Are Car Wraps A Good Investment For Your Small Business?

In this article, you will learn:

What is Car Advertising?

Car Advertising is one of the effective forms of out-of-home advertising. It is nothing but a display of your ads on the surface as well as the interior of your car.

So, one of the biggest advantages of car wrap advertising is that the messages promoting your brand can be displayed on the cars. This gives your brand a mobile exposure.

Cars are not limited to any geographic location. These can travel across busy locations having higher odds of visibility or impressions. The locations may include malls, offices, renowned markets, trade shows, etc.

Thus, advertising on your car helps you to market your business offerings even in those areas where it is challenging to reach out to customers via the Billboard ads, newspaper advertising, TV advertising, etc.

What’s the Cost of Car Wraps?

Now, the very basic question that comes to mind about car wrapping is how much do car wraps cost? So, the cost of car wraps depends on two factors:

• The vehicle you choose
• How much do you intend to get it wrapped? That is, partially or completely.

You can choose any car, SUV, etc. to get these vehicle wraps made of Super Vinyl displaying colorful attractive graphics to tell your brand’s story or the product or service offering details.

Typically, the average cost of a car wrap ranges between $1,500 to $3,000. This includes:

• Printing services
• Vinyl Graphics Design
• Professional installation

One thing that you need to consider here is that car wraps are cheaper than custom paint or other methods of vehicle customization. Say, for instance, you want to change the advertisement displayed on your vehicle.

If these advertisements were hand painted, it would be challenging for you to have your vehicle repainted.

But these vehicle wraps, you can change the advertisement as you like. This is because the Vinyl Sheets can be easily removed with the help of professional installers. All this can be done without damaging the expensive OEM paint beneath the Vinyl material.

Are They Meant for Large Companies?

The next question that comes to mind regarding car wrapping is that aren’t car wraps meant for large companies with vehicle fleets?

Well, there is a common misunderstanding that car wrap advertising is meant only for companies with large vehicle fleets. However, this is not true.

You can rent a vehicle, say a car, a van, or a truck, and still go for these mobile advertisements in case you do not own a vehicle.

In fact, there are companies that provide wrap advertising services to empower brands. This is achieved by bringing together a performance-driven OOH advertising platform with the gig economy.

Thus, it’s a two-sided marketplace allowing the drivers to sign-up, decide the extent to which they would get the vehicle wrapped, or choose a brand they would want to get their car wrapped for.

Thus, you as a business owner too can register with these wrap advertising service providers and take the benefit of the mobile advertising trend. This is irrespective of the fact that you are a big or a small brand.

You too can get the benefit of increased impressions at a lower cost and increase your brand visibility. This means that your small business too can benefit from car wrapping as an advertising technique in locations that have high footfall and get potential customers, much like big brands.

Why Vehicle Wraps Make Sense?

There are a number of advantages that make vehicle wrapping an effective form of out-of-home advertising. The following are the reasons why car advertising makes sense as compared to other forms of advertising.

• Low Cost Per Thousand Impressions

Impressions are nothing but the number of views your advertisement receives. When it comes to fleet wrap impressions, impressions are counted when anyone looks at your brand name, logo, etc on a vehicle.

As per OAAA, a vehicle wrap has a lower Cost Per Thousand Impression (CPM) of $0.77, thus giving you a greater reach at a lower cost.

A comparison of fleet wrap with other media shows that vehicle wraps generate more impressions at a lower cost than other media.

• Mobility

Vehicle wrapping lets you advertise in areas where it is difficult to advertise via newspapers, TV, radio, etc.

In other words, it is not bound by location. Accordingly, it helps your advertisement reach out to your potential customers instead of expecting your customers to see your advertisement on TV, in newspaper, etc.

Thus, you can advertise to a large number of potential customers uninterruptedly on all locations where your vehicle travels. So, mobile advertisements help you to generate sizable leads by giving you endless exposure.

• Cost Effective

Vehicle wrapping does not use paint or a paper on your vehicle. Rather, this process uses a Vinyl Sheet that protects your vehicle’s painted surface from UV rays, scratches, etc.

This means that the original paint of your vehicle will not come off . Also, a quality vehicle wrap can be removed safely without causing any damage to your vehicle.

