3 Years Later: Catching Up With Brian Rappaport, Founder of Quan Media Group

Tim Rowe:
Brian Rappaport, welcome back. We were just catching up in the lead up that the only other person to have ever appeared on the podcast, uh, is of course the, the legend and our friend, Andrea Henley. So it's an honor to have you back a third time. And we're going to catch up on a lot of things. We're going to catch up in the last three years of what Quan's been up to, uh, highlight some of the brands and campaigns specifically. And, and I want to double click and deep dive into it to the Indie agency collaboration. that I know has been a big focus of yours at Quan. Measurement is a big topic of conversation. You have a unique perspective on that. So I'm excited to dive in and talk about all of these things here, but welcome back.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, I'm excited to be back. This is exciting. I said, I kind of feel like, you know, the Steve Martins and Alec Baldwin's on SNL is like in the five, six, seven timers club. So

Tim Rowe:
Yeah.

Brian Rappaport:
it's always good to chat and I'm pumped to hopefully touch on some things that I haven't the previous two times I was on your show.

Tim Rowe:
Well, I looked back the first time that we connected, it was right before COVID. It was like the week that the world was shutting down.

Brian Rappaport:
Yep.

Tim Rowe:
And that episode came out March 27th, 2020. So it's crazy to think it's already been three years since we first caught up. But for folks that maybe don't know you already or aren't familiar with Quan, give them like the 60 second commercial, get them up, get them up to speed.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, I mean, Quan is what we like to call an out of home concierge. We work with brands of all shapes and sizes and all budget levels. We don't care about how big you are, how often you buy out of home, how you buy out of home. If you're only running in the channel once a year, once a week, it doesn't really matter. We are experts in the channel and in the space. We buy and plan across the country and internationally. Um, and we do it all from billboards and bus shelters and subway to 3d projections, painted walls, pop-up shops, integrations of music festivals, and work with over 75 brands. Um,

Tim Rowe:
Wow

Brian Rappaport:
a lot of fun ones in there, everyone ranging from skins to go puff to Casper. Um, so on and so forth. So, uh, yeah, it's been a fun three and a half years. It'll be our fourth year in July. We're a team of five spread out across the country, including, I would say globally, cause we do have somebody over in the UK. So that is the elevator pitch on, uh, on Kwan and us.

Tim Rowe:
Great elevator pitch and, uh, and got the opportunity to meet Ashley, the, the global Quan team in Nashville, uh, a couple of weeks back. So very exciting to see the growth again in such a short period of time. I was, I texted you the other day because I was, I was picking up a drink and I reached into the cooler at my convenience store and I pulled it out. And I'd never purchased this product before. And you were the first person I text because I said, this feels like a Kwan brand and it turned out to be one that you were already working with. So I'd love to ask you this question of as the founder of an agency, you're seeing the leading edge of industry growth. Where do you see the most growth coming from and what do you see as being the primary driver?

Brian Rappaport:
I really do see growth coming from brands that either, it's one of two things. One, they're unfamiliar with out of home as a channel and are just kind of exploring it and are losing faith and trust in other channels, be it they're unhappy with meta. I don't really wanna throw other channels into the bus, but they're just not

Tim Rowe:
Sure.

Brian Rappaport:
happy with what they're getting, be it a cost situation, a measurement situation, et cetera. So they wanna utilize out of home for the first time. They wanna open it up as another channel for them. And then the second part of that are brands that are aware of out of home, but maybe aren't as educated as they should be and don't know how vast the channel is. And they don't know that out of home includes airports. So they don't know that out of home includes incredible place based digital or programmatic digital, or that it could be, you know, having a glass box truck with a pop-up showroom, you know, drive around Williamsburg. And when brands start to get educated more, um, on the things that you can do in the out of home space, they start to realize that and they start to allocate additional dollars in budget. Um, to all sorts of formats in the out of home space. And that's super exciting. So I think as digital out of home continues to expand, I think as out of home in general, along with measurement, and ways to strategically use the channel in a hyperlocal and a geo-targeted way continue to expand. I think that is where we're seeing growth. And it's an exciting time. I mean, the press is there, the trades have all of that information. I mean, OAAA is constantly putting out. fantastic pieces on the growth of the channel and how we are fully recovered coming out of the pandemic. And, you know, it's not propaganda. It's the truth. And it seems like every other week, we're getting four, five, six brands, either legacy brands, brands that have done it before, that are coming back after taking some time off from spending it out of home, or new brands like the Lemon Perfects of the world that realize the value in out of homes, the channel and they wanna spend it.

Tim Rowe:
Because it turns out you were working already with Lemon Perfect, I think, when I text you.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, I mean, and they're just a fantastic brand. And, you know, why not out of home for them when, you know, the Philadelphia Eagles are making a Super Bowl run and their main, you know, spokesperson is Jalen Hurts

Tim Rowe:
It doesn't

Brian Rappaport:
and Philadelphia,

Tim Rowe:
hurt.

Brian Rappaport:
the great out of home city. And, you know, kind of reached out to them and said, hey, guys, like, have you considered utilizing out of home? This is a no brainer. And they they jumped at it. And now it's kind of like a part of their media mix. And they're also signing all sorts of amazing athletes, De'John De'Murray, etc. you know, to the brand and I mean, it's amazing. So yeah, it's a fun time to be in the out of home space. It's a lot of great shops, a lot of great agencies out there. And I think that we're all collectively seeing and feeling the growth, which is, you know, obviously, we don't need to get into negativity and like the economic structure. But like,

Tim Rowe:
All right, good vibes

Brian Rappaport:
it's encouraging.

Tim Rowe:
only. That was our mantra.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, good vibes only. So it's encouraging based on you know, where we are, or we think.

