Caution: Billboards are on the move.
Box trucks outfitted with billboards on three sides surfaced in the Baltimore area about a year ago when drivers began carting the advertising through downtown streets and the suburbs.
The 6-foot-high messages change frequently, often are accompanied by blaring music and can be designed for interaction - one truck was built as a furnished dorm room and allowed visitors to lounge in the back when it was parked at a local university.
Mobile billboards are helping to make transit advertising one of the industry's fastest growing segments. Experts say the mobile ads can help build a company's brand but the temporary signs should be used with other advertising methods as part of a well-rounded campaign.
The scrolling messages are designed to snare the attention of motorists trapped on congested roads and to take advantage of the long commutes of local residents.
"Think about the mass media, you've got three or 400 TV channels, TiVo and the radio to get your news," said Jeff Rasmussen co-owner of In Motion Advertising, which began offering the mobile billboards in Baltimore in February 2007. "But more people are spending more time in the car."
In Motion Advertising is part of the GoMobile Advertising affiliate network, which has about 100 similar trucks on the road across the country. Started by former advertising executives at CBS, GoMobile began in Seattle in 2005. Competitors have cropped up around the country, including Rolling Ads, a Catonsville firm that operates a mobile billboard there. Also, Interstate Mobile Advertising operates two trucks throughout Frederick County.
Rasmussen had been working as a freelance advertising writer in Baltimore and found it difficult to secure advertising space around Belvedere Square for a restaurant there. He and Tony D'Agostino, one of the restaurant's co-owners, decided to form their own advertising company to focus on mobile billboards.
"We had done newspapers, magazines and direct mail, but he was looking for something new and closer to Belvedere Square," Rasmussen said.
So far, In Motion has signed on advertisers such as IKEA, Nelson Coleman Jewelers and Ace Hardware. Rasmussen declined to reveal the company's annual sales.
The trucks carry a 10-foot-by-6-foot glass cube, which is used as a display box for the scrolling poster system. The vinyl signs rotate vertically inside the cube. In Motion's scrolling billboards can hold up to eight advertising messages.
"When you get to the event, the music starts, the panels go up on all three sides and then you have a display. People are like, 'What the heck is this?' " said Mike Seifert, president of the GoMobile Advertising network.
In Motion worked with IKEA to build a dorm room set that included a black and white floral couch, lamps, curtains and artwork. In addition to driving the truck around Baltimore, Rasmussen parked it at Towson University's orientation carnival in August. In Motion's truck sat illuminated among bumper cars, a mechanical bull and bungee slingshots.
"It definitely caught my eye," said Stephanie Michael, a senior communications major at Towson. "To actually have the products in the truck was really innovative."
According to the Outdoor Advertising Association of America, transit advertising, which includes mobile billboards and the ads in transportation buildings such as airports and on buses and trucks, grew by more than 7 percent to $816 million in 2006 compared with 2005.
Some local advertisers said they like the mobile billboards because they can better reach particular populations that don't pay as much attention to static billboards on the side of the highway.
"You can use it for pretty much any client you want because you can design the area that you want to drive around in," said Darren Easton, vice president and creative director of the Cyphers Agency in Annapolis.
Easton, who has purchased mobile billboard advertising for some campaigns he developed for clients, said the medium works well in combination with other tools such as traditional billboards.
Though mobile advertisements catch the attention of drivers, they are not the best medium for relaying complicated messages, according to P.K. Kannan, Harvey Sanders associate professor of marketing at the University of Maryland, College Park. Traditional billboards have similar limitations, Kannan said.
"If it's a brand I wanted to create awareness for it would work well," Kannan said. "But if I were wanting to remind someone of a location of a restaurant or if I wanted to tell someone to buy V8 because it has calcium, fiber etc., ... it wouldn't work as well."
Nelson Coleman Jewelers, a 151-year-old business, used the mobile billboards as an "edgy" way to appeal to a younger clientele.
"Nelson Coleman has incredibly loyal, generational customers. But I really want to get to that younger crowd," said Rebecca Bruce, director of marketing for Nelson Coleman. "I want all these folks moving in to Baltimore to hear about Nelson Coleman."
Advertising experts said the moving billboards also do a good job of catching consumers' attention because they're so different from traditional media.
"This big huge billboard drives by you, it is like an eclipse. There is something to say for an advertisement that is larger than life and right beside you than a mile high in the sky far away," said Easton of the Cyphers Agency.
Most billboards are owned by large corporations such as Clear Channel. A spot for a month on a billboard in Baltimore will cost an advertiser approximately $6,000 to $7,000, according to Tony Alwin, Clear Channel's senior vice president of public relations and marketing. A typical route on one of In Motion's trucks would cost $4,000 for a four-week period, according to Rasmussen.
Clear Channel has trucks designed to carry advertisements, but the company has not incorporated the technology to showcase scrolling messages. Alwin said that if the scrolling technology becomes more popular, his company may consider offering the service.
"We're always looking for ways to meet our client needs," Alwin said. So if more clients were to ask for such advertising, "there is a good possibility we could do it as well."
megan.hartley@baltsun.com