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Digital billboards are signs of the times
 Billboard companies in some cases have agreed to remove traditional signs in exchange for being allowed to install digital billboards. Community organizations don't always like the deals, however. [Photo: Mark Wemple] Size: The majority of electronic billboards are 14 feet by 48 feet. Power consumption: In 2006, a 14-by-48-foot digital billboard consumed an average of 9,000 kilowatt-hours a month — enough to run about 10 houses. Today, the same size billboard uses on average fewer than 4,000 kilowatt-hours. Revenue: Rates vary, but a typical digital billboard might feature eight advertisers, each paying between $3,500 and $4,000 a month for an eight- to 10-second time slot that appears in rotation every 64 to 80 seconds, for a cumulative total of 3 hours per day. Ad rates for a traditional billboard featuring a single advertiser might range from $2,000 to $2,500 a month. Construction cost: From $200,000 to $500,000 (can be as high as $1 million), not including maintenance, electricity and other operational costs Remote control: Messages can be changed and uploaded over the internet, enabling advertisers to target ads to specific days or certain times of the day. |
| Major Messengers Three companies dominate the outdoor advertising business, accounting for nearly 70% of the more than 17,000 billboard permits in the state. Lamar Advertising Clear Channel CBS Outdoor |
Collectively, the diodes can render up to 4.4 trillion colors. Sensors coupled with sophisticated software automatically adjust the LEDs to keep images and text clear regardless of clouds, fog or glaring sunlight. Over the course of 64 seconds, the billboard will display ads for eight companies.
The sign — one of 27 that Clear Channel Outdoor operates in the Tampa Bay region and one of 102 it has installed statewide since 2006 — can bring Clear Channel Outdoor as much as $30,000 a month in revenue, many times what it gets from a traditional, "static" billboard.
Some 217 digital billboards now dot Florida roadways, and the number is growing. While industry representatives say they'll never displace traditional billboards completely, the digital signs are an "important part of the future" for billboard companies, says Joe Little, chairman of the Florida Outdoor Advertising Association and also vice president of real estate in the southeast region for CBS Outdoor.
Getting to that future, however, involves dealing with local governments and, often, opposition from local citizens groups. The community organizations tend to object to digital billboards on traditional grounds — they're unsightly, they say. And the groups also argue that digital signs create a greater visual distraction for drivers than traditional billboards.
So far, the industry has crafted a mostly successful strategy to gain acceptance by emphasizing the benefits of digital billboards — positioning them, for example, as elements in community alert systems that can be used to help find fugitives, track down missing children or warn of severe weather.
Billboard companies have also struck various deals with cities. Miami, for example, collects between $4 million and $6 million annually from billboard companies paying to put signs on city-owned property.
The billboard companies also have been willing to negotiate "swap" deals with communities — for every digital billboard that a company puts up, it agrees to remove some number of traditional billboards. Winter Park, for example, allows digital companies on a case-by-case basis to put up one digital billboard in exchange for taking down three older signs. Tampa and Orlando have established a 1-for-4 swap, and Pinellas County has a 1-for-2 exchange.
 Joe Little, chairman of the Florida Outdoor Advertising Association and also vice president of real estate in the southeast region of CBS Outdoor, says digital signs are an "important part of the future" for billboard companies. [Photo: Mark Wemple] |
