Why Haven’t You Wrapped Your Company Vehicles?

So… why haven’t you wrapped your company vehicles? You know you should every time you see a competitor’s wrapped vehicle on the road. And how often is that? I’m going to end this post with stats to get you out of your car or truck and wrap it, (skip ahead if that floats your boat). First, let’s address the most common reasons I hear companies have not wrapped their vehicles.

We are too small – we only have two cars
Digital printing has made it cost-effective for everyone to wrap vehicles. If you have any adver­tis­ing budget, why wouldn’t you put your dollars where they are most effective?

It costs too much
A Yellow Page bold-line ad can run $100/month — and up to $4000/month for a full-page (I’ve bought both). Bill­boards can run $700 to $2500 per month. A vehicle wrap can run $1500 to $3000, and last two — seven years.

We only have small cars — they are not big enough for wraps
Digital tech­nol­ogy has changed things. No vehicle is too small to wrap. We have effec­tively wrapped smart cars, boats, golf carts, and motorcycles.

We’ve used the same company lettering for years, and that’s all we need
You may have a point; however, think of how much better your message could be conveyed with a wrap? If you own ABC Plumbing, your logo on your truck becomes a whole different message with an image of a clean, uniformed all-American plumber standing at a sparkling, clean sink.

We cannot afford the time to have our vehicles off the road to get them wrapped
In most cases, you shouldn’t have any downtime. The graphics company should provide graphics installers during your off-times.

Vinyl doesn’t last, it looks shoddy, and paint is better
These state­ments were true at one time — and can be true today, if cheap, shoddy materials and work­man­ship are used. With today’s adhesive vinyl materials, provided by 3M and Avery, almost anything can be wrapped better than it can be painted.

We can’t use wraps because we fre­quently change our products
I wish more busi­nesses knew they could easily change products on their wraps. By using a change­able film on the product section of the wrap, it can be changed as often as you like.

Just The Facts, Please
The benefits of a vehicle wrap hit home when you compare the Cost-Per-Thousand Impres­sions (CPM) of other forms of adver­tis­ing (Sta­tis­tics courtesy of the Outdoor Adver­tis­ing Asso­ci­a­tion of America):

• A 30-second prime-time spot in the top 100 tele­vi­sion markets costs $17.78 per thousand impressions
• A 60-second drive-time ad in the top 100 radio markets costs $8.61 per thousand impressions
• A one-third b/w page ad in the top 100 newspaper markets costs $22.95 per thousand impressions
• A four-color one-page ad in the top 23 magazine pub­li­ca­tions costs $9.35 per thousand impressions
• The average for all forms of billboard ads costs $2.18 per thousand impressions
• Vehicle wraps cost $.77 per thousand impressions

According to Driving Revenues — a vehicle adver­tis­ing firm in Wash­ing­ton — a $20,000 adver­tis­ing invest­ment buys:

• Radio attracts 900,000 listeners in six weeks with ten to twelve 30-second spots
• Value Pak offers reach 600,000 with 100,000 addresses per drop, and your client is just one of many adver­tis­ers included in the packet
• Bill­boards receive 700,000 impres­sions per month
• Direct mail reaches 20,000 names with one postcard mailer

Let’s compare the adver­tis­ing above to wraps. If you spend $3000 (high-end) on a wrap, and keep the vehicle for five years:

• A vehicle receives 30,000 – 70,000 impres­sions per day (pdf)
• Five years = 1825 days
• 30,000 impres­sions per day (low-end) = 54,750,000 views
• If you wrapped six vehicles for a cost of $18,000
• This is over 328 MILLION views over the span of five years

So…why haven’t you wrapped your company vehicles?