Metro ventures to earn profits from ad blitz

BANGALORE: The Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation (BMRCL) is now looking at recovering a part of its project cost through revenue from advertisements and commercial use of BMRCL property. In a matter of 24 hours, the corporation will know if the 6.7 km stretch from Byappanahalli to M G Road has enough travellers. BMRCL is now offering 10,000 3D smart cards on limited edition costing Rs. 1,000 each and carrying a fare value of Rs. 500.  Additionally, around 2 lakh smart cards are on sale. Expecting the sale to shoot up after 4 pm on October 20, the corporation is optimistic about earning revenue from the sale of tickets, cards and tokens alone. Speaking to Express, U A Vasanth Rao, General Manager, Finance, BMRCL said that the corporation is  exploring new revenue opportunities as well. “We are aware that we cannot recover the project cost if we depend only on ticket sales. We are aiming to earn 7-15 per cent of the revenue through advertisements and property use,” he said.He further explained that for an advertisement on the back of the metro smart card, BMRCL has charged Rs. 5 lakh  from each organisation. “We have earned Rs. 2.5 crore through advertisements on these smart cards,” he added. While BMRCL is open to explore the option of earning more money through publicity, they do not want to clutter the stations with giant hoardings at the moment. “We would like to first judge the commuter frequency at stations and then decide on allocating station space for other uses,” he explained.BMRCL has been receiving applications for advertisement consultant, who will help in assessing how the station space can be used to maximise revenue from commercial use of the area. Vasanth Rao explained that even if BMRCL were to rent the space inside Metro stations for retail purposes, shops with basic products like medicines and stationery are likely to come up. With ATM facilities already at all the stations along the Reach 1 route, retail shops would complete the picture for a commuter looking to travel by the Metro every day.