Whitewash

The recent recession has hit many in many ways. Executives contemplating a job switch have headhunters tell them to 'keep a little patience', others are no more dreaming of a 'cool' increment, companies are 'seriously' following cost control at all levels, malls are seeing less footfall, restaurants have less guests coming in etc.

At the same time the landscape is increasingly sporing an unusual colour- white. Thanks to the recession, corporates have axed their advertising budgets like never before in a long time and have dropped a large no. of hoarding sites. Those sites now sport the white colour flex with agency name and/ or contact numbers written on it. Hence instead of seeing more ads we are seeing a lot more mobile nos. So bad is the scenario that some outdoor agencies are even booking a part, generally half, of a site. That makes some sites amusingly look half white (with agency name, no.) and half colourful (with the advertisement).

Outdoor advertising gained a momentum over the past few years, increasing clutter in electronic media being one of the critical reasons. It lead to a lot more newer hoarding sites, bigger and bigger, on all main thoroughfares. In Kolkata EM Bypass especially saw a major rush by advertisers due to its location- outside the main city, thereby the visibility being more captive. But all that's a thing of the past now. One's view is consistently getting a jerk every other day in finding newly vacant sites wherefrom even last week Aamir Khan was looking straight making a point about a DTH service or a mobile service provider used to share one info or the other about its matchless service.