Media&Marketing: The growth in public transport in Dublin has provided Dublin Bus with a sizeable advertising opportunity via its 900 bus shelters scattered around the city and surrounding areas.
Dublin Bus carried 149 million passengers in 2004 and expects to have exceeded this in 2005. Getting access to this cohort, particularly while they are waiting for buses, is becoming increasingly important for major consumer brands. The number of young people and students who use Dublin Bus is what makes the shelters particularly attractive to advertisers.
The contract to manage the shelters - held since 1974 by Adshel - has just been put out to tender by Dublin Bus. A spokeswoman said yesterday the number of shelters is also likely to rise over the next few years as the company seeks to exploit the sites as advertising mediums. In other words, bus stops are increasingly going to become bus shelters. The contract is believed to be worth between €5 and €6 million per annum.
According to the tender documentation, the company that gets the contract will be responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of existing shelters and the provision of new shelters.
The current holder, Adshel, is part of the giant US media company Clear Channel Ireland. The 900 shelters put out to tender equates to approximately 1,800 advertising panels.
Because the contract is so large, several major companies in Britain and Ireland are likely to be interested, including Viacom and JC Decaux, the French outdoor specialist. The Spanish company Cemusa is also likely to be in the hunt.
However the latest CIÉ contract - for space at train stations and on carriages - was a bit of a fiasco. The contract was awarded to UK company Maiden, but it failed to meet financial guarantees demanded by CIÉ and the contract was eventually awarded to a company called Titan.
The advertising industry is watching closely. PML, an agency specialising in poster advertising, said this week: "Any shift in this contract would be of major significance in the industry."
Ryder Cup warm-up
Even though it's not taking place until September, the hype surrounding the Ryder Cup at the K Club began early this week with Allianz getting in on the act with a Ryder Cup-related campaign. Meanwhile, Noel Dempsey looks likely to designate the event and make it available to everyone free-to-air on either RTÉ or TV3. This is not going to make him too popular with BSkyB, which currently holds the live rights in Ireland, but clearly the Government is prepared to make Sky unhappy.
This week Dublin advertising agency Initiative released the most watched sporting events of 2005 and the golf will certainly have to work hard to beat the audience reached by the All-Ireland football final in 2005. The game between Tyrone and Kerry grabbed an audience of 887,000. Next best was Ireland's World Cup qualifier against Switzerland, which managed an audience of 769,000.
Although these audiences were impressive in an Irish context, the biggest sporting event in the world, in terms of viewers, was the American football Super Bowl, which reached 86 million - 13 million more than the Champions League final between AC Milan and Liverpool.
Murrays loses out
PR firm Murray Consultants, which features a large list of blue-chip companies on its client roster, suffered a setback over Christmas by losing the account for the National Pension Reserve Fund. The account will now be held by MRPA Kinman, which also recently won accounts for the Health and Safety Authority and IBI Corporate Finance.
Murrays, which represents quoted companies like Kingspan, Readymix and Grafton, and last year secured the Elan account in Ireland, tends to hold onto accounts for long periods. Not this time.
Saor gets accolade
Saor Communications, the advertising agency set up in July 2004, has won an accolade from Media & Marketing Europe, the influential European trade publication for the advertising, media and marketing industry.
The agency's boss, Gary Power, was the only Irish advertising figure listed among the top 40 advertising executives aged under 40 in its recent edition. In previous years, Irish advertising executives have been included, but getting in among the top 40 has usually provided a decent boost to the agency concerned. To date, Soar has more than 20 clients advertising in various methods - digital, sponsorship and public relations.
Frog still irritates
It may be no surprise, but it is still gratifying to hear it. A survey in Britain has named the Crazy Frog ringtone commercial as the most irritating television commercial for 2005.
The survey of 1,000 adults by the TNS research company revealed that 60 per cent of the British public thought the advertisement was the most irritating of the year.
Emmet Oliver can be contacted at eoliver@irish-times.ie