So, all of this means a higher resale value of your vehicle giving you every reason to invest in a vehicle wrapping.

• Not Pushy On Advertising

Radio and print advertising ruin the reading experience of an individual. On the other hand, vehicle wraps grab attention but do not act as a disturbance to the viewers.

Potential customers would just view the vehicle carrying your brand advertisement. They are not distracted from the important things that they might be busy with.

Typically, customers respond higher to the vehicle wrap advertisements for they do not follow a push approach.

• Lends Trust and Credibility

The potential customers think highly of your brand the moment they spot a vehicle wrap.

You may be a small business owning a single vehicle. But the potential customers attach a higher brand value the moment they view your wrapped vehicle.

They think that you are a good brand having a fleet of wrapped vehicles across various locations. This lends credibility to your brand.

There are a number of things that help you in running your business successfully. Advertising is one of the critical factors responsible for the success of your business.

You might be pushing a great product and providing outstanding services. However, you wouldn’t be able to scale your business as planned if the customers aren’t acquainted with your product or service offerings.

There are a number of ways in which you can advertise and send out this message to your customers. One of the critical factors of effective advertising is to leave that first impression.

Vehicle Wraps, also known as wrap advertising, is a growing trend in outdoor advertising. It helps in generating considerable impressions at a low cost for entrepreneurs as compared to traditional advertising tactics like billboards, prime-time TV ads, etc.

As per a study by the Outdoor Advertising Association of America (OAAA), a wrap printed on a local delivery van generates 16 million impressions annually.

Likewise, the average cost for advertising through vehicle wraps is $0.77 as against Billboard Ads costing $2.18, a full-page colour ad in top 23 magazines costing $9.35, and a 30 second Prime-Time TV Ad on top 100 TV markets costing $17.78.

As per another study, 97% of the respondents said they remembered the ads displayed on the trucks. And 96% of them said that fleet graphics were more impactful than the Billboards.

In this article, we will explain in detail what is a Vehicle Wrap, what is the average ROI for vehicle wraps, and how much do vehicle wraps cost.

What is a Vehicle Wrap?

Vehicle wraps are a way of promoting your small business. Vehicle Wrapping involves applying a plastic Vinyl sheet on the painted surface of your vehicle. These Vinyl Sheets can be removed with relative ease making it cost-efficient as compared to the banner ads.

You can communicate your vision, objectives, and provide the vehicle wrapping with your company logo, photos, and other supporting images.

Vehicle wrapping companies collaborate with you to design customized graphic art and print the same on the vehicle of your choice.

Vehicle wraps change the look of your vehicles and are cost effective as they cost less than a paint job.

Also, the vehicle wrap is applied in such a way that professional installers can easily remove these Vinyl Sheets. Removing Vinyl is easy and does not damage your vehicle.

Furthermore, Vehicle Wrapping can be done either partially or completely with Vinyl Sheets promoting your brand and its offerings.

Also, a Vehicle Wrap printed using high-quality materials and done professionally lasts for three to five years.

Finally, installation normally takes between one or two days to complete thus minimizing your vehicle downtime. The time of installation depends on the area that needs to be covered.

Are Vehicle Wraps Effective?

You may wonder if vehicle wrapping is worth the money spent on it? Afterall, vehicle wrapping demands a cost and may need a replacement in a few years.

However, you need to know that fleet advertising has a good return on investment and proves an effective advertising technique for your small business.

• Low Cost Relative To Other Media

As mentioned before, vehicle wrapping has a lower cost per thousand impressions when compared to the other forms of advertising. In other words, when you divide the cost of vehicle wrap by the number of people who view it, you would realize that vehicle wrapping is a highly cost-effective method of out-of-home advertising.

• Wider Reach and Flexibility

Billboard Advertising is both temporary and lacks mobility. Wrap Advertising, on the other hand, reaches out to a large audience as vehicles can travel across locations. Also, you can change the advertisement as you wish for these can be easily removed.

• Difficult to Ignore

It’s easy for people to ignore the advertisement when it comes to TV commercials as all it takes is a channel change. But it is difficult to ignore the advertisement when it comes to vehicle wrapping. Viewers can’t help but see the wrapped vehicles passing by, parked in the same parking lot as their vehicle, etc. Vehicle wrapping, thus, grabs attention.