Tim Rowe:
And the education piece, you know, collaboration is a word I've got kind of titled across my as an indicator, as a point for us to align this conversation to, but how has education really morphed into some of the collaboration? You're working with some agencies like Mischief and No Fixed Address. That was somebody that we've talked about in the past on episodes, but you're doing more work with VaynerMedia and so many exciting companies. How have you used education to help enable collaboration?

Brian Rappaport:
Well, it's kind of great. I mean, we went up to see a partner last week in Boston and simply kind of gave them not a Kwan 101, but like a hybrid Kwan out of home 101 and sat in a room, you know, with some really great marketers and some great media buyers that are very well versed in other channels, but, but self admittedly, not well versed in out of home and took them through, you know, what out of home is and what you can kind of do in this space. And you know, the innovations in the out of home space, as well as like some fun case studies of things that we've done at Kwan from Trigger Grills Farm. on the side of the road to go puffs, hand-painted double decker during our basil a few years ago. And you just looked around the room and saw from the reactions that it wasn't like, I've been in a million luncheon lands. You could tell when people are like, all right on the phone, on the laptop, like get me out of here. But like the questions were there, the excitement was there. And then coming out of that meeting, like so many like additional emails came, including a few briefs. So I think for us it's kind of finding we're not, you know, in the business of like just picking and working with like, other independent agencies for the sake of like revenue and billing. I think for us it's kind of finding like-minded partners who have the same types of clients that we do that think the same way that we do that have the same goals as a shop that we do and really finding ways to work with them in whatever way they feel the most comfortable. If they want to use this one time or work with us on one specific project, that is totally fine. And then if they want to make us a part of their regular, you know, media mix, but their clients and position us as a partner in whatever way. You know, we're open to that too, but I think like the fun part is that there are so many really great independent shops out there, both out of home specialists and then, you know, full service agencies. And I think that we need to have more collaboration between agencies and less competition between agencies.

Tim Rowe:
Amen. I couldn't agree more. There's enough for everybody to eat out there. I'm curious,

Brian Rappaport:
Definitely.

Tim Rowe:
Brian, what were some of the hardest questions that were asked in that room? Surely there were lots of ideas and exciting opportunities, but what were the hard questions?

Brian Rappaport:
How do we project into the Empire State Building? I'm like, you

Tim Rowe:
That's

Brian Rappaport:
can't

Tim Rowe:
a

Brian Rappaport:
like,

Tim Rowe:
hard

Brian Rappaport:
and,

Tim Rowe:
question.

Brian Rappaport:
and,

Tim Rowe:
Ha

Brian Rappaport:
and,

Tim Rowe:
ha

Brian Rappaport:
you know,

Tim Rowe:
ha.

Brian Rappaport:
that's a, it's a hard question, especially when you see like what giant spoon did with stranger things, you know, last year they did it, but like, that's like a specialty case. Like, you know, harder questions, like again, getting into out of home measurement and getting super granular about that and, and really drilling down and asking, you know, how could we prove effectiveness to, you know, to our brands, which it's a whole other conversation. But, but again, like the harder questions like, You know, can we do something in two days, which we can within reasons, digital out of home, we love you. But yeah, I mean, you know, questions around measurement, around like kind of stunty things that are not realistic. We've had, it wasn't necessarily Wednesday, but we've had brands ask, like, could we potentially wrap or brand the GW bridge? Like a real question. And I'm like,

Tim Rowe:
It's a

Brian Rappaport:
you can't

Tim Rowe:
great

Brian Rappaport:
do

Tim Rowe:
question.

Brian Rappaport:
that. You can do anything in out of home. 90% of the things in out of home are doable. You can't do that. I worked with a fantastic R&D team at Media Hub for many years in my report days. And like some of the concepts that came from them were just incredibly mind blowing. And maybe like 2% were just like, no, there's like a hard no. Like you just, you can't do it. But

Tim Rowe:
There's

Brian Rappaport:
yeah,

Tim Rowe:
a line.

Brian Rappaport:
so a lot.

Tim Rowe:
We can't

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
wrap

Brian Rappaport:
So a

Tim Rowe:
the

Brian Rappaport:
lot

Tim Rowe:
GW

Brian Rappaport:
of those types

Tim Rowe:
bridge.

Brian Rappaport:
of projects. Can't wrap the 2W

Tim Rowe:
All right,

Brian Rappaport:
bridge. Yeah. Can't project onto the Empire State Building. Although I guess you can, but like within reason. So yeah, those types of things.

Tim Rowe:
well that's exciting. I think that that's promising. And we'll talk about measurement in a little bit here, but I'd love to kind of get your sense on who has your attention. Who do you think is doing it right? Maybe give someone their flowers, I think, is what the kids say. But

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah,

Tim Rowe:
who's got your eye?

Brian Rappaport:
I mean, I'm going to give flowers again to like, I don't want to say competition, but like friendly competition or friends out there. Like,

Tim Rowe:
Co-opetition.

Brian Rappaport:
I don't know, I look at Rick Robinson and Project X and what they've done with Glossier this year. They've done a lot around, you know, retail openings and some just really incredible work, both internationally and over here as well. They wrapped these amazing box trucks with Agile Media who are incredible in that space. And that was kind of like all over the place. You saw them. They're fantastic. I mean, an incredible campaign that just ran out of milk money, intermissy with JLo, like it's all over New York. I can't,

Tim Rowe:
Saw

Brian Rappaport:
can't go

Tim Rowe:
some

Brian Rappaport:
anywhere

Tim Rowe:
of it

Brian Rappaport:
in

Tim Rowe:
yesterday.

