Results and Effectiveness

The billboard became the talk of the advertising fraternity. The story of the air-cleaning billboard was picked up by the media and featured in every newspaper, tv and online news sites not just in Sri Lanka but across the region, including Campaign Asia and other regional industry and environmental conservation publications. The billboard even got a special commendation by the local government. The agency received queries from the corporate sector in Sri Lanka and the region. BBDO Lanka achieved the task of being recognized as an agency with big ideas and the ability to make a difference in the community.

Creative Execution

In keeping with our status as the only carbon neutral agency in the country and the region, we came up with a concept that would radically change outdoor advertising and get people talking. Working closely with a professional mechanical engineer, we developed the prototype of what’s possibly the world’s first mechanical air-filtering billboard. The first of its kind, this billboard featuring the agency’s logo, takes in polluted air, filters it and then releases around 3100 cubic metres of purified air back into the environment every hour. To demonstrate this idea, an actual working model was put up near a busy street.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

Having commenced operations in 2011, BBDO Lanka is the newest player in Sri Lanka’s advertising arena. We needed to stand out of the clutter and be perceived by peers, the corporate world and the general public as an ad agency that’s capable of coming up with big ideas. We also wanted to stand out as an agency that could make a difference in the community. Which is why shortly after commencing operations, BBDO Lanka became Asia’s first carbon neutral ad agency. But that wasn’t enough. We needed to take this initiative further.