Ripple, an in-store TV company based in El Segundo, has launched a new service that allows retailers to create and manage a campaign shown on flat-screen TVs in other stores in the geographic area near the client’s store.
“The neighborhood sporting goods store down the street now has the capability to build a TV-quality ad, place it in the coffee shop a few doors down and have the power to change or adjust that campaign on the fly,” explained Ali Diab, Ripple co-founder. Diab called the approach “hyper-local advertising.”
Ripple already has a network of 400 screens in locations in Southern California, Arizona, Nevada and Hawaii. Jiffy Lube waiting rooms and Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf eateries account for most of the locations, with the remainder at malls and real estate offices. Ripple, which provides the retail sites with the screens, said that it is reaching nearly 10 million consumers every month.
On-screen content combines local weather, traffic and news with sports and entertainment programs, interspersed with 15-second ads. Ripple’s content partners include ESPN, E! Entertainment, Yahoo, CBS and Clear Channel.
To build and place an ad, business owners go to the Ripple Web site and put together a design template with text and images. They can choose the locations and types of establishments where the ad will display from an online map of the neighborhood they want to target.
L.A.-based Spotrunner Inc. has achieved success with a similar template-based Web service, but its clients’ inexpensively created ads are for use on local cable channels.
With Ripple, a 15-second spot that runs every 10 minutes at one location might cost about $100 to $150 per month. According to a spokeswoman for the company, a typical hyper-local campaign would include three locations with a monthly cost in the $400 to $500 range.
Ripple started in 2004 will funding from Trinity Ventures and Draper Fisher Jurvetson, both venture capital firms in Silicon Valley.
Vroom at the Inn
A traveling hotel might seem an oxymoron, or the sort of idea you’d come up with after a couple of vodka shots.
So maybe it’s no surprise that the hotel which in reality is not a hotel, but a party pad that recently opened in downtown Hollywood is backed by Stolichnaya vodka.
The Russia-based distiller found unoccupied space at 1555 Ivar Ave. and constructed interiors resembling a luxury Russian hotel all part of an elaborate marketing strategy called Stoli Hotel that will last through May. The hotel will host events such as parties for GQ and InStyle magazines, and a bash for Playboy’s Girls Next Door.
Inside, guests find a large bar, a spa and mock hotel rooms inspired by Stoli’s flavors of vodka. The design combines Imperialist Russian motifs with “constructivism,” a Russian art style from the early 20th century that utilizes geometrical and industrial patterns. The entire 10,000-square-creation is inspired by the Hotel Moskva, the building on the Stoli label.
“The Stoli Hotel was conceived by drawing upon the brand’s roots,” said Adam Rosen, senior brand manager of Stolichnaya vodka. “Each facet of the hotel has been carefully selected to incorporate Stolichnaya’s authentic heritage while drawing upon the modern day qualities that top metropolitan hotels possess, including a cutting-edge cocktail culture.”
Attendance at the events is invitation-only; neither rubles nor dollars will be exchanged at the door. Uninvited folks can steal a peak at the promotion’s Web site, www.stolihotel.com.
Once the Stoli Hotel launches in Los Angeles, it will travel to other vodka-friendly cities across the country including New York, Chicago and Miami.
Ads for Advertisers
Hoy, the Spanish-language newspaper owned by Tribune Co., has a new advertising campaign that targets both readers and advertisers.
Titled “Pagina a pagina, Hoy es parte de mi” (Page by page, Hoy is part of me), the campaign will run in both English and Spanish in the three markets where Hoy has a presence New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.
Normally, ads for advertisers appear in the trade press, while ads for readers appear in mass media. The Hoy campaign blurs that distinction, a novelty Hoy promoted by unveiling the spots at an industry show, the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies Convention in Chicago on April 25-27.
Four TV spots in both languages focus on how Hoy plays a role in reader’s daily life, such as a wife who uses a shopping supplement to plan her weekend or a grandson who reads about soccer scores and shares them with his grandmother. The commercials will appear on Tribune-owned KTLA-TV (Channel 5) in English and Telemundo and Azteca America stations in Spanish.
“We want to show advertisers how our unique relationship with our readers and our reach of the Hispanic market is,” said Javier Aldape, general manager and editor of Hoy Los Angeles. “Expressing the emotional connection Hoy readers have with the paper is a key message for our advertisers.”
Tribune Co. also publishes the Los Angeles Times and the Chicago Tribune.
Agencies & Accounts
Citizens of Humanity, the luxury denim design firm in Huntington Park, has selected Capobianco & Associates to oversee their brand marketing and public relations. Cindy Capobianco launched her own agency in 2005 after 15 years of marketing work at brands such as Gap, Donna Karan and Banana Republic; she also worked as fashion editor at both Marie Claire and Allure. Fourth Wall, the story-based marketing shop in L.A., is the new agency of record for Knowledge Adventure, a company that makes education software for the home and classroom. Fourth Wall will create advertising for Knowledge Adventure’s JumpStart World product launch. Vyant Group has been named agency of record for DermaQuest Skin Therapy cosmetics.
Staff reporter Joel Russell can be reached at
[email protected]
, or at (323) 549-5225, ext. 237.
