Billboard Sign
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A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertisements to passing pedestrians and drivers. Typically brands use billboards to build their brands or to push for their new products.
The largest ordinary-sized billboards are located primarily on major highways, expressways, or principal arterials, and command high-density consumer exposure (mostly to vehicular traffic). These afford the greatest visibility due not only to their size, but because they allow creative "customizing" through extensions and embellishments.
Posters are the other common form of billboard advertising, located mostly along primary and secondary arterial roads. Posters are in a smaller format and are viewed principally by residents and commuter traffic, with some pedestrian exposure.
Advertising style
Billboard advertisements are designed to catch a person's attention and create a memorable impression very quickly, leaving the reader thinking about the advertisement after they have driven past it. They have to be readable in a very short time because they are usually read while being passed at high speeds. Thus there are usually only a few words, in large print, and a humorous or arresting image in brilliant color.
Some billboard designs spill outside the actual space given to them by the billboard, with parts of figures hanging off the billboard edges or jutting out of the billboard in three dimensions. An example in the United States around the turn of the 21st century was the Chick-fil-A billboards (a chicken sandwich fast food chain), which had three-dimensional cow figures in the act of painting the billboards with misspelled anti-beef slogans such as "friends don't let friends eat beef."
The first "scented billboard", an outdoor sign emitting the odors of black pepper and charcoal to suggest a grilled steak, was erected on NC 150 near Mooresville, North Carolina by the Bloom grocery chain. The sign depicted a giant cube of beef being pierced by a large fork that extended to the ground. The scents were emitted between 7–10 am and 4–7 pm from 28 May 2010 through 18 June 2010.[1]
Types
Painted
:{:{Almost all these billboards were painted in large studios. The image was projected on the series of paper panels that made up the billboard. Line drawings were done, then traced with a pounce wheel that created perforated lines. The patterns were then "pounced" onto the board with a chalk-filled pounce bag, marking the outlines of the figures or objects. Using oil paints, artists would use large brushes to paint the image. Once the panels were installed using hydraulic cranes, artists would go up on the installed billboard and touch up the edges between panels.}:
These large, painted billboards were especially popular in Los Angeles where historic firms such as Foster & Kleiser and Pacific Outdoor Advertising dominated the industry. Eventually, these painted billboards gave way to graphic reproduction, but hand-painted billboards are still in use in some areas where only a single board or two is required. The "Sunset Strip" in Los Angeles is one area where hand-painted billboards can still be found, usually to advertise upcoming films or albums.[2]}:
A technical invention called "trivision" allowed three different images to be rotated for presentation.[3]
Digital
Digital billboards abound in Times Square, Manhattan.
A digital billboard shows varying imagery and text created with computer programs and software. Digital billboards can be designed to display running text, have several different displays from the same company, or provide several companies with a certain time slot during the day. Flexible and real-time scheduling can decrease traditional upkeep and maintenance costs, and some billboards may measure audiences or serve dynamic content. Using digital billboards dynamically has come to be known as programmatic out-of-home advertising.[4] Billboard posters can play audio using conductive ink; when touched, the posters begin to play sounds.[5][6]
Mobile
Outdoor advertising, such as a mobile billboard, is effective because it is difficult to ignore. According to a UK national survey, it is also memorable. Capitol Communications Group found that 81.7% of those polled recalled images they saw on a moving multi-image sign.[citation ^needed] This is compared to a 19% retention rate for static signs.
Unlike a typical billboard, mobile billboards are able to go directly to their target audience. They can be placed wherever there is heavy foot traffic due to an event – including convention centers, train stations, airports, and sports arenas. They can repeat routes, ensuring that an advertiser's message is not only noticed but that information is retained through repetition.
Multi-purpose
Billboards may be multi-purpose. An advertising sign can integrate its main purpose with a telecommunications antenna or public lighting support. Usually, the structure has a steel pole with a coupling flange on the above-fitted advertising billboard structure that can contain telecommunications antennas. The lighting, wiring, and antennas are placed inside the structure.
