Billboards 101

Think and  Grow Rich!

How to build your own Outdoor Advertising Cash Machine.

Thomas "TOM"
Gunter better know to the International business community
as the founder of several successful businesses and mentor to many
more.



Tom resides in Ocala, Florida with his beautiful wife Angela. Tom has four daughters
and three sons.  



Gunter started as an apprentice in an outdoor advertising business in
1960, by the end of the third year, with less than a hundred dollars in
his pocket, he said his goodbye’s to his employer and open the doors to his own
outdoor advertising company. When his former employer was asked about Gunter
opening his own business?  He replied “How much can one man do?”



Never under estimate the power of one. Over the next 3 years Gunter
would capture the major advertising accounts in central Florida and build and
sell his first million dollar+ business.



It took him two years to build and sell the second million dollar + business.
 Over the following years he would continue to build, buy and sell
outdoor adverting companies and plants across American from sea to sea.
 Over the past 45 years he has had the privilege and opportunity to
work with some of the largest and best know names in the outdoor
advertising industry, many would become the entrepreneurs that would shape the
outdoor advertising 

industry as we know it today.



It was not all work along the way; Gunter had the opportunity to play
out many different roles along his road to success as he ventured into
politics, local, state and national, working with legislators, governors and
finally the President of the United States, Ronald Reagan.  In the mid  80's Gunter would serve on
several committees for the Regan Administration.  



In the spring of 1989,  Hollywood tracked him down through a mutual friend in Washington    D.C., one of the movie industries most noted producer’s
 Richard Zanuck was producing a new film for distribution
through Warner Brothers.  Zanuck's art director asked Tom on behalf of Mr. Zanuck if he would consider producing the billboards for
 

upcoming 1940’s movie named “Driving Miss Daisy”.  Gunter accepted, by the following year “Drivin g Miss Daisy" would win three Academy Awards and become “Best Picture of The Year”.



Gunter was quickly adopted into the Hollywood circle by studios and producers, "Driving Miss Daisy" had open a new door, Gunter would soon build
his own film and television production company and develop a close bond with
the movie and television industry, a bond  that continues until this
day.  Back home in Florida he had been elected president of “The Florida
Motion Picture and Television Guild”  where he would serve three
consecutive terms. By 

the end of third year Gunter stepped down as president to spend more
time with his growing family and focus his attention on the increasing
demands of his growing outdoor advertising business.



After leaving Hollywood to the dreams of others, he continued building his
outdoor adverting company expanding into other venues of the outdoor
industry while  managing  and helping other outdoor advertising
industry entrepreneurs.  Tom’s the kind of guy that will go out of
his way to help almost anyone who will listen. One of Tom's favorite
relatives was “Will Rogers” who once said “I never met a man I did not like”,  with a
smile on his face Tom said he did not completely share the same views with
cousin Will, Tom said  "Apparently he did not meet some of the people
I met."  but none the less Will Rogers was one of his favorite revelatives. Tom and Will both
shared  the same native American
bloodline and  great  grandfather, John Gunter.



One of Tom's favorite writings he associated himself with was written by
the famous American writer Robert Frost, it was a poem,  “The Road Not Taken”.  The two books that most influenced his formative
business years was “The Power of Positive
Thinking” by  Norman Vincent Peale and  “Think and Grow Rich” written by Napoleon Hill and inspired by Andrew Carnegie.  



While building his own reputation and place in the outdoor industry, he
touched the lives of many average American businessmen and women along the
way, many who listened and later became successful business entrepreneurs joining him on
 "The Road Not Taken".