Chairman of the board

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Everywhere: Drivers cannot travel anywhere in the Middle East without encountering Hills’ large billboards.

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Worldwide: The region has been quick to adopt tried-and-tested roadside advertising techniques.

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In charge: Mufleh has a bold strategy for the region’s billboards.

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Hard worker: Mufleh is also a qualified civil engineer.

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Things are going rather well for Sami Al Mufleh. And they probably couldn’t get much better right now.

“I was offered US$70m to sell the whole company, but I turned it down,” says the CEO of Hills Advertising.

Was he not tempted to take the cash and sit on a beach? “I’ll be on a beach this afternoon, no need,” he says. What about buying some new cars? “I have a Porsche, and two Mercedes,” he says. Perhaps a boat then? “I already have one.”

When you look at Mufleh’s business model, it is easy to see why he has everything. Hills Advertising is enjoying spectacular success and practically re-defining the advertising industry in some countries. It buys the rights to landmark outdoor advertising sites — from bridges to buildings — and then sells the advertising space to clients from Nokia to Dubai Holding, often clearing a 60% profit on each deal.

Everyone’s happy, especially Mufleh. “I am like a baby in a candy shop when I see a new location go up — I just love it. But I am very passionate about this job. I cry when I see a client unhappy,” he says.

What? Tears streaming down his face? “Well, it depends how much he is paying me,” he says.

Neither he nor any of his clients currently have any reason to cry. This week, Hills Advertising will unveil a US$15m deal to buy all the outdoor advertising rights for the Jordanian port city of Aqaba, for a period of 10 years. It is the biggest ever deal of its type.

Nobody has ever managed to buy the outdoor advertising rights to an entire city and is unlikely to ever do so again. This comes on the back of a deal with Dubai’s Road Transport Authority (RTA) to secure the advertising rights for every single bridge in the emirate over the next three years, for US$6.53m. The Jordanian deal has been done in partnership with Aqaba, with the government taking a share of all future revenues. It is effectively a US$15m investment. “Aqaba is a fantastic place, it will be the Cannes of the Middle East and it’s not just a place where you go to the beach. It will be an amazing futuristic city that will be targeted by big multinationals and investors.

“Saraya Holdings and Kuwaiti development business Mazaya are both there. What we did was work on the expansion of advertising along with the expansion of the city. We sat with the developers to look closely at the masterplan for development and work out where the advertising should be placed,” he says.

In Dubai, Hills Advertising will bank all the profits from all the sales. Either way there is serious money to be made. “In a deal like the one with the RTA, I suppose in another three years we will make over US$6m on it. The same in Jordan. So we take over the sites and then we start renting them out to multinationals like Nokia, Dubai Holding, Emaar and Nakheel. We get the clients, that’s what we do — we sell media.

"Cities that are newly expanded are so thirsty to do something right,” he says.

Mufleh is obviously doing a lot right himself. “Yes we are making a lot of money. Our turnover each year is around US$65m. Our profit margin is around 60%. Last year we made US$5m, this year our profit will be around US$40m,” he says. “The future of advertising is in doing something different. It’s urban advertising engineering.

We go to developing cities and propose to their owners ways of upgrading the value of their advertising. Look at Abu Dhabi — we went there and we said this is a beautiful island but it needs beautiful signs across the city, which are done to international advertising standards.”

Most people Mufleh talks to like what they hear. He is behind the world’s largest advertisement, the 5735 sq m banner on the 21st Century Tower in Dubai. The Jordan deals have come on the back of equally impressive work globally, with clients such as the BurJuman mall, Nakheel and Jumeirah Beach Residence taking banners in London. The Dubai International Financial Exchange and Dubai Holding are prominent outdoor advertisers in Jordan, and other multinationals are now working with Mufleh on projects in Cairo.

Typically, banner advertising on buildings can cost clients a minimum of US$160,000. The basic fees usually comprise US$27 per sq m in government fees (based on Dubai prices) and around US$30 per sq m for application and construction costs. The rest depends on land rates. The cost doesn’t appear to have put off clients. Mufleh gleefully points to a Barclays Bank banner on a Dubai building, a site which he says now has a 10-year waiting list.

“Why do cities do this? It’s not just a source of income but it’s adding a beauty to the city. I think outdoor advertising is becoming a necessity. When you want to attract investors to a place now, you don’t just need to offer the internet, phones, roads and financial services — you need the advertising infrastructure through which they can promote their products,” he says.

10 years ago, outdoor advertising accounted for just 4% of total media spend in the region. Today the figure is closer to 24% and likely to keep on rising in some parts of the Gulf, particularly Jordan, Qatar and Bahrain. “The boom in real estate has made life much easier for outdoor advertising. Multinationals like Nokia have increased their spending but not by as much as the likes of Emaar and Dubai Holding, the really big real estate companies,” says Mufleh.

It is little wonder that Mufleh has not only had offers to sell his company, but has been courted by bankers over a possible stock market flotation. For now, he says, it is not on the agenda.

“Right now I am proud to be expanding it this way, it’s a family business. I am an entrepreneurial type of person. If we float maybe it will destroy the innovation in the company,” he says.

There’s little doubt that Mufleh — still just 37 years old — has already achieved a great deal. A qualified civil engineer, he took a degree in marketing before ditching engineering for advertising. This was no real surprise to anyone who knew him, and by 1999 he was working for a Dubai-based advertising company.

Three years later, he created Hills Advertising, and has never looked back. “I love advertising. It’s in my blood. I’m a salesman in my blood,” he says.

“I’m a happy person when I see my business growing in the right direction. We are a company that has a vision, and we feel that we are adding a high value for the industry. We don’t only have employees. We also have babies in the street that we are taking care of. Our babies are our signs and our clients,” he says.

Mufleh insists he still gets a huge buzz out of the job, frantically phoning his staff each morning with new ideas before he even gets in the shower. And he makes clear that despite enjoying enormous success, this is no power trip as far as he is concerned. “We have a flat management system. I am the same as everyone in the company. When my team see me working hard, the same as a normal employee, they work harder. This is something I am proud of. I am the office boy, I make the tea and I am also the CEO.

"We go and have lunch and dinner together. My driver joins us as well,” he says.

Right now Hills Advertising has 80 staff, with 14 based in Dubai. Given the outsourcing of most printing and construction work, there are no plans to hugely expand the staff count — or as Mufleh likes to describe them, his family.

He explains: “I am the CEO but I hate the title of CEO. I just want to be called ‘normal person’. Or entrepreneur. Someone who has made money in a different way, through hard work. It is something I am proud of. Because I am from Jordan, winning the deal in Aqaba was very special for me. Knowing that this is the country I came from, and now I am going to be part of something very special again in Jordan."

At the rate he is going, this is likely to be the first of many special projects.

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