Innovocean wins bid for V&A Waterfront outdoor media, set to revolutionise DOOH in retail environments

Innovocean, a joint venture between two of South Africas leading OOH media owners –Tractor Media Holdings and Reveel (a subsidiary of the Nfinity Group of Companies) – has been awarded the exclusive advertising rights for the Victoria & Alfred (V&A) Waterfront in Cape Town, South Africa.

This win sees the newly-established company take on all of the internal and external out-of-home (OOH) and digital OOH retail advertising for South Africa’s largest and most popular ocean-side shopping and entertainment destination, which sees an annual foot count of over 26 million people (pre-Covid).

The Innovocean roll-out will commence on 1 April 2022, and was born from a conversation between Tractor CEO Simon Wall and Nfinity CEO Ken Varejes in 2019, when both realised that the synergies between their respective companies and their collective experience would make for a powerful collaboration in offering clients an unsurpassed product, skillset and service.

Explains Wall and Varejes, “We realised that by joining forces, we would be able to expand our sales presence, marketing manpower and other resources. Innovocean will offer our clients the ability to tap into two experienced, expert teams with one overarching vision.

“In terms of the V&A, there will be a number of brand new digital opportunities that we will be developing, which will include current as well as futuristic inventory design and technology, married with progressive thinking, creative execution and a seamless roll-out.”

Wall adds, “A key component of our vision for this project was to make access to the V&A’s network of inventory more democratic, and as we start to see a recovery in tourism and footfall return to the V&A, we’re extremely excited about the opportunities Innovocean’s network will facilitate.”

Reveel is known for its emphasis on architecturally and aesthetically-pleasing DOOH solutions, and Varejes says that the V&A project will incorporate this approach into its roll-out. “While state-of-the-art digital screens will naturally play a significant role, we will also integrate architectural design that reflects the heritage of the V&A in a contemporary way.”

He goes on to say that while Tractor and Reveel remain completely independent entities, Innovocean will likely tackle other projects in future, but that he and Wall are “firmly focussed on this project until our vision has materialised.”

Says Wall, “Innovocean will have the opportunity to invest in brand new infrastructure and technology both inside and outside the V&A Waterfront and build from the ground up. This will revolutionise the way the way retail advertising is both deployed and consumed in a shopping mall environment.”

Alex Kabalin, retail executive at the V&A, says, “We’ve used the Covid lockdowns period to continue with investments in our retail clothing, food, as well as our attractions offerings that visitors can look forward to. Consolidating our indoor and outdoor portfolio allows advertisers to better access the full customer journey across our neighbourhood, while delivering innovation and growing our network of digital media platforms.”