As originally published in B&T.
From wingdings to scratch and sniff dating – Josh Gurgiel, head of oOh!media’s creative and innovation hub POLY, picks his favourite Out of Home Work from around the world for the first half of 2025.
I have an embarrassing confession to make – I have never watched Madmen. After nearly fifteen years working in our illustrious advertising industry, somehow, I have managed to bypass watching the seminal series; I’ve watched two seasons of America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, yet somehow, not Madmen. I have so many regrets.
Whilst I am not intimately familiar with the series, I am acutely aware of the iconic status assumed by its protagonist, Don Draper. In fact, Draper delivered one of my favourite quotes that so astutely sums up the inherent advertising value exchange between advertiser and consumer (otherwise known as ‘people’): “The greatest thing you have working for you? It’s the imagination of the consumer. They have no budget, no time limit. You get in that space, your ad can run all day”.
‘Imagination’ is too often an underrated weapon in an advertiser’s arsenal. As Draper says, if they can spark their audience’s curiosity and invite them in to play an active role in the exchange, their communication immediately becomes more personal and thereby more memorable.
For a medium like OOH, this imaginative interplay between audience and advertiser is critical as the channel is non-intrusive, requiring a certain level of creative acumen to draw the eye and hold attention. OOH doesn’t interrupt the content, it is the content, so sparking a certain level of intrigue and active participation is a powerful way to secure cut through and conversation. And holy McWings, there have been a plethora of playful OOH campaigns so far this year that have heeded this call to curiosity.
From cryptic codes written in Wingdings, to immersive billboards, to entirely unbranded ads, 2055 has produced some of the bravest yet simply effective creative that hits like an office scotch at 2pm on a Wednesday afternoon… I really need to watch Madmen.
So, here is my list of my favourite global OOH campaigns of 2025 so far, in no particular order…
- McDonald’s – McWings Launch (Australia)
Ok, I lied. There totally is an order here, or at least just this first entry, as it is hands-down my favourite of the year thus far. This campaign from Maccas is proof that sometimes the best ideas are the simplest, and the most bizarre. To tease the launch of McWings, McDonalds ran creative featuring a cryptic message written entirely in Wingdings font, accompanied only by a date. Leaning on the strength of their distinctive colours and iconic ‘M’, the billboards invited the public to decode them, stirring up a frenzy of guesses, shares, and press coverage. A classic case of ‘less is more’ that created a cultural moment on and offline. Imagination: sparked.
2. JCPenney – ‘It’s From Where?’ (USA)
Whilst Macca’s Wingdings execution gave a little, this brave and brilliant concept from JCPenney gave absolutely nothing, taking the minimalism demonstrated by ‘British Airways’ last year to new levels of brand absenteeism. In this sleek campaign across the US, JCPenney pulled the rug from under fashion snobbery, challenging perceptions of their brand through intrigue and mystery. Pairing high-fashion visuals with the tagline ‘It’s From Where?’ and accompanied by only a humble QR code (COVID’s greatest gift to OOH), the executions drove to a JCPenney microsite offering curious consumers 20 per cent off their next purchase. This campaign fused the online and offline worlds to flip perceptions and prompt discovery, showcasing that OOH can be every bit as much about conversion as awareness when the brand gives consumers a reason to pay (attention), removing the brand altogether.
3. Kit Kat – ‘Have a Break From Your Screen’ (Czech Republic)
Minimalism and simplicity continued to dominate in 2025 with this elegant execution from Kit Kat. Leaning into their established territory of ‘Have a break…’, they tapped into modern consumer behaviour by positioning the Kit Kat as the perfect break from the digital screens that dominate our lives. Whilst the irony of using digital OOH screens to make this point is not lost on me, the craft with which they executed this message is second to none; replacing phones with Kit Kat bars in the hands of modern-day phone addicts (aka ‘people’), this OOH creative is visually magnetic, perfectly contextual, making a subtle yet cheeky comment on our times through powerful imagery and nothing else.
4. Canva – ‘Can You Make the Logo Bigger?’ (UK)
One of the most powerful elements of great OOH is the use of context. We often think of such context as relating to place or time, but it can just as effectively relate to the format of the ad itself. In these perfectly self-aware executions, Canva turned the designer’s toolkit into a laugh-out-loud OOH series that poked fun at creative clichés while showcasing real product features using the OOH formats as the basis for the in-jokes. From an oversized logo installation to a billboard with no background (for the background remover tool), every execution felt like a wink to the industry. Smart, self-referential and genuinely entertaining, this campaign turned product demos into punchlines, and the public into willing collaborators.
5. Unilever – ‘Dirt is Good’ (Turkey)
What’s better than a billboard? A bunch of billboards you can play on. This interactive execution turned OOH ad spaces across Istanbul into a fully interactive playground, literally inviting kids to get dirty whilst sliding down slides, kicking a football or shooting some hoops. With the line ‘Dirt is good’, it flips traditional advertising polish in favour of joyful chaos and genuine utility. By virtue of its placement within the community, OOH as a channel – and those who leverage this presence to promote their brands – have a responsibility to elevate and enhance their surroundings; this campaign brought that notion to life through high community engagement, and higher dry-cleaning bills.
6. Unilever – ‘Scratch & Sniff Dating’ (Canada/UK)
Tired of swiping? Try sniffing. Unilever kept the good times rolling across Canada and the UK with several totally bonkers ‘scratch & sniff’ campaigns promoting different deodorants. Their campaign for Axe in Canada turned a dating profile into a scent experience, inviting passersby to ‘Give Kobi a sniff and scan to match’. Equal parts cheeky and charming, this campaign merged sensory interaction with mobile engagement to make love (and deodorant) feel fresh again. Turning up the cheek (literally), Rexona in the UK invited passersby to sniff various privates on posters across the city, testing how far consumers will go for some product sampling. These executions were super fun and irreverent, prompting social sharing by virtue of their novelty and nonsense.
7. Commonwealth Bank – ‘Out of Here Out of Home’ (Australia)
Times are tough for bricks and mortar retailers at the moment. So what do you do with an abandoned shopfront? Well, if you’re Commonwealth Bank, you create an immersive OOH build that turns a travel ad into a physical portal to NYC. Using an empty retail space, CommBank created a yellow billboard that peeled back to reveal a walk-through archway inviting pedestrians into a “new world” beyond, full of quintessential NYC experiences—from a subway station, to hot-dog vendors, to a Times Square replica. This crafty activation promoting travel booking via their app demonstrated that OOH can be multi-dimensional, serving as the launchpad and linchpin for incredible experiences open to those who choose to discover what lies beyond (or behind).
