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slap your ad on us
Agency renting sides of trucks and boxes
By Jennifer Cox
Going postal is suddenly taking on new meaning.
Facing budget deficits and growing competition, the U.S. Postal Service is looking to a new source for some much-needed revenue.
It appears it has found it: advertising.
Beginning the first of the year, the Postal Service launched an aggressive campaign to sell advertising space on the sides of its delivery trucks, collection boxes and mailing materials, as well as on the walls of its offices and inside its lobbies.
"This is an opportunity to generate new revenue and keep postage rates low," says John Ward, vice president of core business marketing for the Postal Service.
Ward says the Postal Service is looking for substantial national buys from what he terms Fortune 100 companies.
Potential advertisers currently have to contact him if they are interested in any of the Postal Service's space, since there is no agency handling the project.
"Ultimately, I envision a third party becoming involved to serve as the U.S. Postal Service's agent," he says. "An outdoor company to bring their expertise to the projects."
A commercial truck campaign, begun in December before the full program got underway, placed AOL on 10,000 trucks in the country's 10 most popular markets. The AOL advertisements capitalize on their placement by featuring the familiar email notification, "You've got mail."
Ward says the Postal Service hopes to eventually have 30,000 to 40,000 trucks out of the agency's 200,000 vehicles, which travel in the top 25 markets, bearing advertisements.
The trucks available for ads will be traveling in high-visibility downtown business districts.
"I don't think you'll see ads on trucks in rural Kansas," says Ward.
The spaces up for grabs measure 45 inches by 108 inches on the larger vehicles and 34 inches by 49 inches on the smaller trucks. Ward says approximately 70 percent of the ads available are on the smaller Postal Service trucks.
Ward won't discuss how much the spaces will cost, or how much AOL paid for their ads. He acknowledges that the ad rates will obviously differ from market to market and says the Postal Service's prices are competitive with the average cost of putting an ad on a city bus.
He notes, however, that the regulations for ads on the trucks, as well as for the other venues, differ greatly from those of city buses.
First off, the Postal Service will not accept advertisements from tobacco, alcohol, and firearms manufacturers. The agency won't feature issue-related messages or ads from its competitors.
The Postal Service is also refusing to divide the spaces, so that one truck will never feature more than one ad.
"We want to make sure to steer clear of classified type ads," he says of sharing the ad spaces. "The space isn't for small, local advertisers."
Advertisements on collection boxes are also expected to appear as early as next month. Nearly 40,000 boxes in large cities and high traffic areas will begin featuring ads measuring 19 inches by 15 inches on both sides of the boxes.
The Postal Service is also putting ads on its packaging materials, specifically its priority envelopes and stamp booklets.
Visa has already bought space on 20 million priority envelopes, which works out to be a two-month national supply. The ad, featured on both sides of the envelopes, stars Lance Armstrong and the Visa-sponsored U.S. Pro Cycling Team.
The Postal Service also hopes to capitalize on the one billion stamp booklets it sells a year. Ideas still in development include putting ads on the back of stamp booklets and behind self-adhesive stamps.
"If there's a market for them and we have the right creative vision, we'll do it," says Ward.
Next on the Postal Service's plan is to cash in on the millions of visitors that visit the post office every year.
Inside post office lobbies, 36 inch by 24 inch poster size spaces are now available for advertisements. Rotating signs are being developed for the offices as well and should be available soon, according to Ward.
The Postal Service owns 7,000 of its offices and plans on eventually renting 1,000 of its offices' outside walls for billboard ads.
The idea is not a new one. Ward reports that the Murray Hill Post Office in New York City, located directly outside the Midtown Tunnel, has featured a British Airways ad for years.
"Thirty million cars drive past that ad every year," he says.
The billboard spaces, which vary in size, are currently being prepared for use. Ward says when the walls are ready, the Postal Service will work with various outdoor agencies on a case-by-case basis.
-Jennifer Cox is a staff writer for Media Life.
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