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UWG Inc.
FormerlyUniWorld Group, Inc.
Company typePrivate
IndustryAdvertising
Headquarters
New York City
,
New York
Key people
Monique L. Nelson (CEO)[1]
OwnerLori-Laine Holdings (51%)
WPP Group (49%)[2]
DivisionsUniWorld Group Advertising
UniWorld Group Healthcare
UniWorld Group Hispanic
UniWorld Films[3]
Websitewww.uwginc.com

UWG Inc. is a full-service advertising agency[4][5] headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, with satellite offices in Atlanta, Detroit, Miami, and Los Angeles. It is the longest-standing multicultural ad agency in the United States, founded in 1969.[6][7][8] In 2014, the company rebranded itself as UWG.[9][10]

Some of its current and past clients include Lincoln-Mercury, Ford Motor Company, CVS Pharmacy, Marriott International, U.S. Marine Corps, AT&T, and Burger King.[6][1][7]

History

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UniWorld Group was founded in 1969 by Byron Lewis,[11][12] who pioneered the concept of multicultural advertising.[13] The company conceptualised the marketing campaign for the 1971 "blaxploitation" film Shaft. The company was credited for popularizing Shaft by using the rhetoric of black power.[14][15][16]

In 1974, the company created a radio soap opera that centered on the post-Great Migration and African Americans settling in the Northern United States, entitled Sounds of the City. The soap opera helped the company earn its first million dollars in gross sales.[17][18] The company started creating TV commercials in 1975. Its first television advertisements were for Avon, a cosmetic company.[19]

In 1997, the company launched UniWorld Entertainment, a production company that developed national TV specials. The company has also handled publicity for films such as A Bronx Tale (1993), Amistad (1997), Boyz n the Hood (1991), Glory (1989), Malcolm X (1992), Shaft (1971), Shaft's Big Score (1973), and Shaft in Africa (1973).[18]

UniWorld did Burger King's minority advertising in the '80s and '90s.[20][21] In 2000, WPP plc acquired a 49% stake in UniWorld Group for an undisclosed amount of sum.[22][23]

In 2012, Monique Nelson and her family acquired the majority stake and were appointed chair and CEO of the company.[24] In 2014, UniWorld Group changed its name to UWG.[9][10][25] Some of the notable clients that UWG served include CVS Pharmacy, Marriott International, U.S. Marine Corps, Gatorade, AT&T, Mars, Incorporated, Amtrak, Smirnoff Vodka, Colgate-Palmolive, Texaco,[26] Lincoln-Mercury, and Ford Motor Co.[6][1][27][28][29][30][7]

Awards and recognition

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UWG has been ranked multiple times in Black Enterprise magazine: #16 on their Industrial/Service 100 (1994),[27] Advertising Agency of the Year (2000);[23][31] #5 in Advertising Agencies (2011);[24] and #8 in black-owned ad companies in the United States (2014).[32] The Association of National Advertisers has given the company Multicultural Excellence Awards in 2010, 2012, and 2017.[33][34][35]

The company's founder, Byron Lewis, was inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame by the American Advertising Federation (AAF) in 2013.[36][37]

Other awards and nominations include: Communications Excellence to Black Audiences (CEBA) awards (1983)[38] and the APAC Effie Awards Gold Award in United States Multicultural & Lifestyle Segments – the multimedia 'Real Talk' ad campaign produced for the United States Marine Corps (2010).[39][40][41]

Further reading

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  • Jessie Smith (2017). Encyclopedia of African American Business: Updated and Revised (Ed. 2, Vol.2 ed.). ABC-CLIO. pp. 495, 496, 497, 498, 499. ISBN 9781440850288.
  • Derek T. Dingle (1999). Black Enterprise Titans of The B.E. 100s: Black CEOs Who Redefined and Conquered American Business. John Wiley & Sons. p. 112. ISBN 9780471318538.