• Improved ROI

A wrapped vehicle carrying your brand’s advertisement is sure to leave an impression on the mind of the viewer who just saw it on his way back home.

If he comes across your brand through a newspaper, TV, or a radio ad, he is already familiar with your brand.

Thus, your brand would be on top of the mind of your customers when it’s time to make a buying decision.

How Do Vehicle Wraps Compare to Other Forms of Advertising?

Vehicle wraps is a form of out-of-home advertising. As per OAA, mobile advertising including vehicle wrapping can be one of the most effective ways of out-of-home advertising.

This is because it has the potential to reach a large number of customers at lower cost per thousand impressions when compared to any other form of advertising.

The following table gives you a cost comparison of vehicle wraps to other forms of media advertising. These include newspapers, TV, radio, digital media, etc.

As you can see, Vehicle Wrapping has the lowest CPM when compared to other forms of media advertising. As per Geopath, vehicle wraps make 30,000 – 70,000 impressions daily.

Accordingly, vehicle wraps generate assured views and impressions when vehicles are parked at high-footfall locations like malls, parks, etc.

In addition to this, you have the control of the design and the place where these vehicles would be parked for advertising.

Likewise, vehicle wraps are hard to ignore compared to other advertising channels. Therefore, this form of advertising on your car or other vehicle grabs the attention of the people passing by.

As per a study, people are exposed to 5,000 advertisements each day. Out of this, 18% of the advertisements go unnoticed.

Also, people use ad blockers in their devices when it comes to advertising digitally. This gives them the flexibility to block or skip digital advertisements.

However, this is not the case when it comes to vehicle wrapping for this form of advertising on your car or other vehicle cannot be overlooked. As per ATA study, 96% of the respondents noticed truck ads.

What is the Average Return on Investment for Vehicle Wraps?

Vehicle Wrapping has proved to be one of the most effective ways of outdoor advertising and promotion. As seen above, these mobile billboards have a lower CPM. Therefore, it gives you the potential to generate more leads and reach out to more people at a lesser cost.

On the other hand, physical billboards are both temporary and stationery. Thus, physical billboards cannot go to places and reach out to a larger audience unlike the car advertising.

Similarly, people are free to skip or fast forward ads in case of TV commercials. But it is difficult for people to ignore wrapped vehicles displaying your brand logo parked at stadiums, popular markets, etc.

Finally, fleet advertising also gives a boost to your Search Engine Marketing Campaigns online. This is because a potential customer would remember your drycleaning brand when searching for drycleaners online later. This is because they would have already seen a wrapped vehicle displaying your brand information before.

Do You Need to Have Advertisements on Car Wraps?

As a small business owner, you can choose custom vehicle wrapping as a means of advertising your business. But these car wraps don’t necessarily need to have advertisements on them.

In other words, small business owners can not only use car wraps for promoting their brand but also use such vehicle wraps to protect their vehicles from wear and tear.

Many people use these Vinyl Sheets as a means to protect the OEM paint of their vehicle. This is done to protect the original paint of the vehicle from coming off.

The Vinyl Wrap protecting the paint provides an additional shield that keeps your vehicle paint safe. Likewise, you can use a color wrap instead of getting a paint job done the next time your company’s car paint chips.

These color wraps are cost effective and allow you to change the color of your company car without getting it painted.

Furthermore, these Vinyl Sheets come in a variety of colors and finishes like Matte, High Gloss, etc. Therefore, you can choose a color and a finish of your choice to make your brand stand out.

Are Vinyl Wraps Legal?

Vehicle Wrapping calls for an investment. Thus, it is important to go through the vehicle modification laws in the areas where you intend to undertake car advertising before making such an investment.

Also, check with the local Municipalities and State Laws so that you do not end up wasting money. A number of States have strict laws when it comes to mobile advertising.

This is because wrapped vehicles are placed in areas with high foot traffic. New York city is a good example where any type of vehicle advertisement is banned.

This is because the mobile billboards are seen as adding to New York city’s already high traffic congestion.