Many saavy business people realised early on that the ooh advertising sector was tremendously lucrative. It has been through the ‘end of print’ the ‘digital age’ and now the rise of programmatic advertising. Billboards have and continue to be the bread and butter of major advertising agencies and media houses – so who better to focus on than the BIGGEST billboard companies in the world? We dive through the Top 9 biggest billboard companies across the United States, Europe, Asia and Australia based on their revenues from 2022.
1. JC Decaux
JCDecaux French advertising, brand marketing, and outdoor advertising business JCDecaux was established in 1964. Their main office is in the French island of Ile-de-France, Plaisir. Founded by Jean-Claude Decaux, the business is currently family-owned and has over 1 million advertising panels spread throughout more than 80 nations. In 1964, they created street furniture advertising, and today they are the industry pioneer. JCDecaux is also the only multinational company that develops street furniture, transportation, and billboard advertising only for outdoor use. Their resume is really excellent and is packed with ambient, traditional, and digital work. In Vilnius, Lithuania, they put up a huge interactive lipstick last year for Avon. The audience could press the large red button on the gigantic lipstick to receive free lipsticks.
Transit would also be there, of course, and it is prevalent in their portfolio. One such is the carnival celebration in Brazil, for which they collaborated with Ambev and Skol to create and paint four metro waggons in So Paulo.
One of the busiest metro stations in Shangai was converted into a hip art gallery for Veet as another example of their excellent work. It was done to honour contemporary women. Visit JCDecaux’s Instagram account to see more. In 2018, they generated an estimated $4.273 billion in revenue.
2. Clear Channel Outdoor
Clear Channel Outdoor is one of the oldest outdoor advertising firms in the US. It was first established in Oregon in 1901 as Foster and Kleiser, then in 1986 it was sold and rebranded to Patrick Media. In 1995, it was sold once more and changed its name to Eller Media Company. In 2001, Clean Channel Outdoor was created. Additionally, it joined the iHeartMedia family and relocated its US offices to San Antonio, Texas. Anything that falls under the category of outdoor advertising, including as billboards, bus shelters, subways, transit equipment, street furniture, posters, and airports, is of interest to Clear Channel. They are spread out around the nation, specifically in 44 States, and they only operate on the U.S. market. The largest outdoor advertising company in the US, Clean Channel has a digital outdoor network with 1,200 displays and is currently experiencing the fastest growth. In 2018, they generated $2.722 billion in sales.
They have work in their portfolio for companies including Nike, Audi, and Uber. The women from the US women’s soccer team were featured on many billboards as part of their work for Nike in New York.
Audi wanted a teaser campaign to give the audience a taste of what was to come four months before their opening. A straightforward but inventive advertising campaign that received a 2019 OBIE award in the automotive category was created by the creatives by utilising billboards and the company’s emblem.
Uber Singapore promoted its newest product, UberFLASH, using Clear Channel’s domination pack. Riders can use UberFLASH to be matched with the closest available ride. Private-hire vehicles and ComfortDelGro taxis are included in this. The purpose of the ad was to demonstrate how the new service allows customers to rent a car more quickly and at a lower cost. Additionally, it implies that both passengers and drivers will benefit from the service. Rider wait times will be cut down, and demand for ride-sharing services will rise, resulting in increased revenue potential for the company.
They created a “all in one” 3D billboard made of vynil with a 3D rocket on it in collaboration with NASA and Soft Signs 3D. The outcome is quite extraordinary and unusual.
3. Focus Media
The largest OOH advertising network in its nation is run by Focus Media, a Chinese outdoor advertising company. It mostly uses digital signs screens and online advertising. Its main office is in Shangai, China, and Jason Jiang Nanchun started it in 2003. It began trading publicly in 2005 and on the American market before returning to private status in 2013. Along with static and interactive screens, they also specialise in movie theatre advertising. In 2018, they generated $2.201 billion in revenue. They solely conduct business in China, and among their many notable clients are Canon, Procter & Gamble, Unilever, BMW, Mercedes, Nivea, Clarins Paris, Audi, and KFC.
4. Ströer
With its headquarters in Cologne, Germany, Ströer is a well-known provider of out-of-home media. It was established in 1990. They provide the entire marketing and sales value chain, as well as services like customised advertising and fully integrated, end-to-end solutions. Ströer developed a strategy they refer to as “OOH plus,” which concentrates on the OOH business’s strong points and is supported by the Content and Direct Media sectors. They perform a lot of digital stuff as well. They exclusively operated in Germany and performed some services for Netflix, Coca-Cola, Nike, Esprit, Coca-Cola, and Adidas. In 2018, they made $1.869 billion.
5. Lamar
Lamar has more than 340,000 displays spread across the United States and Canada, making it one of the largest outdoor advertising companies in the world. Charles M. Lamar and J. M. Coe started it as a partnership in 1902, and it hasn’t stopped expanding since. They possess a sizable collection of conventional billboards in addition to the largest U.S. network of digital billboards, which has 3,300 displays. They collaborated with companies like Pandora, Chevrolet, and Nissan. In 2018, they made $1.627 billion.
