A Barrel of Fun (and Profit)

Columbus, OH-based Orange Barrel Media (OBM) has made its name with distinctive building graphics in Ohio’s capital city. Its portfolio includes numerous building wraps for the city’s Arena District and Easton Town Center (most famously for Nationwide, the Columbus-based insurance company), as well as over-the-top, digital-graphics installations in numerous other markets nationwide. As demand for electronic displays grows, they represent a growing portion of the company’s work.

OBM erected eight horizontal, scrolling displays at Broad and High Sts., one of Columbus’ busiest intersections. Pete Scant-land, OBM president, said the displays enjoy a daily effective circulation (the number of people who view the boards within a 24-hour period) of 94,000.

The displays, which measure from 13.86 x 66.77 ft. for the “Sweet Spot” corner display to a 2.5 x 121-ft. monochrome ticker, are rented to such companies as Nationwide, Kroger, AT&T and the Ohio St. Univ. Medical Center. Scantland notes that the boards, which incorporate Daktronics 12 to 16mm-pixel displays, were fabricated to complement the architecture and follow its radius corners.

“Site surveys are vital to understanding a building’s orientation, and then configuring a display to maximize exposure to pedestrian and vehicular traffic,” he said. The content, either client- or OBM-generated, involves full-motion video and ticker feeds supplied by an RSS news aggregator. Because the horizontal set-up varied from typical billboards or signs, the job required close collaborations with advertisers and their agencies to deliver legible, effective messages.

Because the Broad and High Sts. intersection had long been home to prominent signage – neon spectaculars and large, static billboards had previously roosted there – he said it wasn’t very difficult to convince Columbus city officials to greenlight the displays.

“Our local officials have been very helpful,” Scantland said. “They want to create energy in our downtown area, and understand how distinctive signage can help that goal.”

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OBM also developed an EMC installation for Gallery Place, a lifestyle center situated on prime Washington, D.C. real estate at 7th and H Sts. It includes the highest-grossing AT&T retail store in the U.S., and is next door to the Verizon Center, home of the NBA’s Wizards and NHL’s Capitals. D3 LED built the 8 x 15-ft. boards, and OBM created the content.

Because the boards were installed in a pedestrian-heavy area, high-definition 8mm boards were selected. OBM scheduled the full-motion-video advertisements and developed the content. The boards required approximately a week to install, and, because road closures weren’t feasible, much of this work had to be completed at night.