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January 16, 2007

Mall TVs herald digital advertising trend

By Paul Leighton , Staff writer

PEABODY - Northshore Mall has joined the latest trend in advertising by hanging 37 flat-screen televisions from the ceilings of its main corridor and food court.

The movement, known as digital advertising, is putting TVs on the sides of buildings, in the backs of taxicabs, at supermarket checkout counters - even under your feet. Companies are starting to market computer screens that can be placed on store floors so that people are literally walking on advertising.

"It's a natural progression," said Peter Oehlkers, an assistant professor in the communications department at Salem State College. "It's a much more exciting and dynamic way to get your message across."

Northshore Mall put up the TV screens about a month ago. The programming includes ads for mall gift cards, previews of MTV shows, and tips for caring for dry skin (eat vegetables and buy a humidifier).

A spokeswoman for Simon Property Group, which owns Northshore Mall, said mall manager Mark Whiting is not allowed to talk about the TVs. But not everyone is happy with them.

David Powell, a retired airline worker from Salem, called the big TVs "information overload." As he and his friend Chick Mogavero of Peabody sat in the food court drinking coffee one day last week, one of the televisions played its messages over and over again just a few feet away, although the sound was nearly inaudible.


"I'm from the on-and-off generation," the 66-year-old Powell said. "If I can't turn it on and off, it's way over my head."

The TVs have also cropped up in Shaw's supermarkets, including those in Salem and Beverly. Joe Arnold, the director of brand marketing for Shaw's, said TVs are in about 190 of the company's 250 stores throughout New England.

Arnold said the TVs carry news and sports results but also programming designed to "educate our customers about food" with, for example, a recipe for chicken with balsamic sauce - two ingredients sold by Shaw's, as Arnold pointed out.

"So much of our research shows that customers are starved for inspiration," he said. "They're so time-pressed that they're programmed. They buy the same thing week in and week out. In our research they said, 'Help us,' so that's what we're trying to do."

The United States is actually four or five years behind Asia and Europe when it comes to digital advertising, according to Jeff Kresse of the Digital Signage Group, a company in Washington state that is working with Simon malls. His company has helped put TV screens in taxicabs in Argentina and Aruba, he said.



"It's just really getting its roots in the United States in the last year," Kresse said.

The cost of the flat-screen TVs, as well as the digital signage software that runs them, has been declining, making it more practical for companies to buy them, he said.

"A 42-inch display used to be $6,000," Kresse said. "Now it's $1,200."

Oehlkers said retailers must be aware of the "irritation factor" whenever they introduce a new form of advertising. Digital signing might be more accepted at a mall, where people go to be visually stimulated, he said, as opposed to a downtown area, where it might be perceived as an intrusion.

Stores must also be careful that the content of the programming not offend families with children, he said.

As for the long-term effectiveness of digital advertising, Oehlkers said that remains to be seen.

"Because it's something new, this is when people are going to have to pay attention to it," he said. "Who knows whether in a year or two it's going to have the same impact?"

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