You may not know, But I am a descendant of Custer. Yes, that Custer. So, knowing I’d be near the National Park by his name, we thought we’d drop by so I could pay my respects. The town of Custer, SD is tiny, with about 3,000 residents. “Imagine being a student at school there,” remarked Zoo. “We’re going to massacre you!”

Mauvais goux, but true, I assume. Have to say the National Park was breathtaking. Windy roads and (a few) buffalo. The Black Hills are truly wonderful. Visit if you can.

We also visited Crazy Horse – amazing to see something that will rival Mt. Rushmore in progress. Ten more years and the horse’s head will be done. 100 years and the whole thing will be done.

We did not stop, but we were exposed to a Wall Drug billboard from the east side of South Dakota all the way to the west side. And even after leaving Wall, there one more billboard reminding you you had one more chance to visit Wall Drug!

Anyhoo, it got me to thinking. Thinking about how they had small, carefully crafted billboards with one topic on them. Kinda like Google AdWords. No joke. They were the visual equivalent of spam. Constant interruption from the flowing flatlands of South Dakota. But, like much interruptive advertising, there was one or two billboards that spoke to me. Not enough to make me want to stop after ALL THAT WAITING to see what Wall Drug was about. DInner and beer won. No tchotchkes could stop the mouth-watering I wanna beer feeling. Too bad.

But it did raise the question. Actually, Zoo asked me how many people stop because of it. I said that was the wrong question. The right question is how many more people stop than if there was no advertising? Zoo said that’s what he meant. I said that’s not what you said, though… He acquiesced, so I win. The point being that we guess that they get 10x more visitors simply by awareness of their business. But 1-5 impressions is not enough. I am guessing, but there are probably over 80 billboards in the state for Wall Drug. Wuh… Hurts me, left me laughing and thinking. They win. Except I did not buy anything – I am just telling other people about it ;)

Gotta go make the time-lapse movie of our trip today. See you in a bar, or the comments section here on the site posts.

– SpamZalot