(via Deutsch Inc. advertising)
The city tomorrow will feel a little more natural...or a little more commercial, depending on who you ask. An advertising blitz will blanket the Shuttle station in Grand Central Terminal in posters for Westin Hotels and Resorts. The company bought out every single advertising space in the station and then some, including floors, columns and the sides of escalators. On Thursday morning, what the MTA calls station domination will be complete when the interior of one Shuttle train to Times Square will be covered, floor to ceiling, in nature landscapes. The ads will tell people, "This is how it should feel." While a public relations firm is calling the campaign unprecedented, MTA folks said other stations were similarly dominated. In 2004, the Times Square Shuttle terminal was blanketed by M&M advertising after the company launched train line M&Ms for the Subway Centennial. It's unclear how much the MTA will rake in during the blitz this time, but Westin paid $35 million total for ads in and below Grand Central, the Path trains and in Chicago.
Cabs will not only be sharks in their driving skills this week, they'll also look like the finned creatures. In another eye-catching advertising campaign, the Discovery Channel will decorate 175 taxis with shark fins to promote the channel's Shark Week programming.
Comments (1)
It seems like the MTA is currently worried about their Advertising business in Manhattan only. You can take the 2,4,5 trains uptown and the stations have absolutely NO ADS, Hello? And then they dare to announce a fare increase.