How to Pop the Question in a Unique Way

How did you pop the big question to your sweetheart? Probably it was not as unique as some of these ways. But if you haven’t asked her yet, perhaps this will give you some ideas on ways to do it uniquely! None of these ideas is too expensive and each would make the event memorable.

If you like extreme sports, sky’s the limit for ideas. A couple reached the top of a mountain ready to ski down. Just as they were ready to begin, he proposed and she accepted. What a double rush they both experienced! Speaking of getting a rush, one sky diver proposed to his girlfriend in midair with a sign as they fell at 200 miles an hour.

One game show contestant took advantage of the public nature of the show, then turned to the audience, and popped the question to his sweetheart. The audience starting clapping and, of course, she accepted. One man arranged for help from a movie theater. When the movie the couple was attending ended, a message flashed onto the scream, “Sarah, will you marry me? –Charlie”. Everyone clapped and, of course, after recovering from the shock, she affirmed his wishes.

One man got his neighbors across the street in on it. On some cue, they turned their lights off and on, spelling out the proposal. Another girl was led to believe her boyfriend was miles away. She was participating in a scavenger hunt. The last thing to find happened to take her to his hiding place and when he shocked her by appearing, then fell to one knee and proposed.

A bold girl got tired of waiting for her boyfriend to make the decision. So when they were on a date, she said, “Darling, you know if you would ask me to marry you, I’d say yes in a minute!” . If that seems a bit too bold, maybe you could just drop a hint or two, like, “If you need any money for a ring or anything, let me know,” or “I’ve been practicing saying my new last name after we’re married”

Sam took his honey to a plush restaurant. She was pretty sure this would be the night he would propose but he didn’t even drop a hint during the meal. Finally when they were ready to leave, he asked for the check. There, on the bill tray sat the engagement ring. He took it, fell to his knees and turned her disappointment to joy.

A creative man bought a book of love poems. After the few pages, he glued the rest together, then cut a heart shaped hole in the stack. She was touched by the first few poems but then turned the page and saw in the hole an engagement ring! Allowing time for shock to set in, he then took it and asked her the big question!

Public media is a great way to propose effectively. How about taking out a full-page ad in a paper you are sure she will read. When she turns to that page, get on your knees with the ring. The ad provides a very romantic souvenir of the day.

How about renting a billboard along a road she travels. If you can be in the car with her, have the ring handy; if not, try timing a call to her cell phone as she passes the display. You might even be standing by the road, pointing at it with a ring box in the other hand!

An airplane is a great media for creative proposals. Have a firm sky write your proposal in the sky over an area where she will be Idea two: a banner ad would be more permanent, hiring a plane to pull the ad through the sky over a beach or place you know she will be. If possible, as she reads it, be handy with the ring.

Marriage is an important step in life and should be entered with much thought. However, you can still use creativity in the means of asking to join her life to yours. Why don’t you do it in a way that you will both remember throughout your lifetimes together?

AirSign has been providing creative skywriting and aerial banner messages around special occasions since 1996. Call them at 888-645-3442 and ask them to fly your message. It will be unforgettable.

Advertising With Curiosity

We are painfully aware that we are bombarded with advertisements in every part of life. At a movie we see ads for more movies. TV shows get shorter as ads get longer. Along the street are billboards and shop signs. Newspapers and magazines are filled with appeals to get our money.

All this is a challenge to the advertisers for they must come up with a way to get over the mental block set up by consumers for self-protection. How can you get others to notice your ad among the thousands of others? One effective way of doing this is through building curiosity with sights and sounds.

Sounds often involve music. Many TV ads include some type of mood setting designed to make you at least watch the ad. Other types of sounds also build curiosity and attract attention. The Superman serials on TV in the 50’s were popular with kids partly because of the air sound as the hero landed or took off.

Visual anticipation is also used. A blanket over the newest model of a car builds curiosity. Women in ads sell more to both men and women than men do. Movie previews take a collage of clips to titillate the imagination and make people too curious about how it all falls together to miss the full show.

The double edged sword of both sound and sight will help raise an ad from the ignored to the noticed. By using both the ear gate and eye gate attention is more likely gained. Yet, if everyone does this, then your ad will remain indistinct.

Banner ads are unique in this way for they appeal to sight, sound, and they are the only ad around at the time. A long banner or a billboard trails behind an airplane over a large congregation of people. With no other ads in sight on a beach or music festival, the ad will have the full attention of the audience.

