Enhance your car park advertising offering with touchscreen EV charging stations
Boost your car park advertising potential
EV charging stations in car parks: the inevitable investment
Car park operators and management companies are facing substantial pressure to invest in EV charging stations as demand for EV continues to rise exponentially year on year. In the government’s bid to encourage EV adoption and achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2030, rigorous regulations are being introduced to ensure public charging stations become more widely available. EV charging stations are an inevitable investment in the very near future for property development businesses and operators of public car parks, however, this investment can have a much more impressive ROI than you may think.
It is now possible to offer advertisers a new way to reach their audience through touchscreen EV chargers, offering a new channel to a targeted demographic of users. Management companies can capitalise on the guaranteed footfall of public spaces to ensure their EV charging stations offer a quick payback period and actually become a profitable long-term investment.
Engaging content from multiple advertisers
Pedestal chargers like the Pilot Group Plus+ unit include an 8-inch Android-based touchscreen which are capable of displaying multiple audio-visual adverts, up to a total of 8MB. This allows brands greater flexibility in displaying creative content that will engage with their audience.
The display can be managed remotely and across multiple units, meaning advertisers can purchase advertising space for set periods of time or they can be updated to provide contextually relevant content for peak periods of footfall such as around football matches.
Several adverts can be loaded simultaneously onto each charger, meaning advertising space on each pedestal can be sold multiple times over to show several video ads on a loop or advertisers could pay for exclusivity.
Improving the customer experience with EV charger advertising
Many car park operators manage several sites across towns and cities, which offers advertisers the opportunity for a unique connection with customers on a large scale. Cities like Newcastle and Manchester see an average of 18m to 60m visitors per year and often a car park is the first building many visitors encounter. Utilising EV charging stations to provide engaging content to visitors at car parks will not only enhance the perception of the place they are visiting but also improve the customer experience in the car park itself.
EV drivers as the ultimate captive audience
Heavy footfall within busy car parks is a key selling point when promoting the benefits of EV charging advertising to advertisers. However, the targeted audience of EV drivers is also a huge benefit. The touchscreen is not only used to advertise but also to set-up the charging for the vehicle, therefore engagement with the screen is 100% guaranteed with the charging station user. This unique situation ensures the ultimate captive audience, meaning those businesses looking to target the EV driver demographic will be perfectly placed to engage with their customers. This demographic, according to research, is typically aged between mid-50s to mid-70s, working professionals and with high disposable incomes.
New requirements for EV charging stations in car parks
From 2025, the government has proposed a requirement whereby every new non-residential building with more than 10 car parking spaces is to have one charge point and cable route for every five spaces. If we consider city centre car parks which can hold 600+ spaces, this would equate to around 130 spaces requiring an EV charger, which would provide a staggering scope of advertising space.
Breaking down the payback potential
Dual socket 7kWh or 22kWh pedestal EV charging stations can retail for around £5,000 each with installation. Advertising space on one car park barrier can generate around £6,500 annually (£125 per week) in advertising revenue at multi-storey sites. If we estimate the advertising potential for two dual socket chargers as a similar amount, car park operators can secure full payback within 2 years and within 10 years could have made a profit of over £50,000 with just one advert running across two charging stations.
This can then make it much more cost effective to install multiple units as the majority of the groundwork costs would remain the same whether installing one unit or several but could significantly increase the revenue generating potential.
EV charging is the future and those car park operators that begin to offer this facility first will attract advertisers who wish to associate themselves with sustainable businesses. Including EV charging advertising in promotion packages will also help to differentiate these sites from their competitors to offer alongside poster, barrier, and ticket advertising.
Should you be interested in experiencing the future of EV charging advertising, contact the Pilot Group EV team.