Empty hoarding slots make it a ghost city

A drive to the airport shows 80 per cent of signboards are empty; the reasons given are diversion of ads to the electronic media, falling rupee, economic slowdown and jacked up rates. Large banners and hoardings are the signs of a vibrant city

The moment anyone descends at an airport in any city, he is greeted with a host of hoardings of every hue and size. Hoardings as such reflect the prosperity of a city. People who visit Hyderabad however are greeted to empty hoardings which are in dire need for advertisements. This phenomenon extends to the heart of the city as well. The stretch from most mammoth junctions of the city be it St Ann’s to Lifestyle, Begumpet to Madhapur, Hitech City to Gachibowli or the celebrated Shamshabad Airport road is now null and drab. Considering the fact that flamboyant advertising and multihued hoardings have been the precursors to a metropolitan ambience, large banners and hoardings perched atop most buildings in the city today are lifeless. The only proclamation they make right now is to ‘Advertise here: Contact: 90XXXXXXXX.’

A café owner who has his business along the Begumpet road said, “Earlier there used to be hectic competition for these hoardings. Every month there used to be a shuffle of ads, but now for the past several months they have been lying vacant.”
For an advertiser there cannot be a better vantage point to propagate their product or service like these busy stretches, they are always jam packed with traffic and public. Today, even if there are any ads they are very scantily placed leaving a lot of room for other advertisers, if any turns out. The whole point of using a hoarding is to increase a certain product’s brand value.

Apart from the aesthetic appeal hoardings add to the city; one already has to keep in mind that the lack of hoardings or ads can be interpreted as a sign that the economy is in doldrums. It is a sign that many companies in the city aren’t willing to pay for a hoarding. Because they require quite a lot of money. But the most important reason is that consumer products are mostly advertised through the electronic media, whose reach is immense. For visibility and impact, no other medium is as useful as a Television Ad.

On asking an employee of Ad-Age Advertising about the current scenario, he remarked, “ There are so many issues to be dealt with in the city. Why are you concerned with advertising? First have a report on all the other problems than advertising.” The attitude of the employee can be interpreted as the hostility that is present in the current advertising market. D Jayaraj Kennedy, Assistant Commissioner, Housing & Advertisement, said that the Ad rates had become so high the companies were thinking twice before placing a hoarding.

Apart from the drab atmosphere that has set in because of the vacant hoardings, it also paints a bleak image of the economy to the visitors and newcomers to the city. And this feeling sinks in as soon as one leaves the airport. Though it is lined up with huge hoardings on either side of the road, they are just the iron skeletons and nothing more.