Brian Rappaport:
New York without seeing Sam and his team's work. So I mean, you know, being a fan of the celebrity brand space and the fashion space, I think, you know, that that's fantastic. I mean, I give props to rapport. I mean, my old shop, like they won a great award, um, the ad club out of home now event this past December for their work with the NBA last playoffs. I mean, it just seems like every. Every other week they have some great stuff coming out, whether they're doing work with Lego, et cetera. So, yeah, I mean, there's just some really great out of home specialists out there that it's nice because like you said before, there's more than enough to eat, um, but it's just really awesome to look around and see some great work coming out of other shops. And then of course, like if you look at other full service agencies, I mean, the work that mischief and no, no fixed address did with Tinder and like that whole campaign that's out there now is just utterly incredible. I mean, you can't help, but, but not. you know, not see that. Um, so I always give, give credit to them. I think they do, you know, a pretty fantastic job. And at the same thing, same time, like our friends at Vayner just around the, the new fronts now with Tubi, um, and really doing really

Tim Rowe:
Oh yeah,

Brian Rappaport:
strong

Tim Rowe:
campaign's

Brian Rappaport:
events focused

Tim Rowe:
awesome. Tell

Brian Rappaport:
campaign.

Tim Rowe:
people about

Brian Rappaport:
Like

Tim Rowe:
that.

Brian Rappaport:
it's great. Yeah. I mean, to be wanted to be everywhere in New York city across the new fronts. And this is like where digital out of home really like, I don't need to like tout it anymore, but like focused on major, obviously when you're doing a new front campaign, you want to be in front of every major agency. You want to be where the new fronts are at convene. So like, you know, whether it's dominating Fulton Center and World Trade in the Oculus, whether you are on Firefly Digital Taxitops, you know, geo-targeted to the specific agencies and areas where the new funds are taking place, whether you're utilizing Captivate to be in the elevator screens of the major holdcos, it was

Tim Rowe:
and

Brian Rappaport:
a fully comprehensive plan that included so many digital touch points. And those are the most fun out of home plans to work on because A, everyone gets a little bit of the pie. There's no favorites there. And B, you're really building that immersive like, strategic driven out of home campaign. And on top of it, it just goes to show you and shows people who are unfamiliar with out of home that it's not a four week buy, it's not an eight week buy. Like this is a one week strong, smart digital blitz that that's the right way in certain instances to utilize out of home. So that was a real fun one. So I think I touched on, gave flowers to a lot of people, but there's a lot of good work coming out there, both in the out of home side and media side.

Tim Rowe:
And we'll link to the Tubi campaign because the content I think was So uniquely specific. It wasn't just, you know, a great selection of digital formats. They really leverage some, some cheeky fun content. Can you just give the audience that maybe hasn't seen that a

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah,

Tim Rowe:
sense of

Brian Rappaport:
I

Tim Rowe:
what

Brian Rappaport:
mean,

Tim Rowe:
the content was.

Brian Rappaport:
Mischief came up with these amazing short films that were spoofs on media buyers like trafficking the wrong creative and being interrogated and things like that. And it was kind of great or like, you know, the RFP that went out late, whatever this case is. And it's such mischief work. They're just so good with things like that. And it's kind of, you know, it was just so awesome. So like there were clips of that playing on Full Motion Digital out of home. I mean... We got to use the Oculus screen, which is one of my favorite out of home placements in the world. I mean, it is essentially the length of a football field in the Oculus World Trade Center. And like, it's just such a show-stopping placement that if you ever get a chance to walk through there, it's kind of like you can't miss it. But, you know, the ability to like run these amazing clips, you know, and great creative that was derived for this campaign was just super fun. Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
Yeah, I love that campaign and you know, we talked a little bit at the beginning there about lemon perfect and how I instantly thought of you. You've done an incredible job of being very intentional about building a brand for Quan in such a short time that my my gut reflex picking up a product was, wow, this looks like looks like a brand that Brian will be working with. Who's a brand that you would love to work with that maybe you're not yet?

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, I guess, you know, one that I love that I just admire for a long time is Fanatics. I just

Tim Rowe:
Yeah.

Brian Rappaport:
love what Michael Rubin has built there. I think as they merged the collectible world with, obviously, sports betting, fantasy sports, like it's just an incredible spaceship. And I mean, Michael Rubin's story in itself. I love self-made, incredible people. And his story is kind of amazing. So, yeah, I mean, I would go with Fanatics at the same time. Like... I don't know, maybe their competitors. I'm not really sure how it shakes out in the category, but I've loved DraftKings. I mean, I'm a major

Tim Rowe:
Sure.

Brian Rappaport:
sports fan. I would love to get an opportunity to work with them. Yeah, I mean, those are two that I just kind of like truly admire with respect to whomever they're currently working with. You know, just if you're putting me on the spot, those are two that I truly love.

Tim Rowe:
Well, I appreciate you being willing to be put on the spot and answering it so freefully. I think that those would be two brands I would look at and go, oh yeah, I think that Brian's probably working with them. Um, some of those hard questions in the, in the room in Boston that you spoke about one, uh, that you touched on there was, was measurement. And when we were catching up kind of in advance for this conversation, there is so much focus, even, even obviously for myself, I develop a lot of content around measurement around attribution. But you said something that I scribbled across the page and I said, gosh, we need to just talk about that more. And it was on delight

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
being a measure of success. Give us. Give us that thesis. What does that mean?

