Electonic Vinyl Banners?

I was getting a tank of gas in Pennsylvania over the Holidays, and snapped this picture of an electronic billboard.  It set me to wondering how long before this kind of thing completely replaces the vinyl banner business.

Most billboards are printed on grand format high speed inkjet printers.  The machines are 16 feet wide, and many are made right here in Meredith NH at EFI Vutek.  But I digress.

The real question to me is when will we see something like this in the smaller end of the market. It will need to be portable, durable, and cheap.  Still, it seems to me that those of us in the banner business need to be watching this for it’s impact on our business.  Some day someone will have a vinyl banner that plugs into your laptop and you can hang it up at the football game to encourage your team, and then change the graphics and give it to your kids to carry in the parade.  Here’s hoping I can get to retirement age before it happens!