Gateway Outdoor Advertising was established in 1937 when its first billboards were constructed in Pittsburgh, PA. Gateway grew over the next 53 years owning and operating over 11,000 billboards in multiple states. In 1990 Craig P Heard acquired Gateway Outdoor Advertising with the focus of transitioning the company into a transit focused advertising company.
Since the acquisition, Gateway has expanded into 20 states and has managed more than 250 transit partnerships. We specialize in partnering with city, state, and county agencies to manage, sell, install, and operations advertising on buses, shelters, benches, transit centers, airports, and rail.
Craig P. Heard’s strategy has been to continue the growth of Gateway Outdoor Advertising through acquisitions and aggressive expansion into transit advertising. The expansion, coupled with aggressive sales efforts, has diversified the advertiser base beyond the traditional users of outdoor advertisements.Gateway works to attract both national and local clients who had never before considered out-of-home advertising in their media plans.
Our strategic plan has always looked to the team philosophy for success. Every employee is a vital member of the team, and each member of the GOA family has a vested and personal interest in the company’s success. Servicing our clients is not just a job, it’s our corporate mission.
The Gateway partnership approach spills over into the marketplace. We forge strong working relationships with advertisers, transit authorities, and the communities in which we do business. These partnerships are an important factor in our success and the success of our client’s advertising programs. Working closely with the client enables us to understand their goals and creates a synergy that makes those goals attainable.
As an industry, out-of-home advertising represented approximately more than $8.6 billion of total advertising expenditures in the United States in 2022. Our company’s future continues to be in transit, bus, shelter, rail, transit station, bench, and convenience store segments of outdoor advertising. Out-of-home advertising increased 5% in 2023, and industry experts projected strong growth as the economy rebounds in 2024 and over the next 10 years.
Craig P. Heard has more than 40 years of experience in management, sales, and marketing in transit advertising. He holds a BS and MBA in finance from Fairleigh Dickinson University. He is a recipient of numerous public service awards including being nominated for Inc. Magazine’s Entrepreneur of the Year Award.
Heard left TDI/Winston Network in 1989 and pursued the acquisition of GOA, which was founded in 1937. He completed the acquisition process in June 1990. GOA is now a Heard-family-owned business that takes pride in its family of GOA employees. Many of our team members have been with Heard and GOA for over 40 years.
Gateway management has over 40 years of experience in the industry. However, experience alone does not breed success. What makes GOA unique is that we’ve combined our experience with corporate flexibility that brings every employee into the sales process.
For example, we’ll suggest the best media for your target audience and provide proofs of performance, an invoice, and sample photos recording your ad upon installation or copy change. And of course, we post your ad on time.
This formula breeds success. More than 95% of our customers have renewed business with us over the past three years. Many new national and local advertisers reach out to GOA to be their advertising partner to expand their markets and move their products off the shelf and into the hands of new customers.
Our transit authorities see the benefits of Gateway as a partner with significant increases in revenues over previous operators. The communities where we do business are beneficiaries of our partnership as we reach the heart of the neighborhoods as buses, not like billboards, travel throughout the community and bring the good message home.