Imagine you are sitting on a beach, enjoying the sun when in the distance you hear the drone of an airplane. You have time and interest so you look up to check it out. Coming toward you is a single engine plane pulling a banner with a message written on it. Your curiosity rises. What does it say? You watch with anticipation until you can read the message and you probably do this several times in the 17 seconds it passes.

The plane disappears but in a few minutes it passes by again and you read it a second time. By the third time this happens you have the message memorized and after that, the sound of the plane along causes you to recite the message in your mind.

The advertiser has done his job. He has built the curiosity of you, the audience, used sounds and sights to present the message, and repeated it so that it is fixed in your memory. To top it off, the message faces no competitors. If the product or service is of use to you, he will be confident that when you need it, his name will be the one you choose.

Learn how AirSign has been leading the industry in providing innovative aerial advertising services since 1996. They have banner towing planes stationed across the States ready to fly your message over sporting events, holidays, vacation hot spots or just to that special someone.

Make Your Proposal Memorable with Aerial Banners

Tom and Jenny had been going together for six months and Tom was sure this was the girl with whom he wanted to spend his life. He was also sure she would say 'yes' to the big question but wanted to ask her in a spectacular way that would be remembered all their lives.

To do this, Tom hired an aerial advertising company to design and display a banner, reading, "Jenny, will you marry me? - Tom." His family had planned a reunion the second Saturday in July and that would be the perfect time to unveil his desire. The company handled everything, design, construction, and display of his message. When it flew overhead, Jenny wasn't the only one who was impressed!

You only celebrate your parents' 50th anniversary once, and the Williamson family managed to coordinate their busy schedules to be together for the special day. Memories were shared, songs were sung, favorite jokes were told, and the food was delicious. As a grand finale, at exactly 3:00 pm, the children took their parents to the back yard and looked up as a plane flew by towing an aerial billboard that read, "Dad and Mom Williamson, you are loved!" The entire community knew that was true.


What are a few dollars in light of the lasting memories a banner message will bring to your special day? Think of using an aerial message to recognize an honor, to celebrate a special birthday, or to welcome home someone has been gone for a long time. The investment itself would tell them and the whole community how much they mean to you.

When looking for a company to help you, don't confuse banner ads or aerial advertising with the banner ads on the computer. An aerial message is a full-length sentence or message pulled behind an airplane at a given location for a designated length of time; it is not an annoying frame that pops up on the screen. Banner ads are often seen at beaches or athletic events. The same company that provides these ads can help you with the banner message fitting for your occasion.

An aerial message as described above is simple. Think of a sentence or few words that would express what you want to convey. Then contact an aerial advertising company and present your idea. They will have suggestions to make it just right. The company will do all the work and fly the message where you want it displayed. In some areas more than one company has this service so investigate to find out what is right for you.

By the way, remember Tom and Jenny? Jenny's reply was, "Oh, Tom, I do love you but give me a week to think it over and talk with my parents, and I'll give you my answer then." Sure both Tom and his family were disappointed but they appreciated her mature approach to such an important decision. Little did he or they know what she was planning. The next Saturday, another banner flew overhead, right on time and at the right location. It read, "Yes! - Jenny"

AirSign has been providing customized banner towing services since 1996. Call them today at 888-645-3442 and have them fly an aerial banner that will make your special day unforgettable.

How Can Skywriting Boost Your Business?

The movie The Wizard of Oz, a smash hit when it came out in 1939, had a scene where the wicked witch wrote SURRENDER DOROTHY OR DIE in the sky with her broom. Ever since sky writing has fascinated people. (The witch's message was actually just special effects, produced in a 6 foot by 6 foot glass tank.) But sky writing goes back further than that. It was first tried in1922 in England. Advertisers began using skywriting at the same time but Pepsi-Cola made it famous, using skywriting from 1931 to 1953.

Are the letters really formed by smoke? Yes, skywriting smoke is made by inserting paraffin oil into the exhaust of the plane. The oil vaporizes in the heat making an environmentally friendly white smoke that lingers in the air. Of course, the pilot only injects the oil into the exhaust when he is in a position to form part of a letter.

How tall are the letters? A mile tall. How long is the message? Up to fifteen miles long. How long do the letters stay visible before drifting away? They last up to twenty minutes. What determines if the skywriting will be a success? First, the skill of the pilot. He must be really good at maneuvering the plane and knowing exactly where he is in terms of the message. Second, the size of the plane engine. It must be large enough to make the letters quickly, but it also must be hot enough to vaporize sufficient paraffin oil to make the smoke. That means the paraffin must reach 1500 degrees and to do this, some recommend 450 horsepower engines that are six times hotter than small planes.

