Huge Building Wraps Take Over San Diego Comic-Con

by Amber Larkins, OOH Today

For over 10 years, KAP Media has had a major presence at San Diego Comic-Con, assisting large brands with OOH presence just as hundreds of thousands of people pour into the streets of San Diego. This year, they handled 25 projects from clients, including AMC (Daryl Dixon and Interview With The Vampire), Paramount+ (Star Trek), ABC (Abbott Elementary), NBCU (Olympics), and more.

Lori Brabant, CEO of KAP Media, says she started in non-traditional place-based OOH but, over time, became more focused on experiential activations. KAP Media leverages its experience in OOH and experiential to focus on unique short-term large-format solutions for brands that want a presence at cultural events.

“Our goal is to bring OOH and activations together in creative ways,” Brabant said.

Our goal is to bring OOH and activations together in creative ways

KAP Media believes that large format building wraps are a good alternative to other OOH strategies because they are highly targeted towards a specific event, and are also creative.

“We partner with properties that are centrally located around the event footprint so consumers attending the event get to experience a brand’s messaging from both inside and outside of the Convention Center,” Brabant said.

By focusing on events, they can give brands higher impression numbers than by going for local traffic alone.

“Most importantly, we are able to create a much more complex and interesting interpretation of the artwork on a building versus what you would see on a traditional billboard,” Brabant said.

The creative and approval process leading up to the San Diego Comic-Con is almost a year long. Planning begins when Comic-Con starts with renewals and new outreach in the fall. KAP Media sends over templates and specs to the brands’ creative teams in the first quarter.

During the second quarter of the year, there is a long design and approval process that can take months. It includes rounds of design approvals and approvals from the property and the event itself.

“Our internal design, creative, production, and operations teams work hand-in-hand with all parties along the way to ensure the process runs as smoothly as possible and the end result is perfect,” Brabant said.

Then, two weeks before SDCC, the KAP team descends on San Diego to begin installs. They guarantee that all properties are fully installed the Tuesday before Comic-Con opens.

KAP Media says that their stunning creatives have become a much-anticipated part of the event.

“Some super fans actually come to the event on the first day of our installs to capture photos and post online so that their community can guess who is advertising and what the full creative could be,” Brabant said.

The executives and major talent attending the show also notice the OOH. A member of the cast of ABC Abbot Elementary was asked on a panel this year, “What has changed?” and she answered, “There is like a 50’ billboard outside of me!”

As soon as Comic-Con ends, the building wraps must be removed. Depending on the size and location, this process takes two to four days.

The cycle quickly begins again. Once they finish removing the wraps they begin internal conversations on the first right of refusal (FROR) options for existing clients for the following year’s convention, including an evaluation of locations, pricing, and key learnings from that year’s event. This helps them to put together a new offering for their clients and to begin the sales cycle again with their brand and agency partners. Their goal is to keep having the same clients come back year after year.

“As you might imagine, these walls are in very high demand, so in the unlikely situation that a brand cannot renew for any reason, we have a list of brands that are waiting in the wings to partner with us,” Brabant said.

Other big events that KAP works on are the F1 in the fall, the Farmers Insurance Open in January, and SXSW in March. They also plan to open new shows and new markets in 2025.

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