Teaching an old dog a new trick is difficult business. When it comes to advertising, the classic billboard is about as old a hound of the print breed that you'll find. Sometimes they move, wave, blind, use a lenticular lens, or countdown to grab out attention. But, more often than not it's creative (and often times provocative) messages that captures our attention best. Here's a great example of the "not" with a very unique twist.Until now, we've never seen backlit electroluminescent billboards. Using patented low voltage electro luminescent Light Tape® lamps, Jeep has partnered up with Activision to promote the special edition Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 (MW3) Wrangler and Wrangler Unlimited. It claims to be "the toughest in the world", or "any world" for that matter. However, at first glance, the imagery is generally unassuming and fairly bland in the flavor of your typical Jeep advertisement. Then, after nightfall, the action begins.Checkout this other billboard experiment by Gillette: http://theideagap.com/post/3490332397/multi-stage-billboard-experiment.
This summer, the mayor of Sao Paulo approved a new law banning billboard advertising in the city. It's a zero tolerance law which has resulted in a ton of the city suddenly becoming open. Many billboards were erected with the permission of local residents who collected a fee for allowing advertising on their property, so suddenly houses are appearing from the shadow of their "sponsors". Photographer Tony De Marco has some great shots of the "city that said no to advertising" on his flickr page. Any reader of Howard Gossage's views on billboards will see this as a great step towards removing visual pollution in cities that are polluted enough. Personally, I've never been an anti-billboard man. If they're great like the Economist stuff that's been running in the UK for years or innovative like this Mini ad in Europe billboards are a brilliant addition to an urban landscape. Who am I kidding...the majority are rubbish, but to remove them all seems a bit extreme to me. What's your vote?