Brian Rappaport:
I mean, I just think that like, I think we're getting there. I just, I feel like everyone says the same thing over and over again, that we need just like one universal system of measurement. I mean, I love what Geopath is doing and what they've done and I appreciate it and respect it, and I know we've spoken about like opportunity to see in the past and Ana and her team, you know, are doing a lot around that, but I just think that there needs to be a little bit more of a refined way to measure the impact of out of home. Having said that, there are some great ways to tell the story of if out of home is working and when you work collaboratively with a brand, if a brand internally... is doing their own thing, whether they have vanity URLs, whether, you know, they're, they're, they're tracking sales lift. Like that's great in tandem with what, you know, we all could be doing on the buy side. I mean, there are great companies out there. You have M4 for amazing brand lift studies. You have Reveal for additional measurement. I mean, there, there's so many, obviously Blue Byte and Quorum on the mobile retargeting side, so there's so many different things that you can kind of offer up, you know, brands that you work with. And I think for us, one thing that we've done a lot of, which is kind of cool. is called a lift analysis where we take historical sales data from a brand that we're working with and kind of measure or form a hypothesis of how adding out of home into their media mix led to whatever those KPIs are that you're trying to understand, whether it's an increase in site visitations, store traffic, et cetera. And you know, it's kind of nice because it does tell a story, it works for early stage growth brands, it works for later stage brands, but it's a nice way to kind of understand with. a layer of statistical significance, like if out of home worked. I mean, for larger brands that spend a lot, it's kind of great to do the web attribution dash and pixeling different sites and understand offline to online conversion and hey, did you know how many people walked by my link kiosks, you know, in the East Village versus how many people walked by and converted my dedicated wild postings all throughout Williamsburg and understanding what, what, you know, tactics are performing better than others and then optimizing later campaigns to kind of double down on what you've seen success. And, and You know, brand lift studies as well. I mean, very top of the funnel, but if you're running a multi-market campaign and if there is a brand that's spending pretty heavily in out of home, like it's important to understand intent and awareness and, you know, competitors and so on and so forth. And to be able to get a really in-depth, deep look at brand awareness throughout the course of like our very robust out of home campaign, you know, tells you something. So, I mean, and that's not even getting into like, kind of like, you know, I said Blue Byte and mobile retargeting this flow code that does these incredible vanity URL codes with full backend tracking tech. Yeah. Like flow code. I love like they're fantastic. I mean, sure. There's no true way to measure gorilla while postings. Everyone in the out of home world loves gorilla while postings. You have everyone from, you know, coach to the hottest D to C brands, but like, let's be honest, they're moving weekly. You're not in the same place. It's kind of hard to understand the fact that this like, you've got a flow code designed. If you're a brand and you have them on your gorilla while postings and like to a degree, you could understand if people are engaging with them if they are actually taking action and going to a site. And that's kind of awesome. So I do think that like from 10 years ago, we have come so far as an industry in terms of out of home measurement, ROI, et cetera. The job to be done is just, I think having one universal, like everyone on the same page, this is how we are measuring out of home. This is the process that we are taking. This is how often we are coming out with new data or, you know, new numbers, et cetera. Yeah, and I mean, just kind of going from there. But I think we're getting in the right direction. And I'm excited about it.

Tim Rowe:
And on the other end of the spectrum, Just, hey, you made the brand's life easier. You helped them do some pretty cool shit and they're happy. And that's the measure of success is they had a good experience.

Brian Rappaport:
Oh my God. I mean, awareness campaigns are the best thing in the world, by the way. Like I'm not going to sit here like seven

Tim Rowe:
Hahaha!

Brian Rappaport:
out of 10 have measurement, but then there's that three. But like when you, when you make a brand happy, when, when there's a brand out there right now and like that, that out of home just makes them happy, but also is just accomplishing the goal they have as a brand. And it's kind of like not to go off on a tangent, but we just worked with bombas. It's an ad week. So it just launched this week on a really strong campaign. They're a hun- they donate socks for every pair of bought. And for their 100, I think it's 100 million, their 100 million, you know, sock donation, they launched this campaign across New York City with facts around the stigma of homelessness and different people going through homelessness. Like they ran basically a brand campaign, but not a brand campaign. It was more like celebrating, or not celebrating, but bringing awareness to this very important social cause through out of home, because there's no better visual medium out there than out of home. And if you walk down and know how Soho, Williamsburg, you're in the subway, like you should be seeing these messages for the next four weeks. But like going into mama's office this past week and chatting with the team and kind of celebrating the launch of this pretty, pretty monumental campaign for them and seeing how happy they were and how excited they were. Um, I dunno, it just, there's not enough of that in out of home, I don't think. And you can't tell a client to celebrate successes and happiness. But like, when you, when you have a client like that and a brand like that, that truly like makes you feel. special for like helping them launch an important campaign. Everyone wants to be complimented at some point. So like making brands happy and seeing how in love they are with out of home. Like that was, that was pretty sick.

Tim Rowe:
And I think that that's a takeaway that we can all apply to lots of parts of our life. So thank you for sharing that.

Brian Rappaport:
No, of course.

Tim Rowe:
In recent years, non-traditional, the experiential activations, especially coming out of COVID gained a lot of traction. I'm going to come back and snip that. Also, I'm going to come back and I'll snip out the celebrating part. I've gotten pretty good at that thing. So let me restart that. In recent years, especially coming out of COVID. non-traditional experiential activations have gained a lot of traction. What are some of the key factors that you're seeing contributing to the growth specifically of the non-traditional at home?

Brian Rappaport:
I mean, we're back. Like, we are back with respect to the pandemic and anything horrible that people went through with that. Like, we're back and events are back. And whether it's a Lollapalooza or Coachella or, you know, Governor's Bowl or at the same time South by Art Basel, all of these amazing events, like we have a brand that's that's running something in Cannes, which is going to be kind of sick to see in person in, you know, a month. But like these events are back. And I think that that year and a half that that either things were completely shut down or at half capacity. Like brands realize like the true way coming out of this to really reach consumers, like in an uncluttered environment, in a one-to-one contactful way is, is by having these immersive, incredible, engaging activations. And whether that means you're holding, opening a brick and mortar store in Soho. So you do a branded food truck that's parked outside there for the weekend, you know, opening, or you are at GovBall in New York. and you're a brand new beverage brand and you decide to build a giant tent and give out free branded sunglasses and swag while also giving out free like beverages. There's no better way to connect with consumers and that's the real fun part of out of home. You know, and getting to work with really great partners in the experience, in the experiential space like a City of Vengeance, like to help bring some of these brand ideas to life, like it's the best. So I do think that like... you know, this is a segment of out of home that we should be paying more attention to. I'm hoping that we'll talk more about it at OAAA next year. But like the experiential non-traditional space is super fun. There's a lot of great stuff coming out of it, you know, and I'm excited to, you know, see kind of what's next. Again, you go to a music festival and sure, it's great to hear the artists perform. But like if you're in the out of home world or in the advertising world, you kind of want to walk around and see what brands have like pop-up activations and what they got going on there. If anything, you kind of get good ideas for your brands and then you get exposed to brands you may have never heard of.

