It’s a curving conduit frequented by movie stars, studio executives, agents, and all other industry folks to shuttle between homes in the Hollywood hills, agencies and offices in Beverly Hills, and studios in Hollywood. This 1.7 mile section of Sunset Blvd known as the Sunset Strip is packed dense with billboards trying to grab these tastemakers’ attention. First among the advertisers is Netflix, which not only advertises on more billboards than any other content company or conglomerate but also owns more of the billboards than any other company, squeezing out its competitors.
It’s too early to fully understand just how Netflix is going to leverage its billboards. The company has owned them for less than a year but the billboards are seen as the most valuable advertising space in Los Angeles.
Welcome to our field guide on the coming streaming wars. Check out other parts of our deep dive into the future of television here, including a cheat sheet to the next act of streaming TV, and the increasingly global future of streaming.
We counted 101 billboards and building wraps in our survey of the Sunset Strip on Nov. 15. At least 28 are now owned by Netflix, the most of any single company. Outfront, the former subsidiary of CBS, owns at least 17.
Reported with assistance from Erik Olsen.