Seeking sustainable vinyl solutions
According to Airoutdoor, approximately 300,000 billboards produce hundreds and thousands of pounds of vinyl waste each year in the U.S, while the cost of sending billboard skins to landfill in Australia costs up to $200,000 (£107,000) each year.
Wednesday, 22 May 2019 11:22 GMT
There is consumer demand for sustainable advertising solutions
To target the sustainable issues surrounding billboards, Airoutdoor ensures all its posters are recyclable and not sent to landfill. To make sure of this, its billposters remove all old skins and take them to relevant recycling plants, reducing the brand’s carbon footprint.
Additionally, the firm uses FSC certified and 100% recyclable paper as well as an environmentally friendly water-based adhesive called PP30.
Recognising a gap in the Australian out-of-home (OOH) advertising solutions market, Cactus Imaging and its parent company oOh!media developed a product called SmartSkins.
Once it has finished its time on a billboard, the material can be recycled and repurposed to become park benches, decking, bollards, fence posts and other recycled polymer products.
SmartSkins has been described as setting a new benchmark for the OOH industry with the substrate and mounting rope both being 100% recyclable.
There is an unmistakable need for greener out of home advertising solutions ”
Speaking to Australian media, Nigel Spicer, general manager of Cactus Imaging, says: “There is an unmistakable need for greener out of home advertising solutions and while in other international markets there are biodegradable products that are more environmentally friendly than PVC, these products were not viable for our market.
“Our only option was to develop our own product, which delivered similar quality output, is able to withstand the Australian climate for the typical campaign cycle, and could be provided at a price point that was not excessively more than traditional PVC.”
Now available nationally, Australian Ethical is one of the first companies to adopt the material and has launched a campaign to debut the solution.
The campaign is a collaboration between Ooh!media, Cactus Imaging and Australian Ethical’s media agency, Benedictus Media, and creative agency DO Creative.
Commenting, Allyson Lowbridge, chief customer officer at Australian Ethical, says: “Our bold new brand campaign makes a vital point about the future of our planet, calling for all Australians to investigate where their money is invested and what they are supporting.”
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