#in-store advertising

[nickgerlich]

Ad It Up

You only thought it was difficult to escape the marketer’s voice. From traditional media like outdoor, print, and broadcast, to a variety of ads littering our social media feeds, web pages, and search results, marketers have been seemingly everywhere trying to get our attention. And the more they tried, the louder they had to shout, because it’s crowded out there, and the decibel level—whether audible or visual—is increasing.

Except perhaps in stores and at the gas pump, where we felt like we at least had a few minutes of quiet. That, too, is changing rapidly, as in-store advertising has gone digital, to the point of it being called “broadcast-level scale.” Gas pumps too are now coming equipped with video screens to sell to us while we are filling our tank.

It’s all a mixed bag right now of ads, with gas stations able to deliver hyper-local advertising for third-party advertisers nearby. Inside the store, the campaigns are aimed at the masses instead of using an audience-of-one approach.

I see the day coming, though, in which advertising at the pump will be increasingly one-to-one (remember, you have to insert or tap your card first, which could then quickly allow them to access a profile of you).

And the same goes for inside the store, especially once retail formats like Amazon’s “Just Walk Out” technology are deployed widespread. Your presence and unique data would be detected wherever you go in the store as the system monitors your shopping basket, and messages could be directed straight to you when you ponder the pasta sauces or wherever you go.

We’ve come a long way when it comes to in-store advertising. The majority of what we have seen usually involves massive stacks of soft drinks, the red, white, and green packages from Coca-Cola cleverly arranged to spell words or form images. The same goes for snack foods and beer leading up to the Super Bowl. Otherwise, maybe some small shelf hangers might try to whisper a marketing message.

Now, though, there is the possibility of smart screens attached to the clear refrigerator doors, behind which beverages of all kinds reside. Stand-alone screens can also welcome customers as they walk in. The possibilities are limitless, because LCD screens are cheap, and can all be managed remotely.

All of which speaks to this emerging truth: the retail store and gas stations are now viable platforms for advertising, a rentable space little different from billboards, TV, and the internet. The battle for our attention just found a new place to stage that fight. It allows retailers to boost their revenues and bottom lines above and beyond just selling things.

It’s happening in the online arena as well. Have you noticed how many sponsored spots there are on any Amazon results page? Amazon scored $12 billion in ad revenues in Q3 2023 alone. That’s impressive, especially when you consider that Amazon’s total revenue that quarter was $143 billion. In other words, advertising made up one in every 12 dollars of its revenues.

I predict a similar such cascade of revenues for any retailer willing to parse out its interior—and exterior—space for advertising purposes. After all, why not? If you can hit people right when they are coming to spend money anyway, this is pretty simple.

Truthfully, I do not mind the ads, especially if they point me to things I might be interested in. Elevate it to audience-of-one capability, and it is even better. I know…some people will be creeped out by this, just like they have been with all the targeted advertising we see online. I would much rather hear and see ads for things I am likely to buy, as opposed to things I will never buy. Every time I hear that Tampax ad on one of my podcasts, I think about how they’re foolishly wasting half of their ad spend on men like me.

Others may see such ubiquitous advertising as further invasion of their private space, a harbinger of a dystopian society to come. Or maybe it has already arrived. To each their own, but there is no ad blocker yet for the brick and mortar world, and the best you can do is shut your eyes and ears, and walk on by.

Or out.

Dr “Talk To Me” Gerlich

Audio Blog

[dandyads]

Blockbuster Video, 2000

[goshyesvintageads]

Bergdorf Goodman Inc, 1968

[stone-cold-groove]

Sears Records & Tapes.

[frenzyarts]

When my fiancée writes an Etsy description:

When I write an Etsy description:

[elftwink]

to preface this post i am anti-advertising i think we should explode the entire industry but it's sooo funny when you people make posts like "and they don't even work!!" like. sorry to be the bearer of bad news but yes they do. that's why we have to put up with so many despite everyone hating them and thinking its annoying. because they actually work really well and make a shit load of money

[darkopsiian]

Tidings, T-bones. Season of love is here I guess. Or at best; vague heart shaped objects and things that shouldn't be coated in chocolate, coated in chocolate. The minimal sticker collection provides gifts for your significant other, or just a neat thing to place and look at when you're feeling lonely (I'll always be watching!). In addition, the only Inv sticker that this shop will ever have! I'm serious... the only one.

Everything in the new collection is on sale for the next 10 hours. These stickers, magnets, buttons, and shirts can only be found at:

[mizgnomer]

Behind the Scenes of The Star Beast - Part Five

Excerpt from Benjamin Cook’s Star Beast Set Visit in DWM 597:

Tonight, in London’s famous Camden Market, David will be taking the Fourteenth Doctor’s first, not-so-tentative steps into the big, wide world – shooting the pre-title sequence for Special 1, The Star Beast. Although, right now he’s sheltering inside Modfather (‘VINTAGE STYLE, MODERN LIFE,’ says a sign in the outfitters’ window), to evade the glare of the cameraphones. In his new Doctor Who costume – plaid brown suit, white shirt and knitted silver tie, with a dark blue Shetland tweed coat – David doesn’t look at all out of place here. In October 2022, a mere 12 years, 9 months and 22 days after his last regular appearance in Doctor Who – as the Tenth Doctor, in The End of Time – David Tennant returned to the show. We’d never seen a Doctor regenerate into a former body before. For context, classic Who fans: David turning up in the dying moments of The Power of the Doctor is a bit like if Peter Davison had regenerated into Patrick Troughton’s Sixth Doctor at the end of Time-Flight, in 1982. Which he didn’t. Though, while we’re on the subject… David remembers watching Troughton return in the ’80s, for the odd one-off: “That felt like a man from pre-history turning up, to me in 1983, because I was just – what? – 12 years old,” he says of 20th Anniversary Special The Five Doctors. “But I bet it felt like yesterday for Patrick Troughton.” Forty years on, David can relate: “It’s like when people tell me – in fact, people on this set, working on this show, have come up to me this past week and gone – ‘I loved watching you as a kid.’ I’m like, … you were a kid? What, no! To me, it was a blink of an eye ago. To them… I’m pre-history!” But now he’s the present, too.

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who posted set photos, including Modfather on Instagram

Additional parts of this set are in the #whoBtsBeast tag. The full episode list is [ here ]

[doubledaybooks]

Vintage Lord & Taylor ads that introduced shoppers to American designers. Most stores were taking inspiration from Paris, but Dorothy Shaver put American designers at the center of the store during WWII.

Learn more about the glamorous history of deparmant stores in WHEN WOMEN RAN FIFTH AVENUE by Julie Satow.

[acorviart]

the ultimate dad hat

shop's reopening feb 3, 2pm cst

[daisybell-on-a-carousel]

Bored so you check out what your little brother is doing and end up getting distracted for like an hour

[koujaaku]

[CALAMITY GREMLIN ENAMEL PINS]

Instock sales go live Nov. 13th (Monday), 6AM HST!

[kirby-the-gorb]

[goshyesvintageads]

AT&T Co, 1981

[retropopcult]

Times Square, 1952

[dandyads]

Blockbuster Video, 2000 (Canada)