The story of Jean-Claude Decaux is above all an exemplary story of success through innovation, design and operational excellence. Although met with scepticism at the outset, his model is now the subject of admiration and respect.

Before long, he began to specialise in roadside displays, until the day when a finance law introduced a cripplingly high tax on roadside advertising that made it impossible for his company to survive. The same year, 1964, he invented the advertising bus shelter and the concept of advertising street furniture, which soon caught on worldwide: to offer cities bus shelters free-of-charge, managed and maintained by his company and financed through advertising.

« My whole career has been driven by a constant desire for excellence, a strong emphasis on design, and an obsession with always, always using our advertising-based business to serve the community »