By Becky Smith
The OOH industry feels optimistic right now. Conversations around AI, programmatic, measurement, and consolidation are everywhere, and many operators are looking ahead to what the next phase of growth could look like.
As the industry evolves, I think it’s worth acknowledging that consolidation changes more than inventory ownership.
When a smaller operator sells, relationships often shift along with the inventory. Many local advertisers are loyal not just to the locations themselves, but to the people behind them. That kind of trust is difficult to scale and easy to underestimate.
This is not a criticism of growth or of operators who choose to sell. That is their decision to make and often the right one. As the industry continues to grow and modernize, I think it’s worth recognizing that some of the strengths of independents are difficult to replicate at scale.
Many billboard companies built their businesses by being deeply connected to their local markets. They were local businesses serving other local businesses, and that created a level of trust and accessibility that became a real competitive advantage. Those relationships are harder to quantify, but they remain one of the defining strengths of the independent side of the industry.
Larger operators also bring scale, technology, and resources that many independents simply cannot match, and those advancements are moving the industry forward in important ways. At the same time, modernization can still feel expensive, complex, and difficult to navigate for smaller operators.
So what do independents actually do with all of this?
Independents modernize where it makes sense, protect the relationships that built their business, and become more intentional operationally. A well-run independent with strong systems and strong local relationships is still incredibly valuable. But that kind of business does not happen by accident anymore.
The operators I’ve seen pull ahead over the last few years have one thing in common: they stopped trying to do everything themselves. They built infrastructure around their strengths and created systems that allowed the business to grow beyond one person’s calendar or memory.
That’s the conversation I think is worth having right now while the industry is evolving so quickly. Not whether to sell, but whether your operation is strong enough to compete on your own terms while protecting the relationships and local knowledge that made it valuable in the first place.
Becky Smith is the founder of Behind the Board, an outsourced operations company for independent OOH media owners. Behind the Board serves as a white-labeled operations department, handling billing, posting coordination, digital scheduling, reporting, and backend communication so operators can focus on sales and growth.
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