Moscow authorities promised to dismantle all banners

The confrontation between the Moscow authorities and the owners of advertising banners has moved to the streets. Overnight from Monday to Tuesday, the capital's Department of Media and Advertising promised to remove all advertising information from the banners, that is, to cut off the panels themselves, leaving only the cables from the structures. On the eve of the action, the owners of the banners warned that they would again hang them around the city and demand through the court to compensate for the losses incurred.

The capital's Department of Media and Advertising decided to cut off the banners on the banners on the night of Monday to Tuesday, department press secretary Vladimir Yakovlev told Kommersant. According to him, the action was supposed to begin closer to midnight. The banners are hung on 305 streets, the largest number of them on Leninsky Prospekt (94), the Third Transport Ring (79) and Warsaw Highway (62), as follows from the register of permits of the Department of Media and Advertising. There should be no traffic collapse in the city, since traffic police officers will be involved in the work, Mr. Yakovlev assures.

In Moscow, 1,952 banners belonging to 24 legal entities are now legally hanging above the streets. The largest players in this segment are companies included in the News Outdoor group (1034 structures), the CityText group (348) and the Magistral City company (211). The research company ESPAR-Analyst estimates the revenue of banner owners in 2010 at 1.9 billion rubles, which is 11% of all outdoor advertising costs in the capital.

The Moscow government outlawed banners by adopting Resolution No. 319-PP, which Mayor Sergei Sobyanin signed on July 19. Officials then promised that they would allocate 90 million rubles for compensation for the termination of previously concluded contracts to the owners of these structures, while the city would receive approximately 486 million rubles less. rental payments. In August, the Department of Media and Advertising began to unilaterally terminate contracts, canceling previously issued permits for the installation and operation of banners and demanding that the structures be dismantled within 30 days.

In response, the operators have already filed 11 lawsuits against the department with the Moscow Arbitration Court, demanding that the unilateral termination of contracts be declared invalid (see Kommersant on August 22). As interim measures, the owners of the banners petitioned for a ban on their dismantling, it follows from the court materials. But the petitions filed by Yupon LLC and Viatra CJSC, members of the CityText group, as well as Magistral-City Advertising and Production Company LLC and Justi-Class CJSC, were rejected by the court.

If permission to install an advertising structure is revoked, the owner of the advertising structure must dismantle it within 30 days and remove information from it within three, the law “On Advertising” states. If the structure is not dismantled within the prescribed period, then the authorities have the right to demand forced dismantling through the court. Only if the owner of the structure does not comply with the court decision, the authorities have the right to dismantle the advertising medium themselves.

Dismantling of banners already hung around Moscow is possible only by court decision, admits Mr. Yakovlev. But, he emphasizes, during a night raid, officials will only remove the information posted on the banners, that is, exclusively the banners. No one will touch the advertising structures themselves, the cables themselves that hold the banner above the road, he clarifies.

“According to the agreements concluded with clients, the panels are their property, not ours,” explains Magistral City co-owner Alexander Popov. “But according to the agreement, we are responsible for the safety of the panels. And we, naturally, will protect the interests of our clients by all legal means.” ". He does not rule out that if the banners are cut off, the affected advertisers will contact the prosecutor's office. Director of Marketing and Development of Mosgorreklama (part of News Outdoor), Alexander Zaretsky, promises that if there is any attempt to cut off the panels, the company will contact law enforcement agencies and demand compensation for losses through the court. Lawyer Pavel Monakov believes that if the banners are cut off, the advertiser who owns them can file a lawsuit against the owner of the banner to recover damages, and bring the media and advertising department as a co-defendant, or only then the operator will recover these damages from the department.

If the constrictions turn out to be cut by morning, they will be restored in the near future, Mr. Zaretsky clarifies. “We will fulfill all our obligations to clients regarding campaigns,” says Mr. Popov. Banner campaigns are typically ten days long. Now in Moscow, placements on almost all advertising media are sold out until the end of the year, and banners are no exception, recalls Andrei Berezkin, general director of ESPAR-Analyst.

Sergey Sobolev, Anastasia Gorshkova

Night of the Ad Stealers