Tim Rowe:
Yeah, love that. And I'm sure there's potentially even ways to do it that aren't necessarily going to break the bank that could be scrappy and still very engaging.

Brian Rappaport:
Oh, I mean, we did a coffee card for a brand opening up a brick and mortar location in New York city in October. It was a one weekend coffee card and it was, you know, not to give away costs, but it was below 25 K for like a weekend and branded looked great. Um, you know, cappuccinos, espressos, all that good stuff. But it was kind of like, it really adds a little bit more, um, to what you're doing and like, yeah, the bottom line is like, you don't need to spend a million dollars on an, on an activation, like sure you can and go wild. And I think it was like, four or five years ago that like literally HBO created a real life West world at South by, and apparently the price tag on that was like insane as it should be. So you can go to that end of the medium and go wild, but you know, you could do something that really just people like free stuff. So

Tim Rowe:
People

Brian Rappaport:
if you

Tim Rowe:
do

Brian Rappaport:
weave that

Tim Rowe:
like

Brian Rappaport:
into

Tim Rowe:
free

Brian Rappaport:
anything

Tim Rowe:
stuff.

Brian Rappaport:
experiential, um, you know, shout outs to like also something as simple as, um, the circuit wraps that that are out in the Hamptons and Montauk and

Tim Rowe:
Right.

Brian Rappaport:
LA and et cetera, like They weave sampling in, they weave chartered rides in, like that is considered an activation and something that's pretty cool. So this is the time of year where like, hey, you want to reach people out in the Hamptons and Montauk where there's really no out of home other than, you know, there's a few great vehicular options, but like go ahead and like wrap circuits and sample some product and do some cool things. So.

Tim Rowe:
Maybe there's somebody listening that is interested and kind of wants to explore this. How do you how do you recommend approaching and kind of managing the moving parts to ensure a seamless activation?

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, you have to have there are a bunch of good partners in the experiential space. You know, everyone from I said City of Vengeance, but to be fair, like other ones from like, you know, be the machine. There are like other really great partners out there that you can work with, you know, not to be put on the spot like I have. There's a handful of others, but like you find the right partner. And like when we sit down, I'll use City because we do work with them a lot. I'm like. you bring to them what your client is looking to do. And it really is up to the brand how involved they want to get. They can go ahead and handle everything soup to nuts, getting a permit, brand ambassadors, building whatever needs to be built, et cetera. And that's it. Or a brand can be very involved and they could bring their own brand ambassadors, provide product, be there on site, like get involved and like, city will take a step back and just weave themselves in, in whatever way the brand feels most comfortable. So we've done things from literally building farms in the sides of the road to having coffee carts. to hosting movie nights in parks in San Diego for a brand where there's photo opportunities and free popcorn, et cetera. And it's so many different layers and levels of experiential and how involved the brand has gotten. But the best part is when you have a great partner, they're going to make your life very easy because experiential can be a very convoluted and full of layers type of... Another good partner now that I remembered is also Roaming or Roaming Hunger. They're based out in LA, but they specialize as you would expect in food trucks and things like that.

Tim Rowe:
Oh wow.

Brian Rappaport:
They're awesome to work with too. So, I'm just trying to give flowers to everyone as you would say today,

Tim Rowe:
Thank

Brian Rappaport:
when I

Tim Rowe:
you.

Brian Rappaport:
can.

Tim Rowe:
That's what this is for, right? This is a platform

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
built for enabling, obviously, an amazing global community that's just as passionate about these things as we are. So

Brian Rappaport:
Yes,

Tim Rowe:
I

Brian Rappaport:
exactly.

Tim Rowe:
appreciate you being so generous with that. Maybe

Brian Rappaport:
First.

Tim Rowe:
stepping into some of the little, the hairier topics. And this is, it's funny because I guess maybe let me take a step back and I'll give the audience a story here. So it's 2020. I've just stepped into role as business development director for a region of the Adams outdoor plant in Eastern Pennsylvania. And I've got a little podcast. I'm figuring it out. Right. And I, I have a conversation with someone who's now become a friend, but at the time I just knew Brian Rappaport as the founder of Quan and he was coming from rapport worldwide. And honestly, I was like, does this last name have to do with report? Like is this Who is Brian Rapoport? Uh, and obviously we've come to, to, to know each other pretty well now, but the, the, the ongoing debate about going brand direct, right? We had this opportunity to connect, to connect in a moment of time where I was in that seat. I was being encouraged by sales leadership to go brand direct. But at the same time, I'm coming off of a great conversation with someone who I just met, who's the founder of an agency. And I'm thinking, I want to work with Brian. I want to be collaborative. I, I see more opportunity by being an engaged partner and helping bring him great ideas and his brands, great ideas. Can we talk about this? Can we talk about the very taboo going brand direct conversation?

