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Meter mania: Posting your Captive audience shoveling for quarters By Kathy Prentice |
Streetscape architecture is the basis for an explosion of out-of-home advertising venues, with one of the latest ideas to take hold being ads attached to parking meter poles.
With
5 million poles in the face of the consumers feeding the meters several times
a day, we can only wonder why someone didn't fully exploit this opportunity
earlier.
Advertisers
have been hanging messages on meter poles almost since the parking meter was
invented, but of late the business has been blossoming.
In some cases, it's becoming downright sophisticated, with the
sort of creative one would expect to find in much tonier venues.
There are a handful of companies selling ads on parking meters, according
to Kim Jackson, director of professional development for the Fredericksburg,
Va.,-based International Parking Institute.
Park Place
Media, operating out of New York, has patented a pole-mounted display
chassis that carries up to three ads for the same product. Media Life recently
talked with Park Place president Chip Fisher on his cell phone from a New
York street to get the skinning on the recently hot medium.
This
is the sixth is a Media Life series on how to buy the new out-of-home venues.
They will appear on Mondays.
Fast Facts:
What: Three-side, three-dimensional, Lexon-sheathed ad displays attached to
parking meter poles.
Who: Park Place
Media has its boxy displays sprouting on meters in Massachusetts and Florida,
and the company says they'll soonbe seen on streets of New York and New Jersey.
A handful of other companies, some in Canada and overseas, are dabbling in
meter media.
How it works:
- The company obtains all municipal approval and pays a rental fee for the poles.
- Advertiser provides creative and the printed panels, which can be black and white or four color and must be laminated. The company provides specifics.
- Fisher says sequential ads (like the Burma Shave campaigns) are ideal for meter media. He recommends leaving lots of white space, using logos and simple messages, "not text or graphic heavy."
- Each module holds three 8.24" tall
by 6.25" wide laminated ads
There is only one advertiser on each meter module but the ads for the same product often vary. - Two advertisers per block is the maximum
Park Place will sell. Most of their advertisers take several blocks or a
whole neighborhood.
Company installs and maintains ads. - Brand advertisers use to extend out-of-home
campaigns.
Message is delivered sequentially, on meters extending down a street.
Glow in the dark is available
Markets:
Currently available in Springfield, Massachusetts, Bayonne, New Jersey, and Miami and Hollywood, Fla. Negotiating in Atlantic City, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco.
Park Place focuses on major media markets, college and university towns and New Jersey, where strings of small to medium-sized towns provide a dense market.
Numbers:
How measured?
Data is in the
process of being refined to be presented in CPSs,says Fisher.
Surprisingly, drivers are the top targeted population, followed by pedestrians and then meters users. Fisher notes that 40 percent of parking spaces are vacant at any time in most areas. The average city block is 800 feet long, with eight meters spaced 10 feet apart.
Messages can be seen from 25 feet away, and meter pole advertising combines impact, reach and frequency at a lower cost-per-thousand than other out-of-home venues,k according to Park Place.
Research:
What products/categories do well?
Alternative media does best, according to Karen Merimah, Park Place Media’s New York sales representative. Dot.coms have "incredibly focused and short cycles," says Fisher. He adds that Hollywood movie announcements, real estate and media all do well.
Automotive, sports teams and Hispanic magazines and dot.coms are doing well in Florida and New Jersey.
Making the buy:
- Demographics can be targeted. "You can cherry pick by neighborhood, precise demographics, zip codes," says Fisher.
- One hundred meters is the minimum buy. Fisher calls 250 to 1,000 meters in the same market "a serious placement." An advertiser can buy an entire neighborhood.
- Recommended showings are 12 weeks and discounts are offered for long-term advertisers. Minimum showings are four weeks.
- Prices vary from $66 per meter ($22 per side), with prices dropping as quantities increase. Costs are per month, gross, and don’t include production, which usually runs about a dollar and a half per sign.
- Six weeks lead time is expected. Two months is preferred.
- Park Place Media is not taking tobacco or adult entertainment advertisements.
- Most buys are made through ad agencies and media buying services.
- Sales offices for Park Place Media are in New York and Miami.
What’s unique:
Municipalities get 3 percent of the meters for their own advertising. Fire and police can place ads, as well as announcements of local events and other civic messages.
Who’s already on meter media?
Marriott Hotels, United Way, Geico Auto Insurance, VFS Graphics and Miami Internet Alliance
What they’re saying:
"We had 15 to 20 advertisers in the trial runs in Springfield, Mass., and retained every one. It was a pleasant surprise"--Chip Fisher, Park Place Media president.
Web site info:
-
Park Place Media http://www.parkplacemedia.com
- International Parking Institute http://www.parking.com
-Kathy Prentice writes about outdoor advertising for Media Life, penning her stories from the resort town of Traverse City, in the upper reaches of Michigan.