JFK Soon To Look A Lot Like LHR
Quote:
Bank Signs a Five-Year Deal for Ads at Kennedy Airport
By PATRICK McGEEHAN
Published: April 25, 2006
Travelers landing at Kennedy International Airport may soon think they have landed at HSBC Airport instead.
HSBC, one of the world's biggest banks, has signed a five-year deal with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to be the exclusive advertiser — other than airlines — on the 108 jet bridges that link planes to the terminals at Kennedy.
For a fee of about $6 million a year, the bank's logo will appear on the outside of the bridges, and ads for its products and services will line the inside walls.
The bank is negotiating with the Port Authority for similar arrangements at La Guardia and Newark Liberty International Airports, said Charles A. Gargano, vice chairman of the Port Authority, which operates the airports.
After splitting the bank's payment with the airlines that lease the gates, the Port Authority will collect about $1.2 million annually on the Kennedy deal and could collect as much as an additional $1.5 million a year on a deal with the other airports, he said.
"We've been looking for different sources of revenue," Mr. Gargano said. "Advertising was one where we thought we had opportunities that had not been looked at."
The advertising contract provides more of a windfall to the airlines and the company that brokered the transaction. The airlines will keep half of HSBC's fees, and 30 percent will go to JCDecaux North America, which sells ad space in airports and train stations, Mr. Gargano said.
HSBC, which has been expanding its operations in the New York City region, already has ads on jet bridges at 20 other airports in 15 cities around the world.
Six years ago, it signed on as the exclusive advertiser on the jet bridges at London's three airports, said Martin J. G. Glynn, president and chief executive of HSBC's American banking unit.
The ads that will go up soon at Kennedy will be part of the bank's new campaign, "Different Points of View," which celebrates various views of art, technology and food.
"When you get off a plane or on a plane, you have that same first image," Mr. Glynn said. "It's a powerful first image."
He said the bank hoped to encourage more business travelers and tourists to become customers at home and abroad.
HSBC has automated teller machines in the JetBlue terminal at Kennedy, but Mr. Glynn said the advertising deal is separate from any arrangements for bank facilities at the airports.
HSBC, which plans to open about 20 branches in the New York area this year and next, is competing for customers with America's biggest banks, Citigroup, Bank of America and J. P. Morgan Chase, Mr. Glynn said.
Travelers may have extra time to consider his bank's offerings as they sit on the tarmac at Kennedy, which has one of the worst records for punctuality of any airport in the country.
"It would be great if they just looked out the window and thought good thoughts," Mr. Glynn said.
Everyone in PA management should be canned for not thinking of this years and years and years ago.
