The blog by Drew McLelland The Most Brilliant Outdoor Campaign Ever, is a great read about a great billboard campaign by Garcia’s a local irish pub in Buffalo. The campaign was to create a story of a man trying to meet a girl that he saw at the pub one night by buying billboards that he used to present his messages to her. As McLelland’s blog post stated most outdoor campaigns follow strict guidelines; such as, never use more than seven words, always use an attention getting visual, include the company logo, leave the boards up for a minimum of 30 days to achieve
frequency goals and buy several locations. Garcia’s campaign broke all of these rules, yet it was a powerful campaign. What was even more interesting about this campaign was the complete story line the marketing agency (Crowley Webb) conceived which included hiring two actors to play the part of William and Angel who finally met at the very crowded bar (thanks to the campaign) where they danced and then left together in a limo. The blog is overall saying that it is ok for marketers to break rules as long as it is to add extra value for the consumers and in effect is able to capture the imagination of more people. This is an amazing billboard campaign that captured the imagination of all of Buffalo and was featured in some national news papers and ofcourse throughout Buffalo’s media all for the price of renting the billboard for 9 weeks.