II. The proposed system (VAI with noticeability adjustments) is not consistent with audience measurement techniques used by other media and makes little sense as outdoor advertising’s exposures are better suited to serve multiple functions in comparison to most other media.

In spite of greater clutter associated with other media, television, radio, and print media do not discount exposures based on “noticeability” scores. As alluded to above, not all viewers of a television program are attentive to all ads shown, magazine readers do not closely attend to every ad, and radio listeners may be inattentive or switch channels during advertisements. Thus, outdoor advertising is not a logical medium in which to initiate such a system, as its messages are generally more noticeable (Young 1984).

Outdoor advertising exposures can serve multiple goals. It can, in itself, initiate stops, serving a read/react/stop function (e.g., stopping at a gas station as a response a directional sign). Outdoor ads can also serve a read/recall function whereby a sign is read and recalled later when the need for the good or services arise. An additional function that outdoor ads can serve is extended recall, by which repeated exposure to a message increases the unaided recall period (Taylor, Claus and Claus 2005). Various outdoor ads can be efficient at these multiple functions in a way that other media generally are not.

III. Ephron’s reliance on the POSTAR system assumes that outdoor advertising conditions in the U.S. are the same as is the case in the U.S. Throughout much of Europe, standard posters are smaller than typical billboards.

The United States is a country that has been profoundly influenced by the expansion of use of the automobile. The U.S. has approximately 212 million registered passenger cars, trucks, and motorcycles, and that travel more than 4 trillion miles per year. According to the Automotive News Data Center, the average American spends 443 hours per year driving a car, and averages driving 10,000 miles. Moreover, the number of vehicle registrations and mileage driven continues to grow. For a variety of reasons, typical Europeans do not drive as much as Americans, nor is popular culture as profoundly influenced by the automobile. The United States is a large nation geographically that is connected by a complex network of highways. European cities are older, and traffic patterns often reflect street grids based on ancient, concentrated patterns. Many European cities are comprised of tightly knit streets and alleys which are better suited to pedestrians than automobiles.

In Europe, billboards are referred to as “outdoor posters” and are smaller than standard U.S. billboards. Standard sizes for U.S. billboards are relatively large, at 14’ x 48’ and 12’ x 25’. The largest billboards in Europe are 3 meters x 12 meters, and there are relatively few of these signs. Roadside structures in Europe are usually considerably smaller than those in the U.S., with the most common European size being 3 meters by 6 meters. Speed of recognition is a critically important variable in Europe (van Meurs and Klerkx 2005), as it is harder for the viewer to process the message quickly. Thus, it is likely that getting the outdoor advertising message read and processed is a bigger issue in Europe than in the United States. As a result of the above environmental differences and differences in the sizes of signs, direct comparisons of the outdoor advertising industry in Europe and the U.S. should be treated with considerable caution. While different environmental factors may make the POSTAR system applicable to measurement of outdoor in Europe, the assumption that it can be applied in the United States is problematic.