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THE DAN PLAN

DAN Media is a rare thing: a mall-focused technology startup from the 1990s that can be spoken of in the present tense. The survival of the Montréal-based company, according to its founders, has a little to do with the tough requirements of skeptical Canadian advertisers and a lot to do with Canada’s tremendous landmass.

Established in 1999, DAN (Digital Advertising Network) Media is Canada’s leading mall network. Its gigantic food court screens hang in 58 Canadian malls owned by Cadillac Fairview, Ivanhoe-Cambridge, Oxford Properties and others. Last November the company crossed the U.S. border through a joint venture with New York City-based Clear Channel Malls. The partnership has placed DAN Media screens in nine malls: three in New York and six in Los Angeles. The screens air remotely programmed, 15-minute loops with content provided by Yahoo, including news headlines, sports, entertainment and the Yahoo Buzz Index, as well as local, national and regional ads. DAN Media provides the technology and networking know-how, while Clear Channel Malls contributes its client base and the sales and marketing expertise.

“We plan to be in 200 malls in the next couple of years,” said Donna Baker, president of Clear Channel Digital Mall Network, as the venture is called. “We’ll be distributed throughout the U.S. in the top 20 markets in the next couple of years.”

Warren Stelman, DAN’s president and CEO, says Canadian geography was a key reason the company decided to launch a network of screens that could be centrally controlled from Montréal. The alternative — crisscrossing Canada’s 4,000-mile-wide landmass to tweak content servers at individual malls — was simply unthinkable.

DAN’s straightforward approach, which employs no audio and emphasizes maximum content flexibility, was formed in the crucible of Canadian skepticism, he says. “The natural instinct for most Canadians is to say no to everything,” said Stelman. “So on the one hand, we didn’t have to be in a gazillion malls to go national. But on the other, it was a bit of a tough slog to get advertisers.”

— JG