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, I posted something on LinkedIn the other week and like, I don't think I've ever had like a controversial post. It's usually pretty, pretty straightforward and nice or a real personal anecdotal story. But I got a little backlash because I used to get very possessive when I worked in the holding company world, you know, when a media partner would go brand direct or go agency direct. Like let's say I'm working with media hub and we're the out of home partner for media hub. Like we're working collaboratively on a client, but then a media partner would call a planning team at media hub and kind of cut us out. And then, you know, the planning team at Media Hub would come back to us and be like, well, why is this media partner reaching out to us? Shouldn't you be handling that relationship? And it would just get annoying. And I do feel like the one thing that we can do better on the buy side is responding to media partner emails, acknowledging receipt, level setting with where they are with campaigns, and if they don't make a campaign, here's why. And if you, you know, et cetera, like I think that like, if someone takes the time to put together an RFP, you owe them that answer, whether it's something they want to hear or they don't. You know, so on and so forth. So I do feel that like, I do feel that ultimately, you know, you should be working. If you know that there is a brand coming out of an agency or out of a shop, you should be working with that agency or shop. If you have a great idea for them, be, be aggressive, reach out to that buyer, reach out to the CEO. If the buyer doesn't get back to you, then go hire, go to their AMD, go to their supervisor. But yeah, I think that what I learned from my post a few weeks ago and looking, taking a step back and thinking in hindsight is like, You know, everyone wants business and everyone's pushing, but like you should be working more with the agency partner than trying to like go for those, those dollars. I think there's better, better chance of success that way than like going brand direct. Now it's a little bit different when you get on the specialist side, because I think when you're in the hold call, like everyone has their AORs and like these are your clients. Like you know that these are the clients. Like there, I'll be very upfront. Like we have some brands that we work with that that do their out of home buying in unique ways. Some. You know, the majority will use us and like where they're out of home partner. There are some that do some in-house, they have direct relationships with an out front, they have direct relationships with the JC Deco, and they want to keep that, but they want us to work with all other media partners. We don't ask any questions. We're totally fine. Then there are other, other clients that we've worked with that, you know, have done some of their buying with one shop and some of us, we actually split it with another shop and we're fine with that too. What really frustrates, I think in the cases where like the buying is done, a little bit in-house, a little bit with a partner. If a media partner wants to go and reach out to that client, I get it. Like, we don't own that relationship solely, and like, I have to play devil's advocate and be fair. What bothers me, and I think anyone on my side of the business would say this, is if we have one or we are constantly working with a brand that maybe somebody at a media partner worked with directly three, four years ago. And we've clearly been working with that brand for, I don't know, one, two, three years, done multiple campaigns. And that person who initiated the conversation or initiated the relationship continues to send the options and ideas to that client over and over again, when clearly like the relationship has been moved over to us where they're out of home partner, they've either gotten bigger, they need a partner, they need guidance. And we obviously have a national AE. And I, I think that, you know, that is where And to be fair, some media partners have done a great job of this and others still have not figured it out where the media partner and the higher ups need to figure out internally how best to solve that. That's not on our end as a buyer and

Tim Rowe:
Correct.

Brian Rappaport:
on the agency side. Nobody here on the agency side wants to take away anyone's business. When I went a piece of business that was being bought locally, my first thought is like, yeah, I feel bad for the local AE who was on that business if they're going to get supplemented by my AE. But in fairness, at the same time, that's not... my issue to solve that is the media partners issue to solve in regards to commission and how it's handled. And I said this a long time ago. I said this to a media partner when I first started bringing in direct business to report. I, as I was kind of learning the tricks of the trade and understanding there was some unhappy AEs out there, you know, who were on the local side. I said to one of the higher ups at a company, I said, if you want to give me 20 different reps for 20 different brands that I'm bringing in, I will gladly do that because I don't want to take anyone's business away or their commission away. I said, but. I can't worry about how you guys are figuring that out internally. So that's a very long-winded answer. I think the short answer is like work with your agency partners, work with your specialists. Don't go brand direct unless of course, that brand is buying their out of home in a hybrid way. Or if like you have a personal relationship with a client, if like, you know, your cousin's over there working at Roman and like you call up Roman, I'm not going to get upset and be like, are you kidding? And you're like, well, my cousin's there. He like wanted me to come in and meet like. I'm confident enough in our relationship with Roman as a client. Like all good. I totally get it. It's a relationship driven industry. Go take your meeting. Let me know how it goes. Um, and we'll kind of go from there. So I'll answer any questions very bluntly, how I feel about this, but hopefully that touched on like every potential scenario in the going direct, non-going direct working with the agency world that kind of.

Tim Rowe:
Let me ask a follow-up question to that piece right there, and I'm sure results may vary, right? Brian Rappaport is probably going to handle it different than somebody else at the next agency. So this may not always be the case, but let's say I have a cousin at Roman and I do want to go have that conversation. Should I let you know? Does it depend kind of on our relationship?

Brian Rappaport:
If we

Tim Rowe:
How

Brian Rappaport:
have

Tim Rowe:
do you think

Brian Rappaport:
a relationship,

Tim Rowe:
about that?

Brian Rappaport:
that's a good question. So if

Tim Rowe:
Let's

Brian Rappaport:
we have

Tim Rowe:
say

Brian Rappaport:
a

Tim Rowe:
it's

Brian Rappaport:
relationship,

Tim Rowe:
me. Let's pretend it's me. What

Brian Rappaport:
I

Tim Rowe:
would

Brian Rappaport:
would

Tim Rowe:
your

Brian Rappaport:
appreciate

Tim Rowe:
expectation

Brian Rappaport:
it.

Tim Rowe:
be of me?

Brian Rappaport:
A text, Brian, what's up? My cousin's at Roman on the growth team. He got me a meeting. I'm not talking about rates or anything, but I'm gonna go in there and just kind of tell him what I do, wanted to give you a heads up. I would write back, all good things, so much for the heads up. I appreciate it, they're good people. That's literally how I would respond. That's happened before, where there's been brands that we work with where someone has a friend there. You know, one of my good friends when he was at Intersection and I'll shout him out because he'll, he should be shouted out. Like Rob Levine used to do this all the time. He would always think first for our brands. I would always think like what made the most sense for our brands when I was at Rapport, when I was at Quan and he's very outgoing and friendly. So he would strike up relationships with some of these brands, whether he met them at outings, et cetera, and would give me a heads up and always would say like, Hey Brian, you know, I'm going to go and have a conversation, you know, with so and so we're not discussing rates, but this is a great idea. You can join if you want, here's the time of the meeting,

Tim Rowe:
Wow.

