About Busakwe Advertising
We put brands on the roads that move South Africa.
“We believe the road is the most powerful media channel in South Africa. Every commuter, every driver, every pedestrian is an audience. Our job is to make sure your brand is impossible to miss on the routes that matter.”
Mlungisi Busakwe, Founder
Who We Are
Started in the Eastern Cape. Built for the nation.
Busakwe Advertising (Pty) Ltd is an out-of-home media owner and operator registered in South Africa. We own, develop, and manage our advertising inventory directly — from site identification and council approvals through to advertiser delivery and campaign management.
We are not a broker. We are not a middleman. Every site we sell is a site we own and operate. That means our clients get direct access to inventory, honest pricing, and a team that is personally accountable for every campaign we run.
We are proudly South African. Started in Gqeberha in 2023 and now operating nationally, Busakwe Advertising was built on relationships forged across the country's roads, communities, and commercial corridors. The Eastern Cape is where we started — South Africa is where we are going.
Company Details
The Founder's Journey
A decade in the making.
2015
2015
The Beginning
Photography, Port Elizabeth
Mlungisi started a photography company in Port Elizabeth. Over eight years he documented graduations, weddings, and family milestones across the Eastern Cape. What he built was not just a portfolio — it was a network of deep, lasting relationships. In photography, you learn that trust is not given. It is earned, one milestone at a time.
2016
2016
The Education
BayFM & Boomtown Agency
He joined BayFM, Port Elizabeth's community radio station, and saw for the first time how advertising is the engine behind media. Radio stations, newspapers, television — advertising keeps them alive. That insight reframed how he saw every billboard, every poster, every screen he had ever walked past. The same year, he interned at Boomtown Agency — one of the Eastern Cape's most respected creative firms — learning the systems behind designing adverts for print and video: how ideas become executions, how briefs become campaigns.
2020
2020
The Lesson
Property & Cash Flow
When the world stopped, Mlungisi turned his attention to assets. He studied how property generates passive income and how intelligent asset management separates those who build wealth from those who trade time for money. The lesson that stuck: own the thing, don't rent it. That principle would define how Busakwe Advertising was built.
2023
2023
The Launch
Busakwe Advertising Founded
Busakwe Advertising was registered. The idea was simple: combine the oldest advertising medium — the billboard — with modern technology, data-driven placement, and the kind of client relationships built over a decade of showing up for people on their most important days. Photography taught him relationships. Radio taught him media. Boomtown taught him craft. Busakwe Advertising is where all three meet.
2024
2024
The Growth
Three Brands. Three Cities. One Network.
The first three billboard assets were secured and brought under management. OM Bank, Pineapple Insurance, and Cadbury Dairy Milk went live across Gqeberha — each campaign placed, managed, and delivered entirely in-house. A national footprint was beginning to take shape.
2026
2026
The Network
Five Sites. Four National Brands. Growing.
Busakwe Advertising now operates five billboard assets across the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. Four national brands have run campaigns on the network. Expansion into Gauteng and the Western Cape is underway. The oldest medium in advertising is also the one still standing.
Present day
What We Stand For
Three principles. No exceptions.
01
Ownership, not brokerage
Every site we sell is a site we own. No markups on third-party inventory. No passing the blame to someone else's network. When something goes wrong, we fix it. When something goes right, it is because we built it ourselves.
02
Relationships over transactions
We have been building relationships across South Africa since 2015. Our clients are not accounts — they are partners. We take on fewer campaigns and go deeper on each one. That is how we deliver work that actually performs.
03
The road is the medium
Billboards are not just print on a stick. They are part of the lived environment of every South African who moves through a city. We place campaigns where people actually are, on the routes they actually take, at the moments that actually matter.