Nissan collaborated with Lamar to saturate the market with an eye-catching OOH campaign in order to promote its new store. They concentrated on particular areas where Grand Blanc Nissan’s product would benefit from sustainability provided by the HHI.
Lamar created a cutting-edge OOH technique for Chevrolet to draw customers’ attention to their mid-sized automobile. The billboard was outfitted with technology that, at a distance of 1,000 feet, could recognise certain rival auto manufacturers and transmit tailored messages to its users’ drivers.
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6. Outfront Media
Outfront Media was founded in 1938 and has its US headquarters in New York City. They own billboards across the US and Canada, and they specialise in outdoor advertising. Transit and street furniture are also done by them. They also produce social media campaigns. Essentia Water, Honest Tea, Ben & Jerry’s, Rockland Trust, Amazon, JetBlue, and other companies are among their clientele. In 2018, they made $1.602 billion.
In the US, JetBlue collaborated with Outfront Media on their outdoor advertising campaign. To increase client awareness of their loyalty programme, they carefully placed billboard and transportation advertisements about it around US cities. They located the neighbourhoods where their regular clients and potential clients lived and posted their adverts there.
Amazon Web Services collaborated with Outfront Media to establish dominance at the Federal Triangle and Pentagon metro stations in order to increase attendance at their Public Sector Summit. Since they also sought to enhance the attendance of their particular target group, they also used mobile ads to target federal buildings.
During the week preceding up to the Super Bowl, Pepsi placed advertisements on transit media and billboards all throughout Atlanta with the assistance of Outfront Media. The fact that this guerilla campaign took place in Atlanta, the birthplace of Coca-Cola, gave it particular resonance.
7. Global
Ashley Tabor established the multi-media company Global in England in 2007. Its main office is in London, England, United Kingdom. Regarding media, they are active on a number of fronts, including radio, music apps, and outdoor advertising. They have 95-106 Capital FM, Heart, Smooth Radia, Classic FM, Capital Xtra, Radio X, LBC, and Gold among other radios. Download their podcast and audio app, Global Player, to access their radio stations and an infinite selection of music. They are also a market leader in outdoor advertising, providing transport, retail, and theatre advertising for clients. They have 235,000 advertising locations in the UK and beyond Europe. Their expected total revenue for 2018 was $621 million.
For brands, agencies, and advertisers, Global integrates outdoor with its radios, digital brands, and industry-leading digital advertising platform. Work for Universal Studios, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, Peugeot, Subway, Renault, Amazon, Audi, Vodafone, Volkswagen, and many more can be found in their portfolio.
8. oOh! Media
Brendon Cook created the Australian media business oOh! Media in 1989. They are the top outdoor advertising firm in Australia and New Zealand, and they have over 30,000 places in those countries, including on the sides of roads, in stores, airports, office buildings, restaurants, and even online. Together with Two Good Co, who assists victims of domestic violence, they also engage in some community service. Work for companies including Porshe, The Body Shop, Dyson, and others can be found in their portfolio. In 2018, they generated an estimated $361 million in revenue.
They were the organisation in charge of carrying out Body Shop’s pop-up promotion. In order to establish themselves as the go-to source for Mother’s Day gift purchases, oOh! developed a British Rose VIP experience. It featured cocktail parties, makeovers, live art, and a social media amplification plan for top beauty blogger Rachel Brooke. It was a 5-day campaign that used Fashion Blogger to reach nearly 200,000 online buyers, generated 815+ Instagram posts, and surpassed engagement and dwell time goals.
To inform the public, especially their female target, about the advantages of their new product, oOh! collaborated with Dyson in an airport pop-up. They created a campaign called “Airport Pathway” that featured digital advertising, a blow-drying demonstration, and sales from Dyson professionals in airports and lounges. In the two weeks of the campaign, there were almost 6,400 visits to the Dyson experiential booth, 1,881 talks, and 1,346 product demos by Dyson hair technicians, with each taking an average of more than 10 minutes. Even though the product costs about $700, the technicians had a high conversion rate from demonstration to sale with the target group.
9. APG | SPA
APG SGA is a corporation that specialises in outdoor advertising. Its headquarters are in Geneva, Switzerland. They provide a range of services, such as installation and upkeep of poster panels, finance, conception, manufacture, and maintenance of urban furniture, management of a national posting organisation using the posting cycle system, and installation and maintenance of poster panels. gathering and studying movement and location information. They also performed some outstanding work. They created a vehicle advertisement for Jodlerfest How that consisted of accordions made out of the articulated bus’s hinges. An extensive digital and analogue out-of-home advertising campaign was implemented on crowded streets and urban squares to promote the release of the new Sony PlayStation 360. The 360° Spiderman scene particularly made an impact at Zurich’s main station. These are only a few of the accomplishments they’ve made. Also take note that their income for 2018 was over $309 million.
