UWG Inc. Formerly UniWorld Group, Inc. Company type
Private Industry
Advertising Headquarters , Key people
Monique L. Nelson (CEO)
[1] Owner Lori-Laine Holdings (51%)
WPP Group (49%)
[2]
Divisions UniWorld Group Advertising UniWorld Group Healthcare UniWorld Group Hispanic UniWorld Films
[3] Website
www .uwginc .com
UniWorld Group, Inc. , branded as UWG , 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 Co ,
CVS Pharmacy ,
Marriott International ,
U.S. Marine Corps ,
AT&T , and
Burger King .
[6]
[1]
[7]
History
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
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
References
^
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 .
^
"UniWorld Group advertising & marketing assignments" . Adbrands.net. 9 January 2020.
^
"UniWorld Film's New President" . Upscale : 28. 1999.
^ TARQUINIO, J. ALEX (November 4, 2008).
"Office Tenants Flee Manhattan Rents for Brooklyn" .
The New York Times .
^ Dougherty, Philip H. (July 30, 1982).
"Uniworld Starts Unit To Create Hispanic Ads" .
The New York Times .
^
a
b
c
"Top Black Ad Men and Women You Won't See on Mad Men" .
The Root . November 4, 2014.
^
a
b
c Rittenhouse, Lindsay (August 2, 2019).
"Toasting UWG's 50th year" .
AdAge .
^
"UniWorld: Changing of the guard" .
New York Amsterdam News . March 5, 2012.
^
a
b Aditham, Kiran (June 3, 2014).
"UniWorld Group Rebrands as UWG" .
Adweek .
^
a
b Spiropoulos, Richard (June 3, 2014).
"Changes at UniWorld repositions agency for digital age" .
Black Enterprise .
^ Byron, Ellen (March 3, 2004).
"Questions for… Byron Lewis" .
The Wall Street Journal .
^
"Leader of the pack" .
Manhattan Times . May 8, 2013.
^ [Jet; 07/26/99, Vol. 96 Issue 8, p24, 2p, 5 bw.]
^ Eric Lichtenfeld (2017).
Action Speaks Louder: Violence, Spectacle, and the American Action Movie .
Wesleyan University Press . pp. 14, 15.
ISBN
9780819568014 .
^ Reid, Mark. Redefining Black Film . Berkeley:
University of California Press , 1993.
^ 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 .
^ Campbell, Barbara (April 8, 1974).
"SOUNDS OF CITY, Black Soap Opera, to Cut the Jive" .
The New York Times .
^
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 .
^ 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 .
^ Dougherty, Philip H. (April 14, 1983).
"Uniworld Group Gets A Burger King Account" .
The New York Times .
^ Elliott, Stuart (December 20, 1993).
"Burger King Widens Role for Uniworld" .
The New York Times .
^ Sampey, Kathleen (June 19, 2019).
"WPP Takes Piece of Uniworld Pie" .
AdWeek .
^
a
b Alexander, George (September 2000).
"A matter of survival" .
Black Enterprise (September 2000): 23.
^
a
b Edmond, Alfred Jr. (May 30, 2012).
"UniWorld Group's New CEO Monique Nelson" .
Black Enterprise .
^ Willoughby, Sergie (May 4, 2012).
"UniWorld Group CEO Byron Lewis Retires" . The Network Journal.
^ Beatty, Sally Goll (November 21, 1996).
"Black-Owned Agency Retained By Texaco to Bolster Its Image" .
The Wall Street Journal .
^
a
b
"Uniworld Group Inc. celebrates its silver anniversary in the advertising business by targeting international markets" .
Black Enterprise . January 1995. p. 95.
^
"WPP announces joint venture with Uniworld" .
WPP.com . June 16, 2000.
^ Dingle, Derek T. (July 24, 2017).
"No. 37: Black Ad Agency Slays A Madison Avenue Giant" .
Black Enterprise .
^
"UniWorld Group wins Amtrak Account" . Portada Online. October 12, 2012.
^ G. Graves, Earl (June 1, 2000).
"How UniWorld redefining urban reality" .
Black Enterprise : 189, 190, 192, 194, 195.
ISSN
0006-4165 .
^
"Minority Owned Advertising Agencies Shut Out on Game Day" .
NBC News . February 2, 2015.
^
"Burrell and UniWorld Win Top Honors at ANA" . Rolling Out. November 11, 2010.
^ Wentz, Laurel (November 1, 2012).
"Ford, GM, Xoom, Rosetta Stone Win ANA Multicultural Ad Awards" .
Ad Age .
^
"ANA Announces 2017 Multicultural Excellence Award Grand Prize Winners" .
Ana.net . November 6, 2017.
^
"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.
^ Caslin, Yvette (April 29, 2013).
"Advertising maverick Byron Lewis inducted into the Advertising Hall of Fame" . Rollingout.com.
^ Dougherty, Philip H. (October 28, 1983).
"Uniworld and J.W.T. Tie for CEBA Awards" .
The New York Times .
^
"2010 Effie Winners" (PDF) . 2010. pp. 1, 9.
^ 2010 United States
Multicultural & Lifestyle Segments
^
"Effie Search - 1 - 5 of 5 results" . Retrieved 2024-01-18 .
External links
Divisions and subsidiaries Former/defunct divisions and subsidiaries People