São Paulo, Brazil, has apparently had a public advertising problem for years. It’s had too much signage, some of it illegal, and the mayor says they could not control it. So they get rid of all of it: billboards, car signs, bus stops, and flyers. Everything.
An advertising exec. who opposed this move had this bit of comedy to contribute, “Advertising is both an art form and, when you’re in your car, or alone on foot, a form of entertainment that helps relieve solitude and boredom.” Yeah, that’s how I see it. When I’m driving up the Interstate and my girls read a billboard that tells us it’s milkshake time, I almost smack the guard rail–it’s so entertaining. And the brightly colored car wash with more square footage in the signs than on the property, that bit a marketing genius is pure art.
But São Paulo is not be the clean bar of soap it may sound like in this article. Some signs have been removed, but elsewhere only sign faces are gone, keeping the sign structure in place.
Personally, I’ve always liked advertising signage. Living in the Upper Midwest, there are big stretches where the signs are the only vaguely interesting things to look at.
I know an old man who, to this day, cannot forgive Ladybird Johnson, because of her campaign to eliminate advertising signage on interstates. The ban absolutely killed the museum/tourist spot he operated.
I can understand that. Advertising does have it’s place, but it isn’t everywhere.
I don’t like roadside advertising; but have a special loathing for it when it’s on public land. In a municipality where I used to live, the Lefties (who were out of power) ranted constantly about advertising in the town. What happened when they got into power? Things got many times worse. Public land had been out of bounds; but the new bunch of pols brought in a program where if you did something (build a walkway over the street, etc.) you got to put up monstrous billboards on public land (of a size we’d never seen before.) The answer to complaints was; “this company spent x dollars building this project… therefore we gave them the right to….” They turned the place into one of the worst eyesores around… all on public land. (But no doubt some of the pols, and friends, made some good money on the deal.)