If Coley Porter Bell’s business blog is anything to go by, Sao Paolo authorities have decided to rid the city of “visual pollution” – and ban all outdoor advertising.

No, this is not an early April fool’s joke. And it amazes me that it’s not hit the marketing headlines earlier. But according to the pictures I’ve seen (sourced from their website, reviewed here for academic purposes), this is one major clean-up!

(Post-poster ban. Pre-poster ban: see here)

Given I’ve now been working a good 2 decades in marketing/advertising, I’d have thought this would put me into panic. But you know what… I like the idea. Maybe it is time to consider what global consumerism is doing to our towns and cities.

And I have faith in the creative nature of advertising people. May marketing execs in Brazil rise to the challenge, and find new ways to plug their products!! There are already whole product categories that are not allowed to advertise. So Sao Paolo advertisers… you’ll survive.

But what an interesting term for advertising … “visual polution”.