CorpComms Magazine

When Lesley McPherson heard from a journalist that the driver of a taxi carrying her company's logo had no idea who the company was, she knew exactly what she had to do. The head of corporate media at Edinburgh-based Aegon, one of Europe's largest insurance and pensions groups, decided to take the situation into her own hands. She organised for the drivers of the 50 cabs the company had hired to carry its branding to be briefed about the group and designed prompt cards listing eight basic facts about Aegon for drivers to carry with them. 'When we were thinking about how well our brand is known,' McPherson says, 'one of the things we concluded was that Aegon was one of the biggest companies people had never heard of.'

In fact, Dutch group Aegon has been in the UK since 1994, when it bought pensions business Scottish Equitable, the brand it trades with. 'We were trading happily using the Scottish Equitable brand,' explains McPherson, 'but in a corporate market, if one group is pitching for business, the decision-makers are looking at the global credentials of the company behind it. The recognition of Aegon was not high enough.' Aegon decided it was time for a brand offensive. It was not a consumer campaign, but was targeted instead at executives responsible for making decisions about company pension schemes.

'Hence the taxis,' says McPherson. The draw of taxi branding is that you get a one-to-one captive audience for an average of 15 minutes, 21 times a day in each taxi, with what is known as an ABC1 - someone who earns at least £35,000 per year and works for a company worth at least £10 mn.

Cost drivers

Ian Reynolds, director of London-based taxi advertising firm KBH Transport Media, says: 'Taxis are so appealing to corporate clients because compared to other forms of outdoor advertising, the entry costs are relatively low. We have a mass audience, and we can be quite targeted.

'If you want to hit the City of London, then you pick drivers who live and work near the City. We are handling promotions for a Kensington-based furniture company at the moment, so we have picked drivers who live in west London.'

Asher Moses, managing director of Taxi Promotions, which sells advertising on taxis across the UK, agrees: 'You've got to plan carefully. If all the cabbies live in east London, you won't get enough exposure in north, south and west London.' Moses says the concept of the 'ambassador taxi' that McPherson unwittingly stumbled upon is a serious one. He organises sit-down briefings for his own drivers so they know something about the clients advertising on their cars.

A former taxi driver himself, Moses, whose firm has worked with most charities and has donated a cab to the National Missing Persons Helpline, says: 'We handpick our drivers for this job. Most are owner-drivers who work eight to ten hours a day. It's a lonely job and all of them can communicate effectively. Drivers pick up info all the time, so why not feed them information about the client?'

Reynolds adds: 'With a lot of campaigns, we want drivers to be involved as brand ambassadors and we often offer incentives.' Taxi Media, another promotions group, flew 30 London cabbies to South Africa for an all-expenses-paid holiday courtesy of the South African tourist board.

'All our travel clients have sent taxi drivers to their destinations so the cabbies can tell their passengers about their experiences,' says Moses.

When it comes to branding a taxi, there are two main products - supersiding and livery wraps. The first is a sticker that stretches from front to back on each side of the cab, leaving the roof untouched. This is used for short-term, strategic campaigns that usually last no longer than one or two months. A livery wrap involves literally wrapping an entire car in a thin coating bearing your message. These are used for longer term brand awareness campaigns, which usually last six or twelve months. Taxi Promotions offers a third option called megasiding - a livery wrap that appears on the sides of the car only, leaving the roof black.

Taxi Promotions quoted 100 supersided cabs for three months at £50,000 including tip-up seats and branded receipts. The firm said 25 liveried taxis for twelve months would cost £80,000 including interiors and all production costs.

KBH Media quoted £75,000 for 300 supersided taxis for one month, or £90,000 for 30 liveried taxis for six months. For a year, this would rise to £110,000. Branded cabs can be used for more than just floating around the City. Reynolds has organised stunts for clients including Lanson Champagne-branded cabs picking people up at Southfields tube station and dropping them off at Wimbledon for free. He has arranged a convoy of 20 Hutchison taxis to drive slowly through central London and when high street clothes store H&M opened next door to Harrods, Reynolds organized 20 H&M-branded cabs to pick up minor celebrities and be photographed dropping them off at the new store.

Moses agrees that branded cabs should be used to full promotional effect. 'You should always use the taxis for PR. We use them for photo shoots and at exhibitions and events,' he says. However a company chooses to decorate its cabs - and put them to work - it can be fairly certain that the process will at least be more fun than organising a plain old billboard campaign.

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