Besides these factors, there is the weather. The wind cannot exceed three to five miles per hour. The sky must be nearly clear for the white letters to be visible against the blue sky. Since wind speed may vary at different heights, the planes will fly anywhere from 7000 and 17000 feet. At these heights, the message is visible for thirty miles on either side. Cooler air temperature makes more smoke, but the air temperature cannot exceed 95 degrees. The best months for these conditions are September and October.

How large is the message? It is usually four to six letters and it takes one to two minutes to form each letter. A shorter message is more likely to be visible at once. Why not make it longer? When a message is longer than this, it will take too long to form so that it is seen all at once. One remedy is to hire multiple pilots. The two or three pilots coordinate their maneuvers so that, as they work together, they will produce the message visible for the minutes before it drifts away.

Think about this: the pilot is writing from the top, parallel to the earth though the message may seem to be vertical. Therefore the pilot must write the letters backwards from above so that they appear correctly to the readers below. The letters must also be uniform and in a straight line so that the message is attractive. This requires great piloting skills.

This method of advertising is so novel that it almost demands to be read all the time the letters are forming. So what kind of people would benefit from hiring skywriting to get their message across? Skywriting has been used to advertise soft drinks, motion pictures, websites, political candidates, products, and so forth. One company says they skywrite fifty marriage proposals each year.

What does all this cost? The cost depends on the company, and on the availability. For example, if you must fly in a skilled pilot from some distance, that will add significant cost to the adventure. But for local skywriting, count on starting around $1000 and look for a discount if you get more than one message or the same message multiple times.

Skywriting advertising is just one of the aerial advertising services AirSign provides. Learn how AirSign has been leading the industry in providing this innovative advertising method since 1996.

Steps for Getting Aerial Ads into the Air

Have you ever been at a large gathering somewhere, like a sporting event or a beach, and seen an airplane fly by pulling an announcement or an advertisement of some type? These ads or messages are called aerial advertising, and have proven to be an effective way to get a message out to a large group quickly.

So how do they get such a huge banner into the sky? If the banner were attached to the plane before it took off, this would cause two problems. First, the banner would drag across the runway and get damaged. Second, The drag of the huge banner would make it more difficult to get off the ground and this means the banner would drag even longer.

Getting the aerial ad into the sky takes a great deal of skill. But the huge success of banner advertising makes it worth the trouble. First, the airplane takes off with a device called a "grapnel hook" hanging in the window. The other end is attacked to the tail of the airplane by either rope or cable.

Once the airplane is airborne, the pilot releases the hook from his window and lets it fall. The hook falls below the plane and is ready for the next part. Meanwhile, on the ground the banner is folded up, but it has a lead pole attached to the front. A harness is attached to that and a pick up rope to that. Finally a loop of rope connected to the lead rope is draped between two poles about five or six feet off the ground.

Next the plane flies over the open area where the banner's loop is visible. As he passes low over the area, the hook dragging below the plane is designed to catch the loop, pulling the lead rope and then the banner into the air. The moment he reaches the pick up area, he pulls back on the stick and throttles the engine, making the plane soar upward at a steep angle. The hook snags the loop of rope, and pulls the banner up into the sky. If for some reason his hook misses, then he circles around and tries again.

How do they keep the banner straight and not acting like a spiraling kite? The bottom of the banner is weighted so that it is always down. The end of it also has tiny parachutes that keep it stretched out. Banners could be up to fifty letters long and when you consider the letters are seven feet tall, that is a long banner to pull! It takes skill and practice to do it just right.

When the pilot has completed his mission over the designated area, he will fly the banner back to the drop off place, fly low again, and, release the hook so the banner falls to the ground unharmed. This way it is reusable if that is appropriate.

Larger planes are able to actually pull the banner with them on takeoff without damaging it, but most single engine prop planes use the plan outlined above to get the banner into the air.
All this may seem like a lot of trouble, but the result is worth the effort. Thousands will see the banner, both at the event and on the way to and from it. The message will get out and people will be influenced by the message.

But not all aerial advertising companies are alike. Some simply take an order and contract it out. Since 1996, AirSign has been leading the industry by taking personal care of their customers using the best pilots, sharpest looking planes, and providing accountability for their work through free GPS tracking. Give them a call and find out what they can do for you!

Using Balloons in Aerial Advertising

Advertising in the sky has become a very successful means of getting a message across to a local group of people quickly. Usually a banner is pulled behind a single engine plane over a beach or sporting event. This huge exposure of a product, service, coming event or the like means more people are likely to investigate further.

