Hartford Business Journal

14 Hartford Business Journal • July 18, 2016 www.HartfordBusiness.com Coming: Billboards that can 'see' from page 1 Independent Outdoor President David Gannon and his private company's sales chief, Eric Lambert, both outdoor-ad indus- try veterans, say the 33 digital boards IO has posted from Connecticut into Massachusetts offer more and varied opportunities for cli- ents' advertising "impressions'' on consum- ers than traditional "static'' billboards. Louisiana-based Lamar Advertising Co. accounts for about 1,000 of Connecticut's billboards — mostly in Greater Hartford and Greater New Haven — of which 20 are digi- tal, including two that went live in early June, said Steve Hebert, Lamar's Connecticut vice president/general manager based in Hartford. The nearly infinite ways digital billboards can be programmed to showcase ads with almost high-definition-like color and clarity, with ads rotating every eight to 10 seconds, will keep them outdoor-media darlings for the foreseeable future, Hebert and others say. "It's the technology in the fact that we can upload the ad content directly via the Inter- net,'' Hebert said. "And the client can change the ad copy as often as they want.'' Lamar will install two new electronic boards in the Hartford area before yearend, he said. Hebert and other outdoor-media executives hesitate to share board counts and ad rates — citing what they claim is the highly competitive nature of their business. Rates vary widely, industry experts say, depending on the specific location of a board next to a highly traveled freeway, where bill- board-ad rates tend to be highest, or along a quiet main road. In Independent Outdoor's case, New Brit- ain is home to five of its digital boards. Two of its newest are on I-84 at the Farmington town line, near the UConn Health. The other is along Route 9, at the Stanley Street exit. "We look for premium sites,'' said Gan- non. "Great visibility. No obstructions. And heavy traffic.'' Competition, too, is often heavy for the most coveted roadside sites, Gannon said. Also, the long-term lease contracts between billboard vendors and landowners are rarely broken or come up for renewal. Ex-New Britain Mayor Tim Stewart, now president of the Greater New Britain Chamber of Commerce, said IO's plan to build or convert several billboards to digital drew some opposi- tion. However, in the end, many communities welcome billboards because they generate personal property taxes, yet they "don't gener- ate trash and don't put kids in schools,'' said the father of sitting New Britain Mayor Erin Stewart. "They're unbelievable as long as they're not in a place that's distracting to motorists,'' he said. Independent Outdoor, along with Lamar and West Haven-based Barrett Outdoor Com- munications are Connecticut's largest billboard owners-operators, officials say. Outfront Media, formerly CBS Outdoor, also has a presence. Barrett, too, has three New Britain bill- boards along I-84, one of which went digital a few months ago, Stewart said. Barrett didn't respond to a request for comment. Growing appeal The low rate of sign turnover means just a small percentage of Connecticut's billboards are digital. Over time, however, digital boards will expand as advertisers' demand for them rises and the cost of the technology shrinks, operators say. Independent Outdoor sources its digital boards through an Arizona maker, Gannon said. It hires a contractor to assemble dozens of modules containing colorful light-emitting diodes (LEDs) into an ad-display board typi- cally with the largest displacement, 48 feet wide by 14 feet high (other standard sizes are 25 x 11; and 11 x 5). The modules are easily replaced if they fail, officials said. Construction takes about five days, Lam- bert said, including pouring and setting the concrete that anchors the sign's hefty steel base and framing. Each sign's electronic "brain'' is equipped with software into which Independent Out- door can upload the rotating circuit of ad text and images. The signs also log how many times in a 24-hour period each ad is displayed. With a display time ranging from eight to 10 seconds, a digital billboard can show ads more than 1,400 times in a day, Lambert said. Its digital boards are programmed to dim at night. Moreover, the ability of digital boards to interact with, and display, "dynamic content'' boosts their appeal, Gannon said. Often, the time between an advertiser contracting to "buy'' display time on a digital billboard and when it actually appears, takes anywhere from minutes to a few hours, with the click of a computer mouse transmitting the coded ad message to the billboard vendor, who trans- mits it directly to the sign's microprocessor. Unique displays The technology also allows for some cre- ative billboards. Connecticut radio station 104.1 FM recent- ly used an Independent Outdoor digital board to give passing motorists the title and artist of its aired songs in real time, inviting them to tune in immediately. The upcoming annual Travelers Champion- ship will rely on the billboard vendor's signs along I-84, I-91 and I-95 to provide real-time lead- er-board standings, while urging motorists to either visit the course or watch the match on TV. The boards also deliver "digital countdowns'' for sales events or other promotions, Lambert said. Indeed, new avenues for vendors and cli- ents to interact seem to almost crop up daily. Lambert said industry demos are under- way in which a digital billboard "sees'' the in-grill logo for an approaching vehicle and responds in nanoseconds by cueing a rival carmaker's billboard ad for one of its models. They can also be used to display the names and/or images of contest winners in real time. "It seems like all the time they come out with new stuff for us,'' he said. "There's so many creative things you can do with digital. That's what's driving it.'' Traditional boards, by contrast, are set up pretty much the way they have been for genera- tions. The first leased U.S. billboards appeared in 1867, according to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America Inc., a trade group. Originally, outdoor ads were either printed or painted onto wood- or metal-framed bul- letin boards. As time went on, the styling and printing materials for those message boards have slowly evolved to the point that most are nothing more than machine-made vinyls onto which messages have been printed. Even traditional boards are getting high- tech treatment, growing ever bigger and fea- turing three-dimensional display art. Earlier this year, East Hartford's Out Of Home Amer- ica | Wilkins Media participated in setting up a novel billboard ad for Toyota's RAV-4 SUV in New York's Times Square that featured a climbing wall used by real climbers. n Lamar Advertising's digital board on I-91 in Hartford, north of the Colt Building. Independent Outdoor erected and activated one of its newest Connecticut electronic billboards along I-84 in Waterbury. P H O T O S | C O N T R I B U T E D

• Cover