A new revenue stream is being adopted by South Staffordshire District Council ' selling advertising space on its refuse trucks.

The local authority plans to bring in extra cash to help plug a budget gap by offering the space to businesses and other organisations.

Its 15 refuse trucks already carry public information campaigns and all are fitted with the Spedian interchangeable vehicle graphics system.

The council is also using data from Roadvert ' a sister company of Spedian ' to help it maximise this revenue generating initiative. Roadvert data calculates how many people will see the messages and puts a price on the service. The audience reach can be broken down by age group to help estimate how long a campaign will need to run in order to reach a certain percentage of the target audience.

Advertising will be sold by South Staffordshire District Council's entrepreneurial arm, the Business Hub, for two of the refuse trucks, initially to local businesses. The council is also in talks with the Local Government Association about running national campaigns.

Business Hub lead, Imre Tolgyesi, said: 'Roadvert is a really cool website that enables us to see how many people will view the advertisements and we will use that information to sell the advertising.

'It's another tool in our armoury to generate money directly for our public services. Every pound that we generate will help. If each department could raise thousands of pounds a year it would go a long way to retaining services for the benefit of local residents.

'We've not sold advertising on refuse trucks before because the financial incentive wasn't there. But times have changed and councils have to adopt a more commercial perspective now'

Lawrence Craig, chief executive of both Spedian and Roadvert, said: 'We are delighted to be helping South Staffordshire District council to raise more revenue in such a visual way for the benefit of local residents and businesses.

'I am sure it will catch on ' council vehicles visit every street, are out almost every day, are highly visible and a great means of communication, so advertisers will see a great potential.

'And as councils are increasingly looking for innovative ways to balance their budgets it's a win-win proposition'