Other
Three-sided
:{:{Common along highways are free-standing two-sided as well as three-sided billboards. Other types of billboards include the billboard bicycle attached to the back of a bicycle or the mobile billboard, a special advertising trailer to hoist big banners. Mechanical billboards display three different messages, with three advertisements attached to a conveyor inside the billboard.}:
There are also three-dimensional billboards, such as the ones at Piccadilly Circus, London. Traditional billboards consist of a large format advertisement printed on a resistant material such as vinyl; this is placed on a large metal structure, which makes it one of the media with the most visibility and high impact within the advertising field. ^[7]}:
Placement
A billboard for attachable paper ads near the market square in Seinäjoki, Finland
Some of the most prominent billboards are alongside highways; since passing drivers typically have little to occupy their attention, the impact of the billboard is greater. Billboards are often drivers' primary method of finding lodging, food, and fuel on unfamiliar highways. There were approximately 450,000 billboards on US highways in 1991.[citation ^needed] Somewhere between 5,000 and 15,000 are erected each year. Current numbers are put at 368,263, according to the OAAA (Outdoor Advertising Association of America).[citation ^needed] In Europe billboards are a major component and source of income in urban street furniture concepts.[citation ^needed]
An interesting use of billboards unique to highways was the Burma-Shave advertisements between 1925 and 1963, which had 4- or 5-part messages on multiple signs, keeping the reader hooked by the promise of a punchline at the end. This example is in the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution:
Shaving brushes
You'll soon see 'em
On a shelf
In some museum
Burma-Shave
...
Early billboards basically displayed groups of large posters on the sides of buildings, with limited but still appreciable commercial value. As eyeballs, roads and highways multiplied, the billboard business thrived.
- Late 15th century – Flyposting was practiced in Europe.[31]
- 1796 – Alois Senefelder, working in Bavaria, introduced lithography,[32] which allowed the mass production of posters.
- 1835 – Jared Bell was making 9 × 6[clarification ^needed] posters for the circus in the U.S.
- 1862 – Formation of the United Kingdom Billposting Association.[33]
- 1867 – Earliest known billboard rentals[34]
- 1871 – Fredrick Walker designed one of the first art posters.
- 1872 – International Bill Posters Association of North America (now known as the Outdoor Advertising Association of America) established as a billboard-lobbying group.
- 1889 – The world's first 24-sheet billboard was displayed at the Paris Exposition and later at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The format was quickly adopted for various types of advertising, especially for circuses, traveling shows, and movies.
- Early 1900s – Poster-art schools were established in England, Austria, and Germany.[35]
- 1908 – The Model T automobile was introduced in the U.S., increasing the number of people using highways and therefore the reach of roadside billboards.
- 1919 – Japanese candy company Glico introduced its building-spanning billboard, the Glico Man.
- 1925 – Burma-Shave made billboards lining the highways.
- 1936 – The Wall Drug billboards started to go up nationwide.
- 1960 – The mechanized Kani Doraku billboard was built in Dotonbori, Osaka.
Hertz Rent A Car sign with digital time and temperature display on top of the Texas School Book Depository in 1969, Dealey Plaza, Dallas, Texas, facing Stemmons Freeway
- 1965 – The Highway Beautification Act was passed after much campaigning by Lady Bird Johnson.
- 1969 – The Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act banned cigarette ads in television and radio, moving that business into billboards.[36]
- 1981 – The United States Supreme Court overturned a San Diego billboard ban, but left room open for other cities to ban commercial billboards.[37]
- 1986 – Non-television advertising became restricted – non-television adverts could not show people smoking. This meant that Benson & Hedges and Silk Cut, amongst other brands, advertised their cigarettes through increasingly indirect and obscure campaigns to a point where they became recognizable.
- 1998 – The four major U.S. tobacco companies signed the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement, which eliminated billboard advertising of cigarettes in 52 states.[38]
- 2007 – The industry adopted one-sheet plastic poster replacement for paper poster billboards and began the phase-out of PVC flexible vinyl, replacing it with eco-plastics such as polyethylene.
- 2010 – The first "scented billboard", emitting odors similar to charcoal and black pepper to suggest a steak grilling, was erected in Mooresville, North Carolina by the Bloom grocery chain to promote the sale of beef.[39]
- 2010 – Augmented billboards were introduced in the Transmediale Festival 2010 in Berlin using Artvertiser.