The CBC reported that the TTC has sold the advertising rights, including the naming rights for the subway stations to Pattison advertising for 324 million dollars for the next 12 years.
This reflects very poor judgement on the part of the TTC who have grossly undervalued the advertising properties of our transit system. The TTC itself reports it’s ridership to be approaching 500 million per year.
With the $324 million being divided over the next 12 years that averages to only $27 million per year. This means Pattison advertising is only paying about $0.06 per rider/per year to bombard a captive audience with ads. Google can’t even beat that rate!
To put this into a little perspective; the operating budget for the TTC is 1.4 billion a year. Twenty seven million dollars is a drop in the bucket and means the advertising sales will contribute less than 2% of the over-all operating budget not including the expenses they incur.
The naming of stations by corporations not withstanding, this would suggest either very poor judgement or some form of corruption.