Billboard (advertising)

A billboard or hoarding is a large outdoor signboard, usually wooden, found in places with high traffic such as cities, roads, motorways and highways. Billboards show large advertisements aimed at passing pedestrians and drivers. The vast majority of billboards are rented to advertisers rather than owned by them.

Uses of billboards

Highway billboards

Most highway signs exist to advertise local restaurants and shops in the miles to come and are crucial to drawing business in small towns that no one would stop at otherwise. One illuminating example is Wall Drug, which in 1931 put up billboards advertising "free ice water" and the town of Wall, South Dakota as it is known today was essentially built around the 20,000 customers per day those billboards were bringing in as of 1981. Some signs were even placed in locations great distances away, with slogans such as "only 827 miles to Wall Drug, with FREE ice water." In some areas the signs were so dense that one sign almost immediately followed the last. This situation changed after the Highway Beautification Act was passed; the proliferation of Wall Drug billboards is sometimes cited as one of the reasons the bill was passed.

Related Topics:
Wall Drug - 1931 - Wall, South Dakota - 1981 - Highway Beautification Act

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Big name advertisers

Billboards are also used to advertise national or global brands, particularly in more densely populated urban areas. According to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, the top three companies advertising on billboards as of 2003 were McDonald's, Anheuser-Busch and Miller. A large number of wireless phone companies, movie companies, cars manufacturers and banks are high on the list as well.

Related Topics:
Outdoor Advertising Association of America - McDonald's - Anheuser-Busch - Miller - Wireless phone

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Tobacco advertising

Billboards are also a major venue of cigarette advertising (10% of Michigan billboards advertise alcohol and tobacco, according to the Detroit Free Press http://www.cancer.org/docroot/NWS/content/NWS_2_1x_December_Mixed_Month_for_Tobacco_Opponents.asp). This is particularly true in countries where tobacco advertisements are not allowed in other media. For example in the U.S. tobacco advertising was banned on radio and television in 1971, leaving billboards and magazines as some of the last places tobacco could be advertised. Billboards made the news in America when, in the tobacco settlement of 1999, all cigarette billboards were replaced with anti-smoking messages. In a parody of the Marlboro Man, some billboards depicted cowboys riding on ranches with slogans like "Bob, I miss my lung."

Related Topics:
Cigarette advertising - Advertise alcohol - Radio - Television - 1971 - 1999 - Marlboro Man

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Non-commercial use of billboards

Not all billboards are used for advertising products and services—non-profit groups and government agencies use them to communicate with the public. In 1999 an anonymous person created the God Speaks billboard campaign in Florida "to get people thinking about God", with witty statements signed by God. "Don't make me come down there", "We need to talk" and "Keep using my name in vain, I'll make rush hour longer" were parts of the campaign, which was picked up by the Outdoor Advertising Association of America and continues on billboards across the country to this day.

Related Topics:
Non-profit groups - Government agencies - 1999 - Florida - God - Outdoor Advertising Association of America

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South of Olympia, Washington is the privately owned Uncle Sam billboard. It features conservative, sometimes inflammatory messages, changed on a regular basis. Chehalis farmer Al Hamilton first started the board during the Johnson era, when the government was trying to make him remove his billboards along interstate 5. He had erected the signs after he lost a legal battle to prevent the building of the freeway across his land. Numerous legal and illegal attempts to remove the Uncle Sam billboard have failed, and it is now in its third location. Humor has been more successful. One message, attacking a nearby liberal arts college, was photographed, made into a postcard and is sold in the College Bookstore.

Related Topics:
Olympia, Washington - Chehalis - Liberal arts

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