How Aruba Tourism’s Times Square DOOH Campaign Transported Would-Be Travelers

July 11, 2025

There’s an entire nation roughly the size of DC that's got a TripAdvisor section listing a whopping 304 hotels, 888 things to do, and 573 restaurants. So if anyone knows it’s nice to have options, it’s Aruba Tourism.

When the destination marketer wanted to make a splash in Times Square, the challenge was to communicate in a single DOOH campaign just how broad that array of choices awaiting visitors was. If that sounds like a lot to fit into a single 30-second spot, it was. Fortunately Aruba Tourism didn’t have to.

It’s because the latest installment of the “Aruba Effect” brand campaign was powered by QRad, the content control capability from OUTFRONT XLabs that brings futuristic interactivity to digital out of home by allowing consumers to actually, personally impact what plays on the screens.

Times Square was the obvious location to launch Aruba Tourism’s campaign – after all, they don’t call it the “Crossroads of the World” for nothing. Every day, 286,000 pedestrians pass through; also the average Times Square visitor spends 81 minutes here. Eight of those minutes are spent looking at billboards – not casually, not passively, but with intention (SOURCE: Times Square Alliance). Billboards are why they’re here! Billboards are why Times Square matters.


OUTFRONT offers Times Square billboard coverage from all angles, but for this campaign Aruba Tourism decided on Duffy’s Duo, a stacked pair of bold, bright screens located in Duffy Square adjacent to the oft-Instagrammed red steps - the section of Times Square with the most foot traffic and the longest dwell time (SOURCE: Times Square Alliance). Combined, the two screens cover an area nine times the size of a standard billboard – a veritable sea of pixels, which was appropriate for a campaign infused with visuals of the deep blue Caribbean.

The first half of the 30-second spot displayed a QR code against mesmerizing images of the beautiful island. But not just any QR. When passersby scanned this one, their browser took them to a microsite on aruba.com, where they were then prompted to select one of six “dream vacation” archetypes: Chill Out, Taste Aruba, Family Fun, Explore More, or Couples Escape.


Doing so triggered a corresponding scene – not just on the phone of the person who scanned the code, but on the billboard itself! The code scanner was then redirected to the main Aruba Tourism website, where they could put those daydreams into a rate calendar.


The interactivity of QRad encourages deeper engagement, and the gorgeous creative earned the campaign more than 2,600 scans while delivering 51.5 million impressions. Visitors to the microsite had an average dwell time of over two minutes (SOURCE: OUTFRONT XLABS). The campaign’s combination of stunning creative and cutting-edge ad tech earned Aruba Tourism and XLabs finalist recognition in the 2025 OBIE Awards.


QRad fit perfectly into Aruba’s brand – and the campaign that has communicated it to the world for the last three years. “As a creative platform, The Aruba Effect continues to evolve in smart, surprising ways to capture the truth that the physical beauty of the island is matched by the kindness of its people,” said Matt Steinwald, executive creative director at Deep Focus, Aruba Tourism’s agency of record.

Aruba Tourism isn’t the only advertiser that’s discovered the excitement of interacting with out of home via QRad.

Last year in Boston, the Peabody Essex Museum launched its first brand campaign in two decades and used QRad to show off some of the featured artwork in its spring exhibition after previously using it to play up its witchy pedigree during Halloween season. The second campaign was a finalist in the 2025 OAAA Local Case Study Awards.


And then there’s Coca-Cola, which revived its “Share a Coke” campaign this spring with over 200 names on cans and bottles at retailers nationwide. Inside New York City subway stations, the brand ran its own QRad-powered creative on our Digital Liveboards. After scanning the QR code, subway riders could then enter their name – and then see a virtual version of a personalized bottle! And just like the real thing, that digital Coke is meant to be shared.


“It’s not just about likes and shares – we’re talking real-world moments, amplified,” said Islam ElDessouky, Coca-Cola global vice president of creative.

The digital transit campaign was part of Coca-Cola’s broader “Real Magic” marketing transformation, which CEO James Quincy credits for the “tangible results” of 12% annual growth in organic revenues last year (SOURCE: Marketing Dive). With “Real Magic,” Coca-Cola has blended digital and physical experiences, which manifest in creative executions like the brand activation where an AI-animated version of Johannes Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring seemingly reached out of the screen, Coke in hand (thank you anamorphic creative), then tossed the bottle into the on-screen end of a contraption whose other end spit out real-life, ice-cold bottles all day long for holiday shoppers to enjoy.

While we can’t conclude this story by offering you a tasty beverage, we can tell you that QRad content control is creating real magic of its own for brands that use it.

Want to become one of those brands? Contact OUTFRONT today and let’s put our imaginations together!

Author: Jay Fenster, Marketing Manager @ OUTFRONT

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