Out-of-Home Advertising

Request for Information: Out-of-Home Advertising

1. Introduction to the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority / Merseytravel
Merseytravel is the transport delivery arm for the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority (LCRCA). Merseytravel oversees transport and travel across the Liverpool City Region, which has a population of over 1.6 million people.
Merseytravel is working to deliver the Metro Mayor’s vision of a Transport for London-style Transport System to make travel quicker, cheaper, and more reliable. This vision is captured and articulated in the LCRCA Corporate Plan 2024 to 2028 which outlines a programme of innovation, investment, and improvement to set the region up for success in years to come. The aim is for the Liverpool City Region to be the best place to grow up, grow a family and grow a business where no one is left behind. The next few years will see an acceleration of delivering this modern, integrated and publicly controlled transport system to promote mobility, enable economic success and connect people with great places. The aim is for a whole system approach (which will be branded as METRO) that increases the linkages between bus, rail, ferry, tunnels, and active travel.
LCRCA is introducing a franchising scheme for the whole of the Liverpool City Region. This means that bus services will be under the Combined Authority’s control, and they would decide which services would be provided, like the way buses are run in London and some other major cities around the world. LCRCA will set the routes, timetables, tickets, and standards, while the bus operators would run the services.
The LCRCA / Merseytravel is responsible for delivering a range of improvements for better buses. Over the next few years this will include:
• A new multi- modal interchange in St Helens town centre
• Re- introduction of bus priority (including bus lanes) alongside a Bus Rapid Transit system on key routes to/ from the city centre
• Decarbonise the bus fleet.
• Move towards a 24/ 7 operation.
The LCRCA / Merseytravel builds, maintains, and staffs the bus stations and interchanges, and installs and maintains over 6,000 bus stops, including more than 2,500 shelters. For more information, visit https://www.liverpoolcityregion-ca.gov.uk

2. LCRCA / Merseytravel Request for Information – OOH Advertising and Bus Stop Supply, Clean, Repair, Maintenance & Timetable Publicity
The LCRCA / Merseytravel is currently investigating market interest for forthcoming Out- of- Home (OOH) advertising contracts (bus stops and tunnels) as well as bus stop supply, clean, repair, maintenance contracts, including the provision of timetable information and electrical aspects. This Request for Information (RfI) is an opportunity for LCRCA to understand the marketplace and how the findings may shape up our commissioning and procurement requirements.
We are interested in engaging with the market to obtain information relating to the following:
• Interest in our initial requirements.
• Interest in future potential advertising requirements and benefits.
• Discussion on funding for capital expenditure to install replacement shelters and new advertising inventory.
• The marketplace’s interest in the possibility of providing a turnkey solution, encompassing advertising sales, supply, and installation of advertising inventory, posting of advertising displays, monitoring, and maintenance.
• Understanding if the marketplace can provide all or part of the requirements e.g., just the advertising, or advertising and maintenance or, the supply of new infrastructure and maintenance.
Please note this is a Request for Information only and does not commit the LCRCA / Merseytravel to any contract or tender release.

3. Vision for the LCRCA / Merseytravel OOH Advertising
The LCRCA / Merseytravel’s ambition is to develop an OOH advertising estate and to develop a partnership with a media owner to innovate and drive revenue growth. The estate has massive potential, and with the growth in assets that will be owned by the Authority, providing even greater coverage across the Liverpool City Region. Some of this will not form part of the tender coming out to the market early next year but will be part of future plans for growing the number of assets owned by the LCRCA / Merseytravel.
The forthcoming tender provides an opportunity to further unlock access to an audience of mass scale via multi modal touch points. The OOH advertising estate is predominantly print based with significant opportunity for further digitisation.

4. Instructions to Respond
Suppliers that are interested in participating in market engagement to be held at (a) date(s) to be confirmed are requested to email both paul.desmet@liverpoolcityregion-ca.gov.uk and Tender@liverpoolcityregion-ca.gov.uk no later than 17:00 on Tuesday 8 October 2024.