Historic Columbia billboards

Semaphore recently unveiled a new billboard and web campaign for the Historic Columbia Foundation (HCF). HCF wanted to increase traffic flow to its website and generate interest in its house museums for tours. The tag line “Discover People, Places and Progress” focuses on HCF’s strategic plan to ensure that historic preservation and local history are key drivers in the community’s economic development and quality of life, and that HCF is the local leader in heritage tourism.

The Historic Columbia Foundation has four historic house museums and three historic properties. The billboards feature a single word coupled with a black-and-white historic image. Each word and photo combination represents a specific property. The bottom of the boards includes the foundation’s website and logo, along with the tag line. The goal is to drive viewers to the foundation’s website, where they can discover the stories behind Columbia’s historic properties and make plans to visit them. The boards appear on the HCF homepage, where visitors can click on them and link to a page describing the property.

Three billboards have been posted in an around Columbia: “Class,” representing the Hampton-Preston Mansion and Gardens; “Freedom,” representing the Mann-Simons Cottage; and “Vision,” representing the Robert Mills House and Park. More billboards representing other historic properties are scheduled to appear in coming months.