The California legislature is considering issuing digital license plates, turning the automobiles on which they are affixed to miniature - and moving - billboards. Lawmakers are being asked to conduct a feasibility study on the subject, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Other uses for the digital license plates would include notices about hazardous road conditions and Amber Alerts. The ads or messages would be displayed only after the car has been stopped for four seconds, for safety reason. When it begins moving again, the plate numbers reappear. Whether the concept will ever reach fruition remains to be seen. There are a number of reasons not to introduce such tags, despite the revenue they would bring to the cash-strapped state. These include privacy issues and the possibility of hacking.
What's For Dinner?
The concept, though, represents the ever-growing creativeness of outdoor ad formats, digital or otherwise. There is, for example, a billboard in Mooresville, NC, for a division of Food Lion, Bloom, that is shaped as a giant piece of steak on a fork. What is unique about it is that it entices passerby's with the aroma of steak or barbecue, reports the local Fox news station. A high-powered fan at the bottom of the billboard blows air over cartridges loaded with the BBQ fragrance oil, explains Murray Dameron, marketing director for Charlotte-based ScentAir, which provides custom scents and fragrance-delivery systems for hotel lobbies, casino gambling and retail stores.
"With all the advertising around, you wanna be able to jump out and really grab the consumer's attention," said Angie Hunter, a spokesperson for Bloom stores. (via Fox News).
Clean Green Graffiti
Then there is GreenGraffiti, a Dutch marketing firm that is making a name for itself by plastering public property with a type of graffiti that services as advertising. Essentially what the firm does - which may or may not be legal according to the New York Times - is wash city sidewalks using stencils and high-pressure water sprayers. The 'clean' words and images left behind in the grime are the advertising. Besides being different, it is also environmentally friendly, the company claims.
DOOH Gets Creative
The sexist applications, though, are undoubtedly in the digital space. A Toronto firm, AddMirror, has developed a digital ad format for bathroom mirrors and is in the process of placing them in restaurants and lounges in Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary, writes the Toronto Star. The ad is printed on film behind two-way glass that is backlit by LED lighting, the Star explains.
Custom software runs images in a 20-second loop. It remains dormant until a person is standing before the sink and mirrors, at which point a motion sensor triggers the ad storyboard. Right now the company has convinced 80 restaurants to carry its ad-mirrors; these venues will get paid whether or not the company signs a deal with advertisers.
"We're trying to get some great advertisers up front and then we think it will build on itself," says AddMirror president Elliott Atkins. Some advertisers have signed up, according to the Star: a mutual fund company has crafted a campaign in such words as "sock drawer" and "mattress," run across the screen before revealing its name and the statement that mutual funds are a better place to put your money.
