repeat the process until I’m done.