Tube station rebrands earn TfL £2.4m as commercial deals divide passengers

From ‘Webminster’ and ‘Burberry Street’ to the more recent ‘Kaneary Wharf’, temporary renaming deals on the London Underground have generated millions of pounds for Transport for London – but the unconventional advertising strategy has not been without controversy.

Transport for London (TfL) has generated £2.42 million from commercial Tube station rebrands since 2015, with major brands paying hundreds of thousands of pounds to temporarily put their names on some of the capital's best-known stations.

The practice has transformed Westminster into Webminster, Bond Street into Burberry Street and Old Street into Fold Street, while football provided the inspiration for Southgate becoming Gareth Southgate.

More recently, parts of Canary Wharf were rebranded Kaneary Wharf as part of a £150,000 Skechers campaign linked to England captain Harry Kane and the World Cup.

Figures released by TfL following a Freedom of Information request reveal the scale of the revenue generated by the unusual commercial partnerships.

The biggest single deal came in 2017, when Amazon paid £390,000 for Westminster station to temporarily become Webminster.

In 2025, Absolut Vodka paid £355,000 for a partial Charing Cross activation featuring a Haring Cross roundel, while Warburtons paid £300,000 this year for part of Baker Street to become Bakers Street.

Other deals have included £250,000 each for Samsung's Fold Street campaign, Burberry's transformation of Bond Street and Amazon Prime's Picardilly Circus promotion.

Advertising income versus passenger clarity

The approach gives TfL another way of generating commercial income from one of the world's most recognisable transport brands, but altering familiar station identities has also prompted concerns about accessibility and passenger confusion.

Those concerns became particularly prominent following the 2023 Burberry Street campaign.

TfL received 46 complaints about the temporary Bond Street transformation, while reports emerged of passengers becoming confused by the replacement signage.

The issue subsequently reached the London Assembly.

Speaking in December 2023, TfL Commissioner Andy Lord acknowledged that some of the measures intended to minimise confusion during the campaign had not been applied consistently.

“There are a number of operational mitigations that were put in place that weren’t consistently delivered. So, it did cause some confusion for some customers on the network.”

Lord said TfL had reviewed the experience and would apply lessons from it to future commercial opportunities, stressing that the organisation would not simply accept every proposal presented by advertisers.

£2.42m raised through station campaigns

TfL's commercial station activations over the past decade have included:

Year	Station rebrand	Brand	TfL income
2015	Canada Water → Buxton Water	Buxton	£110,000
2017	Westminster → Webminster	Amazon	£390,000
2018	Southgate → Gareth Southgate	Visa	£80,000
2019	Westminster → Westminster Jungle	The Times	£250,000
2020	Piccadilly Circus → Picardilly Circus	Amazon Prime	£250,000
2022	Green Park → Green Planet*	BBC	£135,000
2023	Bond Street → Burberry Street	Burberry	£250,000
2024	Old Street → Fold Street	Samsung	£250,000
2025	Charing Cross → Haring Cross*	Absolut Vodka	£355,000
2026	Baker Street → Bakers Street*	Warburtons	£300,000
2026	Canary Wharf → Kaneary Wharf*	Skechers	£150,000

*Partial station rebrand.

Together, the campaigns have generated £2.42 million for TfL.

While relatively modest compared with the overall cost of operating London's transport network, the figures demonstrate the commercial value attached to the Underground's stations, roundels and globally recognised identity.

For advertisers, temporarily altering an iconic Tube station can generate attention far beyond the passengers who pass through it. For TfL, it provides an additional revenue stream without permanently selling station naming rights.

The challenge is balancing that commercial opportunity against the fundamental purpose of station signage: helping millions of passengers navigate London.

With brands continuing to pay six-figure sums for temporary access to some of the capital's most recognisable station names, the unusual rebrands appear capable of delivering valuable revenue – but TfL's experience also shows that the price of changing a familiar name cannot be measured in advertising income alone.