Palmer Products Corporation — Website Design & Development

Ask anyone in the glass industry; they know Palmer, and with good reason. Some of Palmer’s adhesives have been a part of buildings since they first were constructed, a humble and reliable triumph — something in the background that acts as the bond of architecture we see and properties we enjoy. We might not even realize Palmer’s footprints around us, and yet the technical precision and dependability serve everyone regardless of what we understand at first sight.

Palmer-Ball and his timeless impact are a testament to the American dream — a man born in England in 1885, who immigrated to the U.S. believing in hard work and the power of working with his hands to make change possible. He went on to build a legacy from the ground up — and his son, S.W. Palmer-Ball, the last boy of seven and the youngest of nine children, expanded this company’s legacy, landing among those recognized by the Glass Industry Hall of Fame in 1995 for his work. 

The company made many products over the years, including mirror adhesives in small batches — something that when first developed in 1933 was considered a sideline product. In the 1970s, S.W. Palmer-Ball recognized the world was changing and the glass industry was ripe for a new era. He saw that the time for mirrors using adhesives in homes, hotels, and casinos was right. He followed his father’s high standards and made new connections and relationships within the glass industry to establish Palmer Mirro-Mastic ® as the standard for the industry. 

There’s no limit to who has turned to Palmer’s reputable products, from a Miami artist working on a large-scale project in LA to a yacht builder in the Middle East designing mirrors on the bedroom ceiling for a sheik's daughter. You may have gone holiday shopping in a Kohl’s, Express, or Victoria’s Secret department store without realizing that Palmer’s mirror adhesives help hold those buildings together. Maybe you've seen Joanna Gaines on HGTV's Fixer Upper renovating a home with the name Palmer in the background. Palmer Products may be in the background, but the company’s mirror adhesives have played no small part, even used in a 9/11 commemorative structure at the Pentagon. 

These kinds of resources, experience, along with knowledge of technical applications are hard to come by —  and Palmer Products has been cultivating a foundation of mirror adhesive insights for almost a century. When it comes to the business of quality and professionalism, customers have learned they can bet on Palmer Products for even longer. With a name that’s been time-tested for the ages, it’s no wonder customers feel secure using it. 

It’s not just about being the first company to market a mirror adhesive. This legacy also comes down to long-standing human values, like an unwavering anchor in integrity, one passed down by a father's father. As a small business, closely overseen quality control is a key advantage. Perhaps precisely because this company is family-owned, there’s an unmatched commitment to elevating the customer journey; allowing the Palmer-Balls to deliver excellent products.

Today, Lawrence Palmer-Ball, Sr.’s dedicated descendants run Palmer Products in Louisville, Kentucky, adapting the business as it initially began: to keep making products that people want to buy. The revolutionary Mirro-Mastic was first formulated for adhering plate glass mirror and acrylic mirror to various substrates, tested in the field and in the laboratory to ensure compatibility with major brands of mirror and backing paints. Palmer-Ball, Sr.’s son, S.W. Palmer-Ball led Mirro-Mastic to become an industry standard and proceeded to grow the company’s adhesives line in 1993 with the high-quality, fast-curing QwikSet Mirro-Mastic. 

Since then, the Palmer-Ball family has carried this legacy forward, delivering the solvent-free, low VOC SuperSet Mirro-Mastic in 2017: a product that qualified for LEED Green Building Rating System credit. Palmer Products has worked hard to meet the changing needs of the industry. Today’s generation invests thoughtful attention to environmental impact, with products that are premium for customers and the planet alike. 

Palmer continues to test with mirrors from all over the globe, maintaining technical precision in every product made. For a new era, the family-owned and operated company, with generations of history behind the name, sought to revamp Palmer Products’ web presence. 

“I really enjoyed working with them and being able to enhance and optimize their presence online. Their products are top-notch so we wanted to deliver a site for them to deliver the same quality results,” notes Pfeifer, who appreciated that Palmer’s “branding is so unique to them.” When a company like Palmer has branding that tells the story of a family’s decades of diligence to perfecting quality that lasts, it’s particularly satisfying to create a just-right fit for a refreshed website. 

Pfeifer enjoyed seeing the details come together, where authentic history became an indispensable part of Palmer’s rejuvenated site: “We loved incorporating the vintage style into the site. At the same time we kept it clean and simple and easy to use.” Choosing the best framework to craft a smooth user-friendly journey meant all hands on deck. 

This kind of careful weaving of details takes a cohesive team to pull off flawlessly; one which Moso commends Chase Crawford, Back-End Developer, for implementing with speed and razor-sharp accuracy: “Setting up products on the back-end involved incredible collaborative effort, where Chase Crawford hit the ground running on the interface.” The result was well worth the endeavor, as Moso feels proud “clients can now gain the access they need to locate exceptional mirror adhesives.” 

Crawford explains that there was a “unique challenge” that Hatfield Media’s team “achieved tying all the different pieces of information (specifications, certificates, videos, downloadable assets, product variants, etc.) to each special product.” After storing “that information in a way the front-end team could easily plug the assorted data into Palmer’s new site design,” Crawford feels “proud of how we pulled all those pieces together, making them easily manageable through our backend interface.”

Graphic Designer at Hatfield Media, Morgan Fletcher, likewise understood that elevating Palmer’s brand meant a close-up lens on detail work, noting, “I knew I’d need to laser-in on details that would bring refreshing modernization to this respected company. The challenge would be in finding a professional way to breathe rejuvenation into the color scheme.”

Achieving a modern look that reflects the company’s spirit meant drawing inspiration from Palmer’s products themselves. Fletcher says, “I played with the backgrounds from images of Palmer’s innovative products, achieving a sense of colors really popping off the page. Additionally, I welcomed some new brand colors to the site’s redesign, to signal a fresh next era for Palmer’s remarkable legacy.” 

Palmer Products is a family-owned, third-generation business. While embracing a site that is clean, sleek, and modern, Hatfield appreciated Palmer’s unique history; and wanted to help the company hold onto that in the redesign. Preserving the past while building a future-oriented site, Hatfield delivered a web redesign that would feel current for Palmer’s target audience; without losing the very history that makes Palmer respected and trusted across the industry. 

Now, Palmer can leap into the future in more ways than one; connected through the past, infusing traditional colors and fonts selected with care; unified with a modern twist — perceptive to devoted users and their enhanced site journey.  Moreover, Hatfield delivered on what mattered most to Palmer’s customers: easier site navigation.  After all, Palmer has prioritized what customers want since the inception of this business in the early 1900s. 

This new site was made to align with the forward movement that represents Palmer Products. It’s this kind of momentum that has defined the company’s respected history as much as its budding future. 

From the very beginning, this company has done just that: grown from its family-oriented roots to better meet tomorrow's market. As Palmer adapts once more to the world's changes with innovation and resilience, this website opens the doors for a rich history to inspire lasting ways to move beyond.

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