Startup company Litcabs goes big on Mumbai’s Kaali-Peeli taxis

Mumbai-based startup Litcabs is a first-of-its-kind mobile OOH service provider offering advertising solutions for brands on the iconic Kaali-Peeli taxis in Mumbai. The company says it provides intelligent and effective OOH advertising solutions by mounting back-lit panels atop taxi carriers while supplementing the income of taxi drivers. Over 8,000 Kaali-Peeli taxis in the city will be outfitted with taxi top advertising displays with the first 350 hitting the streets of Mumbai this week.

Litcabs has been founded by a team of four entrepreneurs – Jyotiba Patil, the founding partner, along with Arjun Meghe, Siddhartha Shekhar and Aditya Thorat. The founders started Litcabs with the aim of exploring unique options in new-age communication to target masses on the go. Mumbai’s black-yellow cabs are an essential part of Mumbai’s city life and advertising on these cabs will allow brands to reach their target groups across the city.

Through their GPS system, Litcabs monitors the total kilometers run by the taxis on a daily basis, the route taken by them, as well as the number of hours the advertisement was lit up,. Each taxi makes an average of 5,00,000 impressions per day according to MRSS, a market research firm. This database is shared with the client as an ad effectiveness report and thus serves as a unique advantage.

A majority of the company’s fleet consists of shared cabs, which follow a definite route through the day that starts from an office complex / market place and ends up at a railway station. The cabs spend most of their day in a specific area ensuring repeated exposure and hyperlocal advertising that helps in brand recall value.

Commenting on the launch, Jyotiba Patil, Founding Partner, Litcabs said, “We are happy to announce the launch of our new service for advertisers in Mumbai. Our goal is to provide OOH advertising solutions that are mobile, cost effective and impactful compared with that of billboards, bus stands and other transit media. Kaali Peeli is the popular medium of transport. With the ability to schedule advertising by location, coupled with superior reporting tools, we are looking to provide advertisers with a highly targeted, flexible and reliable medium to manage campaigns for their clients.”

The team has been investing continually in R&D to enhance the aesthetic appeal of their design & production and also towards studies to understand consumer behaviour further. They also want to begin engaging with fixed OOH screens. Based on the response generated, they plan to expand to other cities over the next few years.