Durden Outdoor is running two eye-catching billboards for a client. One billboard has a 7 foot waving arm and one billboard has a 19 foo0t 3D inflatable pillow. Insider talked with Bill Durden about the project.
How did you come up with the idea for the arm and pillow.
This regional client had always done business with one of our billboard competitors in a market that we shared. So when MR MATTRESS opened a new store in our hometown of Dothan, AL it just so happened that Durden Outdoor had an available 14×48 right over his store. Our sales team knew we had to pitch a knock your sheets off idea to get in the door with them. That’s when the Famous Maker’s creative team dreamed up the idea of the owner Jeffery Douglas holding a huge illuminated inflatable 3D pillow to solidify his position in this new market. During the photo shoot at Durden studios our late sales director Frankie “The Stoneman” Stone upsold Jeffrey an additional board on a main artery coming into town. The client said the only way that I’ll buy the additional board is if you can have me on the board welcoming everyone into town. That is when the waving arm idea was born. Our in-house production team has built 12’ truck doors that open and close, waving insect arms, 3D debt ball and chains, LED throbbing spinal cords, non of which are easy but we do love a challenge. Several brainstorming sessions, 3 motors and two swinging concepts later we figured it out. We were just so thrilled that this client believed in us and our medium to do two HUGE creatives in one campaign…….these opportunities are rare.
What powers the arm?
We engineered a short arm throw from the motor to the arm with no pulleys. The arm did not need to move at lightening speed, so we settled on a 14 RPM Dayton outdoor motor to power our 7′ tall waving arm. A chloroplast roof was also made over the motor to help shield it from direct rain.
Did you make the pillow or did you use Eddy Carolan’s Softsigns for the pillow?
Awesome! I’m old school and love static faces with this type of embellishment. Reminds me of the ET and Terminator boards that Universal had on I-4 in Orlando back in the nineties. A great static face beats a digital board every time.