• by Erik Sass , February 25, 2008

Captive Network, which operates video screens in elevators in big office buildings, added about 200,000 viewers a day during 2007, according to President and General Manager Mike DiFranza, who said that brings the total daily audience to 2.5 million. The company's 2007 build-out added 618 screens in 68 buildings in the country's top 20 DMAs, for a total of 8,200 screens in 822 buildings.

While the audience figure might seem small compared to, say, the 30.7 million viewers who watched the finale of 2007's "American Idol," DiFranza pointed out that it reaches a large proportion (7%) of the working population in those markets, which tend to be dominated by corporate towers with multiple elevators.

This audience is a desirable demo, he says--with an average household income over $100,000, and 60% in professional managerial roles. That means there's a high proportion of "decision makers" who control or advise their company's purchases. 75% fall in the 25-52 age bracket.

As the company's name indicates, the place-based video network reaches a "captive" audience of elevator passengers on a daily basis, offering high frequency for ad messages. The ads are incorporated into a silent, video and text-based broadcast featuring news, stock updates, sports scores and weather, drawn from over 100 major media outlets. Its content partners include USA Today (also owned by Captivate's parent company, Gannett) the A.P., The Washington Post, Wired and CNN.

Geographically, the Captivate Network covers most of America's big and mid-sized cities, including New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Seattle, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Memphis, Miami, Phoenix and Denver. It has also opened Canadian operations in Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary, and a French-language service in Montreal.