U-Haul is the world's largest advertiser in the Yellow Pages. A customer service of the yellow pages told me U-Haul makes 15 billion every year from listings in the yellow pages...
i will call them again to find out the rest b/c they say it's confidential
Source(s):
yellowpage.com/contact_us

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U-Haul is the world's largest advertiser in the Yellow Pages.

According to this source:
http://www.myprofessionaladvertising.com/Yellow%20Page%20Strategies.htm
------Quote:

" The average national cost of a one-year, ½ page yellow page display ad is $17,100. "

-----/Quote
this means any company you find with at least a half page ad in a major phone book is likely paying near $20,000 per year on their yellow page national advertising.

The return on investment is said to be $6 per ever dollar spent advertising in the yellow pages, so that means they should expect to get a minimum of $120,000 in return on their investment, making it a profit over advertising alone of more than 100 grand.

Knowing this, you can estimate that about half that cost would be used for a quarter page ad, which is what most of the car rental companies that are national take out in yellow pages. So they will pay AT LEAST $8600 bucks per year for national yellow page advertising. These companies include:

*Hertz
*National
*Budget
*Enterprise

And other companies like this. I would venture to guess that along with local advertising in the yellow pages, they are probably spending at least 10k per year in yellow page advertising alone.

Lawyers who handle class action suits will advertise nationally as well, and the figure for full page national spots with lawyers is about 25-35,000 per year in advertising for national. These class or group action suits are usually for large suits against major corporations and such, so it makes the money worth it.

I would venture a guess that after Uhaul and Car Rental Companies, attorneys then make up at least part of the top ten listing of yellow page national advertisers.

The problem with getting you the information you need specifically is that there is no single 'national' yellow pages. Because of this, someone advertising nationally has to purchase ads in 'local' phone books for metropolitan areas, and so it's impossible to tell you what these all are, since one person can pay for an ad locally while another person advertising buys bundled ads on multiple yellow page phone books for regions.

Anyway, that's just some info that might get you started with the information you need.

Unfortunately, the only way to get more accurate numbers would be to either get the information from each individual company or to get it from each individual phone book ad department (if they would even share it) and that, quite frankly, is worth a lot more than the tip offered here.

Hopefully this can help you get started though and if it is along the lines of what you're looking for, I can probably get you some more numbers, but it won't be by individual company, but rather by industry.
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I don't think I have the exact answer yet, but U-haul does appear to be a contender. U-haul is owned by Amerco. In Amerco's 2009 annual reports they state that "Advertising expense was $24.7 million, $31.3 million and $31.5 million
in fiscal 2009, 2008 and 2007, respectively."
The report also specifically lists Yellow Pages as one of their marketing tools, along with print and web based advertising. Unfortunately, it does not break down the specific amount spent on Yellow Pages advertising.

I have not yet been able to find if any other companies spend more on Yellow Page advertising.
The "Yellow Pages Marketing Forecast" may contain the specific information you are seeking http://www.simbainformation.com/sitemap/product.asp?productid=2073282 However, it appears to be outrageously expensive!!!
Source(s):
http://www.simbainformation.com/sitemap/product.asp?productid=2073282
http://www.amerco.com/news_article.aspx?id_pdf=21635&id_section=0

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