Brian Rappaport:
but I'll also recap on an email afterwards, like what we discussed coming out of it, and any next steps, like we can grow this business together. And I always appreciated that, and nine times out of 10, I didn't join the call. I trusted him, I was like, go for it. Like, let me know how it goes, and like if there's a way for us to grow this business together, let's do that. And when media partners go that route, it just gives me the utmost respect, you know, more so than if, you know, you're kind of doing things. the other way and taking the back channels. Like everyone wants that business, but there's like the right way to kind of get it, get it done. And it's why the, the buy side and the sale side need to be a little bit more unified in that approach, um, when possible. And obviously every situation is going to vary like, like you said, but, um, yeah.

Tim Rowe:
Yeah, shout out Rob. That's badass

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
because I think that's kind of what we're all looking for is Partners who can help give us scale you give a partner like Rob scale and access to brands that would otherwise be you know Right and and and that's again back to the theme of this conversation Collaboration there are ways

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
for us to work together that are win-win-win. It's a win for the brand

Brian Rappaport:
Bye.

Tim Rowe:
It's a win for you personally and your company. It's a win for the agency involved. It's a win, win, win. I love those situations.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah, I mean, I think that there are ways also on the specialist side and the agency side where like brands right now, collaboration is the name of the game. There's a lot of good shops out there and a lot of smart people out there. And why should you buy your out of home just through one person or do you're planning through one person and give you business to one agency? There are certain brands out there now and it's not all the time in common, I'll be honest. But there are some brands that we work with, like I've said earlier, that split their out of home, buying and planning with us and with another shop. And they give us clear. directives as to what they want from us. And they give the other shop clear directives what they want from them. And they get a little bit of something that's like going to a buffet from everyone. And I'm not going to be greedy and say, I want you to do all of your out of home, buying and planning through us, because I'm excited to work with said brand. But like, you know, I think there's something to be said about that. Like I'm not out here trying to propose the brands that work with us to kind of split their out of home, buying and planning. But like, you know, I think it kind of extends outside of the world of out of home where I don't know, I'd love to see, I saw today in the trades that Uber is putting their business up for review. It'd be very interesting for Uber, and I don't know that world of how those big pitches go, to like bring in a few independents that work collaboratively together and maybe they get certain channels from, you know, a great shop X, but they get out of home from a great shop B and

Tim Rowe:
Yeah.

Brian Rappaport:
they get creative from a great shop C. And then all of a sudden, like, you know, The holding companies are fantastic and there are amazing, smart people there, but it's a unique way. And that's like one thing I would love to see in the future. And I don't know, it's a larger conversation and it's me going off on a tangent, but I think there is something to be said about finding two or three independent shops that work very well and collaboratively together and having them universally pitch, you know, for, for one of those major brands that normally would go to, you know, WPP, Omnicom, IPG, et cetera.

Tim Rowe:
Yeah, I love I know Quan is the un-agency. I love the idea of the unhold Co. And I think it reflects, like, it's how we buy stuff. It's how we how we are as behave as consumers, right? We no longer just buy, you know, once upon a time, I bought Sears t shirts and Sears socks, right? Like, no,

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
now I buy bombas and I buy different brands. And this is how I this is how my life is assembled.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
Why can't we work that way professionally as well? I love

Brian Rappaport:
No,

Tim Rowe:
that.

Brian Rappaport:
I agree. There's a lot out there. So, um.

Tim Rowe:
Speaking of a lot out there, where do you stay plugged in? How do you stay kind of up to speed on things, you know, maybe outside of the industry trades, like what is on your radar and how do you stay in the know?

Brian Rappaport:
There is some, some really good newsletters out there. I mean, I'll just shout out, I don't know the names of every newsletter. So I'll shout out the people behind it. Cause if you Google them common newsletter,

Tim Rowe:
Yeah.

Brian Rappaport:
you'll get it. Obviously my boy, Nick Sharma loved him. Fantastic growth marketing newsletter. And these are newsletters that don't skew to out of home only. So it's kind of good from an educational standpoint because all connected, holistic will help you. But Nick Sharma, Cody Plowker who is over at Jones road beauty puts out a great newsletter along with Eli Weiss, who also is over there, he does a great job. Nate Rosen, it puts out a fantastic newsletter on CPG and packaged goods. So like if brands are getting funding, if there's new

Tim Rowe:
Oh, that's cool.

Brian Rappaport:
brands coming out, like it's an awesome read. And then Celebrity Packaged Goods is another fantastic website. And Drew over there puts out an insane newsletter that's like any celebrity brand collab every week, highlighting everything that's kind of going on in that. So those are a lot of really great newsletters. It'll end up filling up your inbox, but it's a really good mix of non-out-of-home specific information in addition to your Adweeks, AdAges, glossies.

Tim Rowe:
It's kind of like that, that the buffet that you were describing there, right? Like, yeah, take a little bit from this a little bit from that and get back to the

Brian Rappaport:
Totally.

Tim Rowe:
table. We got a nice full plate of yummy things to eat. What predictions

Brian Rappaport:
Exactly.

Tim Rowe:
do you have next 12, 18 months? What do you see coming?

Brian Rappaport:
I think that like we're positive here. I think the economy is going to get better. That's not my prediction in out of home related, but with that, I think out of homes growth continues on an upward trajectory. And I think, I don't know, 10, 12% like low double digit growth year over year, which is great. I think we see a heavy recovery. We've already seen the heavy recovery in airport. Airport is back. So I've been bullish. Everyone should be buying airports. If you're a brand and you're buying a market, airport should be immediately included. I think with that mass transit's gonna come back, it's already back for the most part, but I think we're gonna start to really see it back to being an instantaneous part of those big mass transit cities, the San Frans, DCs, New Yorks, Chicago's that we saw before the pandemic. I think programatics again, are gonna continue to trend upwards and take another tick up there. I think that we're gonna see many more brands dive in. And we're also gonna see continued evolution, I think, of smarter and digital cities. And by that, I mean you see You know, the conversion to a lot of digital shelters, J.C. Deco has their digital pillars coming in San Francisco. You look at like what Outfront's done with the transit system in New York with digital brand trends and digital car cards for Metro North and Long Island Railroad. And I think it's so visually stunning and offers the ability for brands to be quick and truly connected. So yeah, I mean, I think we're gonna see a lot more of that infrastructures of cities kind of play to out of home strengths, but also obviously make cities a lot more appealing. So. A lot of like short little bursts. I do think that like, we're going to see kind of a lot more dollars flowing to out of home.

