Seven Toastmasters billboards recently found space in the skies of Amarillo, TX, and the local clubs look forward to reaping the benefits of this excellent advertising opportunity.
About once a year, someone contacts the District Governor and Lieutenant Governor of Marketing and asks to have a billboard put up in their town. The response is always along the lines of, “Great idea! Can you handle the local logistics by getting us in touch with the right people and finding out the costs?” Most of the time, the costs exceed our district’s limited budget. However, this time Area 53 Governor Natalie Waters was determined to find a way.
Through a contact at her office, she was able to discover that the local billboard company, LAMAR Advertising, works with non-profit organizations to help them find less expensive ways to obtain advertising.
“They support non-profits and military by donating the sign space, if the company pays for the vinyl advertisement. Once someone buys the board, they take down the non-profit and move it somewhere else,” said Natalie.
Natalie downloaded an Adobe Acrobat formatted file (also known as a “PDF”) containing Toastmasters brand-approved artwork directly from Toastmasters International’s Virtual Brand Portal (http://www.Toastmasters.org/vbp). With a little assistance from the graphics department at LAMAR , she was able to get seven billboard vinyls created and placed around Amarillo in just a few weeks.
“They look really good and clear, which is testament to the TI folks who obviously do high quality work. LAMAR used the .pdf file and I didn’t need to send them anything else. ”
District Governor TK O’Geary and Lieutenant Governor Marketing Jim McCabe gave her an enthusiastic approval for her final price tag of only $820.
Would you like a Toastmasters billboard put up in your town? Contact Jim McCabe or Incoming Lieutenant Governor Marketing Jef Conn to find out what information you can collect to make this a reality in your town!
Thanks Natalie! And thanks LAMAR Advertisting!
Photos by TK O’Geary and Natalie Waters.
