How Adsposure and IndyGo are transforming Indianapolis advertising

A leader in public transportation

IndyGo is the largest public transportation system in Indiana. It moves millions of residents and visitors across more than 400 square miles in Marion County, connecting Indianapolis and the surrounding area. Its focus is getting people to school, work, and play, and it is improving public transportation and the city while it does that. At the time of the 2023 partnership announcement, IndyGo provided on average more than 35,000 trips each weekday. Its partnership with Adsposure lets it carry meaningful, impactful messages across the Indianapolis area as well. Carrie Black, IndyGo’s Chief Public Affairs Officer, walked the Adsposure team through the progress of the past few years and what comes next.

The IndyGo and Adsposure partnership began in May 2023 and was announced on July 18, 2023. Adsposure became IndyGo’s exclusive transit advertising partner, expanding advertising across IndyGo’s buses, shelters and paratransit vehicles. The first ad in the new program promoted Tea’s Me Cafe, the cafe owned by basketball Hall of Famer Tamika Catchings. The design wrapped across the bus windows and down the passenger side, with a QR code to the cafe’s website.

At the announcement, Lesley Gordon, then IndyGo’s Chief Public Affairs Officer, said: “Transit advertising can be a gamechanger, especially when it comes to the ads on buses.”

Bus rapid transit, one line at a time

One of the biggest things that sets IndyGo apart is bus rapid transit, or BRT: buses traveling in dedicated lanes. While many transit agencies were looking at light rail, IndyGo chose something far more economical that still provides a rail-like experience.

The Red Line launched in 2019 and is one of the first all-electric BRT lines in the United States. It showed other agencies that environmentally and economically sustainable public transportation is possible. It also brought infrastructure improvements to the areas it serves: 208 upgraded traffic signals, 596 new ADA curb ramps, 30,714 linear feet of replaced sidewalk and 30 new trees. Adsposure sells the advertising space on the 60-foot articulated electric buses used on the Red Line, and prominent organizations have already been featured, including the Indiana Fever, the F.C. Tucker Company and Ivy Tech Community College.

The Purple Line is IndyGo’s next BRT line. It runs through a historically economically disadvantaged part of the city and brings new street paving, new drainage, new sidewalks, and new multi-use paths for walking and biking. Adsposure helped wrap an IndyGo bus to promote the Purple Line to the community.

Revenue that fuels the whole system

IndyGo’s advertising program includes exterior and interior ads across its fleet, Red Line included. Because of the revenue sharing model, advertising with IndyGo is not like other Indianapolis advertising choices. A sizeable part of the advertising revenue goes right back to IndyGo, so when an organization advertises, its dollars go into the public transportation system that carries the message, helping IndyGo continue to grow.

“Having that extra added revenue is a huge boost to our services, and it’s a huge boost to our teammates. So, I cannot speak highly enough of what it’s like to bring in that extra ad revenue and what it means to IndyGo and to our ability to continue to grow, continue to bring in new people and to continue to expand our services.”

Carrie Black, Chief Public Affairs Officer, IndyGo

What Adsposure handles

Adsposure dedicates its efforts solely to transit authority partners. For IndyGo, that means Adsposure finds and manages the advertisers, plans the campaigns, and takes care of the production and installation of the advertising on IndyGo’s assets. The program includes exterior and interior advertising on buses, with the 60-foot articulated electric buses as a signature format, and the 2023 announcement also covered shelters and paratransit vehicles.

More than a bus service

Through IndyGo Cares, the authority runs programs well beyond transportation.

• Wellness in Transit partners with local organizations to provide free healthcare to anyone in need, regardless of insurance or ID, through mobile clinics at the Carson Transit Center every week.
• Food in Transit brings fresh, locally grown produce to the people of Indianapolis for 15 weeks in the summer and early fall. It is backed by the City of Indianapolis, and the Office of Public Health and Safety joins with cooking demonstrations twice a month, recipe cards and take-home ingredients.
• Music in Transit connects local Indianapolis musicians with the community, letting them perform on the larger electric buses. IndyGo’s YouTube channel carries the performances.

Advertising fits that picture. It is one more way IndyGo reinvests in the community it serves. IndyGo and Adsposure treat the program as a two-way street. Local businesses, including small neighborhood shops, can reach the community in a new and unique way, and IndyGo builds relationships with them.

Black says IndyGo appreciates Adsposure’s commitment to community partnerships and relationship building, because that makes all the difference.

Want to see what transit advertising could do for your authority? Talk to Adsposure, The Transit Advertising People.