Tim Rowe:
I

Brian Rappaport:
Um,

Tim Rowe:
don't

Brian Rappaport:
I'm

Tim Rowe:
like

Brian Rappaport:
not supposed

Tim Rowe:
that.

Brian Rappaport:
to say that cause, cause that's what we do,

Tim Rowe:
Is

Brian Rappaport:
but

Tim Rowe:
that

Brian Rappaport:
I

Tim Rowe:
too

Brian Rappaport:
just,

Tim Rowe:
taboo? Yeah.

Brian Rappaport:
I just, I just think that brands are going to get tired with other channels. And I just think it's going to like, it's going to be kind of like a breakthrough where all of a sudden everyone's going to be like, Oh my God, like kind of coming out of the pandemic, we didn't expect things to be this good. And here we are again. So I think it's a good year. per se for everyone for the most part this year within the industry, but I think the best is still yet to come.

Tim Rowe:
I see that iconic Apple 1984 commercial in my

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
in my head as you describe that marketers who've been confined to this little you know, box in our pockets being able to

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
free themselves into the real world and take advantage of the ultimate canvas.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah. And I think a better universal measurement system within the next two years. I think that we have too many smart people between Geopath, OAAA, and our industry as a whole, comb, et cetera. And I just think like universal out of home measurement that really like takes our channel and everyone's like, okay, like I think

Tim Rowe:
Yes.

Brian Rappaport:
people already say, this is a legitimate great channel more than just awareness, but people really say like, wow, like they, they are here. So I'll put that one like 12, 12 to 24 months just to be realistic, but you know, it's, it's

Tim Rowe:
I

Brian Rappaport:
coming.

Tim Rowe:
like it. I like it. I'm 100% taking this last closing question from another great podcast called invest like the best. I heard the host ask it and I thought, wow, that might be the best closing question for a podcast that I've ever heard. What's the nicest thing anyone has ever done for you?

Brian Rappaport:
This is, it's really good because it kind of comes before Mother's Day. But to tell this very quickly and be cognizant of time, I was walking on the street back in 2017 by my apartment and saw an old college friend who asked me if I was single and I told her I was. And she said, I'm setting you up with my friend who's a matchmaker. And I was like, I'm not paying for a matchmaking service.

Tim Rowe:
Hahaha!

Brian Rappaport:
And she's like, don't worry. You don't have to, she's going to take care of you. And it turns out that this woman, Lori Zaslow, who runs the matchmaking company, Project Soulmate, which. is somewhat famous, met with me and was an amazing person and is a good friend of mine now. And basically told me that she wanted to set me up on a bunch of dates and not charge me whatever her service charges for free. And introduced me to a bunch of different people and ultimately the fourth of four dates in one week introduced me to my wife.

Tim Rowe:
Wow.

Brian Rappaport:
And set me up on a date with my wife when I'd been looking for someone for a really long time. And, you know. It's not really about the free. It's about more so like she took the time to sit and have breakfast with me for an hour and let me explain to her what I was looking for in somebody to spend the rest of my life with. And really like even the ones that didn't work out, like she caught the type of person that I was and ultimately put me with the type of person that I was looking for. So I would say that, you know, that random friend who saw me on the street, she's not a good friend, but she's someone I see here and there. And then Lori, who is a friend as well, nicest things that people has ever, or that people ever did for me. So yeah,

Tim Rowe:
It's a beautiful thing.

Brian Rappaport:
hopefully that's a good answer, not too sappy or cheesy.

Tim Rowe:
No, I think it's beautiful. It's pure. It's honest. Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there.

Brian Rappaport:
Yes.

Tim Rowe:
You know, I think what we'll have to do is, is line this one up to come out just ahead of Mother's Day. That's what we'll do. It's going to come out next week. So,

Brian Rappaport:
I love that.

Tim Rowe:
Brian, this has been an incredible catch up. We won't wait nearly as long to do it next time. Again, we've got some predictions in here that we're going to have to

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
come back and check. So. I can't thank you enough for being here. Where do folks find you? How do they get in touch? Give them the Latin long on

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
not only yourself, but Quan.

Brian Rappaport:
You can find me at BeRapy55 on Twitter. Fair warning, a lot of Yankees tweets, a lot of Knicks tweets, but I do mix and get out of home insights and marketing insights. So if you could deal with the rants, like definitely follow me there. You know, QuanMediaGroup.com. All of our stuff is there. Same thing with Instagram. Brian at QuanMediaGroup.com. You shoot me an email. You'll hear back in two minutes, unless I'm playing pickup basketball or sleeping. And that's really it. But maybe next time, Tim, I bring a client.

Tim Rowe:
I would love

Brian Rappaport:
We mix

Tim Rowe:
that.

Brian Rappaport:
this up next time and we have, or brand I should say, when we have a fun conversation about why they love out of home. So we'll have to chat.

Tim Rowe:
Let's do that. We've got lots of folks hanging on bated breath

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
for the next one.

Brian Rappaport:
Yeah.

Tim Rowe:
If you found this to be helpful, please share it with somebody who could benefit. As always, make sure to smash that subscribe button. Brian, thank you again for being here.

Brian Rappaport:
Thanks again. Great to see you as always. You're the best.

Tim Rowe:
Thank you. We'll see you soon.

Brian Rappaport:
Thanks, Tim. See you soon.