Billboard ads are also flown over crowds of people. These can be as large as a roadside billboard but are much lighter. These aerial billboards are pulled by planes or even helicopters for helicopters can pull a greater weight. If the plane can handle it and the budget allows, some even pull a banner behind a billboard ad. It usually contains additional information like an address or webpage.

Helium balloons are also used to attract attention. When a giant balloon is seen attached to the ground by a banner, people will drive over to see where it leads. A newer form of aerial advertising is by hot air balloon, or blimp. It is possible to buy a blimp and have your company name put on the side. Goodyear has become famous doing this and their use of the blimp for others probably pays their expenses. However, this is very expensive and probably cost prohibitive to most companies.

Remote controlled balloons are a nice compromise, inexpensive but further off the ground than helium balloons. These balloons are heavier than air since they have to come down. Without the weight of a pilot, the balloon doesn't need to be as large to carry the ad.

These large balloons are propelled by a pusher prop attached to the rear of the balloon. The remote control unit determines the angle of the propeller, whether up, down, or turning. It actually resembles a slow moving model plane. When such a balloon displays an ad and is flown over a crowd of people, it will work much like a banner ad. The balloon can then be returned to the operator to be used again.

These balloons come in varying sizes, some starting at six feet and going to nearly twenty feet. They are not helium filled so preparing and launching them is simple. Of course, wind plays a factor with something so light and scheduled runs may need to be postponed.

How much would this type of advertising cost? A probably typical estimate for six foot balloons displaying a company sign or logo is about 1500 dollars. Larger sizes go from 4000 dollars for a thirteen foot, to 7000 dollars for a seventeen foot. Since a pilot is not needed for this type of ad, the owner can fly it any time he wants, that is, when the weather permits.

If you want to target your message effectively, it is time to get in touch with an aerial banner company and get it printed and into the air. It won't take long before your well planned message will be read by thousands and the result in sales will follow.

How Are Aerial Billboards Used in Advertising?

While traveling to Canada some years ago, I was struck by the absence of billboards along the roads. I guess it was against the law. Actually I missed them. Sure, too many can be obnoxious and an eyesore, but I found I rely on the information they present as I travel.

Of course, most billboards are huge signs pasted to a support on some rented piece of property like a farmer's field. The more people who travel that highway, the better. The billboard stands there, awaiting people traveling by to read the message. Now imagine this billboard flying into the air over some huge gathering of people. That is the essence of advertising with aerial billboards.

Aerial billboards are similar to roadside billboards but different in a number of ways as well. For example, the roadside billboard is fixed, being seen by moving people. Aerial billboards on the other hand, are moving while the people are stationary. Also, the roadside billboard is only noticed by those looking its way as they drive. The aerial billboard is read by virtually everyone who sees it because of the uniqueness of the display. The roadside billboard will be viewed by 100,000 people after a long time; the aerial billboard could be read by that many in a matter of minutes.

The aerial billboards are made of nylon. Some are painted and some are dyed with a sun inhibitor for protection. The billboard is not a banner but a banner is sometimes attached to the end of the billboard to give an additional message. Some billboards are as large as 50 feet tall and 100 feet long! The message on it may be a logo, the name of a product, photos, or just about anything a roadside billboard contains.

The billboard is weighted on the bottom so that it stays upright, and has a lead pole attached to the front. A bridle is attached to that and the bridle to a 250 feet long rope attached to the plane. To get the billboard into the air, the pilot must take off without it, then circle around and catch a loop of rope fastened to the tow rope. He catches it with a large hook attached to the rear of the plane. He immediately banks upward so the billboard is hoisted up and not dragged along the ground.

Of course, billboard advertising like this is dependent on the weather. Heavy winds could make it impossible for a small plane to pull such a resistance. Sometimes the banner cannot be added to the back of the billboard because of the drag. When the flight is over, the pilot is able to fly low and drop the billboard safely to the ground where it will be retrieved and stored for future use.

What is the difference between aerial banners and aerial billboards? The only real difference is the size and shape of the message trailing behind the plane. Clients might include restaurants, products, special events, congratulatory messages, wedding proposals, directions, information like a web page to get further details, special sales events, businesses, movie ads, and so on. Billboards display just about any brief message someone wants to get to the public in a hurry.

The cost for billboard or aerial ads varies with companies and locations. Generally you should plan on 0 to 0 an hour for towing time and 00 and up for the billboard or banner. If that seems like a lot of money, consider the revenue that the message will bring in as a result of thousands of people seeing your aerial advertising message in a single day.