Miami's next billboard trend: LED boxes on delivery scooters
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A Lumix scooter driver in Fort Lauderdale. Photo: Courtesy of Lumix Advertising
Miami already has billboards that float on the water and banner ads that fly overhead. The latest advertising venture to hit the city: LED boxes strapped to the back of delivery scooters.
Why it matters: Lumix Advertising's scooter-mounted billboards will add to Miami's growing billboard landscape — which includes controversial LED billboards downtown and a forthcoming drone banner ad company.
Driving the news: Miami-based Lumix plans to launch in December with a fleet of 24 scooters, each outfitted with a 13.5-by-15.5-inch billboard box that doubles as a food-storage container.
- Each box features three LED screens that can cycle through six 10-second digital ads. Lumix installs the boxes for free and drivers can take them home.
What they're saying: Founder Jonathan Sherman tells Axios the service will make it more affordable for small businesses to advertise and give delivery drivers extra money as they fulfill food orders around town.
- The GPS-enabled boxes can gauge ad reach by tracking anonymized cellphone data along drivers' routes, Sherman says.
- Drivers who qualify can make more money doing their regular jobs and receive a free food storage box with cup holders, he added.
- "We've gotten great feedback from drivers who work in the evenings that it really helps prevent scooter accidents given how much they are able to stand out now," Sherman wrote in an email.
Friction point: Asked about resident criticism over Miami's "visual pollution" — like the large mural ads wrapping downtown buildings — Sherman says billboards and other outbound advertisements are "visually a part of the environment."
- "You're not being bothered, it just kind of blends with reality."
- He says Lumix has been advised by legal counsel to avoid using red-and-blue flashing lights and "any graphics that may cause accidents," like pornography.
- "Luckily, we live in a state that is pro-business so it has been seamless thus far," he said of the regulations Lumix must follow to operate.