In 2020, Jesse London formed TierOne Media after a career which included stints at Clear Channel Outdoor and OUTFRONT.  TierOne owns 51 billboard faces in Alabama and Florida, including 31 digital billboard faces.  Billboard Insider asked London what he’s learned after a year one his own.

What do you know now that you wish you knew before you started out as an out of home entrepreneur.

I shouldn’t have waited so long to make this move; could have/should have left corporate ten years earlier.  My time now is far more productive, every decision is mine and presumably the work will lead to a more controlled and favorable pay off.   TierOne is far from being sold, but I can see the value increasing with each accomplishment.  Building new structures and lifting ad sales for my company instead of for stockholders is infinitely more satisfying and rewarding.

Wish I knew that the industry multiples were going to jump so significantly – maybe we would have purchased more.  Likewise, had I known that housing would go through the roof I would have bought something in Pensacola (where I live now) instead of renting.

How have supply chain issues impacted your company?

We have not seen delays from key partners like Selective, Formetco, and Image Printing.  The rising cost of steel has led to a small reduction in our static-only development.  Auger rental and cement pouring takes longer, but we anticipate that now and reserve dates sooner.   We feel a slight lag from service advertisers like restaurants, and heating/air contractors who can’t push ad budgets up due to their staffing shortages or their own product supply chain problems, but that is offset by the growth in help wanted ads.

What trends are you seeing in your business?

Advertisers in the Panhandle, Mobile and Montgomery are shifting more spend and attention to billboards.  We are seeing new advertisers and low churn/rate increases from repeat advertisers because our billboard solutions are working.  Local radio cpm’s seem to be dropping and advertisers are beginning to complain of digital/mobile fatigue.

The area is blossoming – it’s being discovered; the Pandemic has helped to draw population from cold cities.  There is a ton of new construction, roads are widening, bridges are being improved, new towers are being built along the coast, subdivisions are popping up, commercial development is exploding, and airlines are adding more direct routes.  National brands including Aldi, Amazon and Top Golf have recently announced their first footprints in the region.

Ad dollars are chasing billboard performance here, and it seems that equity/debt funding is too.  Years of low interest rates combined with the improved business fundamentals in billboards has led to a dizzying number of acquisitions.  There are so many announcements that the brokers will need PR departments.

What are some of Tier One’s objectives for 2022

Grow existing assets at a rate greater than our interest rate with increased rate & occupancy, continue to push hard on the seventeen faces we built so far by hitting 90% occupancy on those, and to plant one new pole a month for the next twelve.

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