References

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  1. ^ a b c Baskin, Anna (May 2, 2012). "PEOPLE ON THE MOVE: MONIQUE L. NELSON TO TAKE OVER FOR BYRON LEWIS SR. AT UNIWORLD GROUP". Ad Age.
  2. ^ "UniWorld Group advertising & marketing assignments". Adbrands.net. 9 January 2020.
  3. ^ "UniWorld Film's New President". Upscale: 28. 1999.
  4. ^ TARQUINIO, J. ALEX (November 4, 2008). "Office Tenants Flee Manhattan Rents for Brooklyn". The New York Times.
  5. ^ Dougherty, Philip H. (July 30, 1982). "Uniworld Starts Unit To Create Hispanic Ads". The New York Times.
  6. ^ a b c "Top Black Ad Men and Women You Won't See on Mad Men". The Root. November 4, 2014.
  7. ^ a b c Rittenhouse, Lindsay (August 2, 2019). "Toasting UWG's 50th year". AdAge.
  8. ^ "UniWorld: Changing of the guard". New York Amsterdam News. March 5, 2012.
  9. ^ a b Aditham, Kiran (June 3, 2014). "UniWorld Group Rebrands as UWG". Adweek.
  10. ^ a b Spiropoulos, Richard (June 3, 2014). "Changes at UniWorld repositions agency for digital age". Black Enterprise.
  11. ^ Byron, Ellen (March 3, 2004). "Questions for… Byron Lewis". The Wall Street Journal.
  12. ^ "Leader of the pack". Manhattan Times. May 8, 2013.
  13. ^ [Jet; 07/26/99, Vol. 96 Issue 8, p24, 2p, 5 bw.]
  14. ^ Eric Lichtenfeld (2017). Action Speaks Louder: Violence, Spectacle, and the American Action Movie. Wesleyan University Press. pp. 14, 15. ISBN 9780819568014.
  15. ^ Reid, Mark. Redefining Black Film. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.
  16. ^ Robert E. Weems; Robert E. Weems, Jr. (1998). Desegregating the Dollar: African American Consumerism in the Twentieth Century. NYU Press. pp. 97, 98, 192. ISBN 9780814793275.
  17. ^ Campbell, Barbara (April 8, 1974). "SOUNDS OF CITY, Black Soap Opera, to Cut the Jive". The New York Times.
  18. ^ a b Jessie Carney Smith; Millicent Lownes Jackson; Linda T. Wynn (2006). Encyclopedia of African American Business: K-Z. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 446. ISBN 9780313331114.
  19. ^ Laura Warren Hill; Julia Rabig (2012). The Business of Black Power: Community Development, Capitalism, and Corporate Responsibility in Postwar America. University Rochester Press. pp. 126, 127, 128. ISBN 9781580464031.
  20. ^ Dougherty, Philip H. (April 14, 1983). "Uniworld Group Gets A Burger King Account". The New York Times.
  21. ^ Elliott, Stuart (December 20, 1993). "Burger King Widens Role for Uniworld". The New York Times.
  22. ^ Sampey, Kathleen (June 19, 2019). "WPP Takes Piece of Uniworld Pie". AdWeek.
  23. ^ a b Alexander, George (September 2000). "A matter of survival". Black Enterprise (September 2000): 23.
  24. ^ a b Edmond, Alfred Jr. (May 30, 2012). "UniWorld Group's New CEO Monique Nelson". Black Enterprise.
  25. ^ Willoughby, Sergie (May 4, 2012). "UniWorld Group CEO Byron Lewis Retires". The Network Journal.
  26. ^ Beatty, Sally Goll (November 21, 1996). "Black-Owned Agency Retained By Texaco to Bolster Its Image". The Wall Street Journal.
  27. ^ a b "Uniworld Group Inc. celebrates its silver anniversary in the advertising business by targeting international markets". Black Enterprise. January 1995. p. 95.
  28. ^ "WPP announces joint venture with Uniworld". WPP.com. June 16, 2000.
  29. ^ Dingle, Derek T. (July 24, 2017). "No. 37: Black Ad Agency Slays A Madison Avenue Giant". Black Enterprise.
  30. ^ "UniWorld Group wins Amtrak Account". Portada Online. October 12, 2012.
  31. ^ G. Graves, Earl (June 1, 2000). "How UniWorld redefining urban reality". Black Enterprise: 189, 190, 192, 194, 195. ISSN 0006-4165.
  32. ^ "Minority Owned Advertising Agencies Shut Out on Game Day". NBC News. February 2, 2015.
  33. ^ "Burrell and UniWorld Win Top Honors at ANA". Rolling Out. November 11, 2010.
  34. ^ Wentz, Laurel (November 1, 2012). "Ford, GM, Xoom, Rosetta Stone Win ANA Multicultural Ad Awards". Ad Age.
  35. ^ "ANA Announces 2017 Multicultural Excellence Award Grand Prize Winners". Ana.net. November 6, 2017.
  36. ^ "UniWorld founder Byron Lewis' Hall of Fame induction to be celebrated at Schomburg". Targetmarketnews. April 8, 2013. Archived from the original on August 17, 2013.
  37. ^ Caslin, Yvette (April 29, 2013). "Advertising maverick Byron Lewis inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame". Rollingout.com.
  38. ^ Dougherty, Philip H. (October 28, 1983). "Uniworld and J.W.T. Tie for CEBA Awards". The New York Times.
  39. ^ "2010 Effie Winners" (PDF). 2010. pp. 1, 9.
  40. ^ 2010 United States Multicultural & Lifestyle Segments
  41. ^ "Effie Search - 1 - 5 of 5 results". Retrieved 2024-01-18.
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