Early in his career, Thomas J. Burrell set out to create an advertising firm that exploded myths about black culture, buying power, and brainpower. Now, after helping to redefine the industry and garnering clients like Bacardi, Verizon, Sears, McDonald’s, Toyota, and Nationwide Insurance during his 43 years in the industry, Burrell will step down from his post as chairman and CEO of his Chicago-based firm.
A veritable trinity in black advertising, Fay H. Ferguson, McGhee Williams, and Steve Conner will be Burrell’s new managing partners. They will get an even share of the 51% majority ownership the firm retained after forming a strategic partnership in 1999 with French global advertising and communications agency network Publicis Groupe, which will retain its 49% minority equity stake.
The agency, which was launched with three employees in 1971 and has grown to 130 today, was among the first to bring the message that “black people are not dark-skinned white people” to the ad world. Burrell will stay on at the firm as chairman emeritus while executing his carefully calculated succession plan. “It’s time to give these younger minds with fresh ideas and passion the opportunity to do what I’ve groomed them to do — guide this firm into the next era,” he says. That era is predicated on Yurban marketing, a concept formulated by Burrell (No. 3 on the BE ADVERTISING AGENCIES list with $190 million in billings) to create marketing messages for the youth-oriented, urban market that defines every new trend from speech to music to fashion to food.
The Burrell leadership shift will be “the first time one of the older African American-owned agencies goes through a period of planned transition in its management,” according to Ken Smikle, publisher of Target Market News. “It says we’ve reached a certain point in that era, and it says a lot about the maturity of these agencies as businesses. But Tom’s legacy as one of the great pioneers in the advertising industry is assured.”
Burrell will be remembered for creating the African American advertising space and developing hundreds of Burrell alumni over the years
who are now bringing the concepts learned in the halls of Burrell to the marketplace, many of them by launching competing firms. Many others are working in corporate marketing, “not just dealing with African American-specific assignments but more general-market assignments as well,” Burrell points out.Conner, one of those whom Burrell encouraged to start his own firm, the Steve Agency in New York City, will now lead the creative team at Burrell. The 20-year industry veteran is most well known for the award-winning Budweiser Whassup! campaign that rocked airwaves throughout 2000 by capitalizing on an intonation given to a common phrase in urban slang. He accepted the partnership at Burrell after recognizing a unique opportunity to “help make Burrell’s reach as far and wide as the black diaspora.” Conner and his partners Ferguson and Williams, who have helped shape the agency’s culture and point of view, express passionately their commitment both to Burrell and to maintaining their focus on African American advertising.
Ferguson, a former school teacher who came to Burrell in 1984 after stints at Bozell & Jacobs Inc. and Leo Burnett, will continue to handle account management as well as the agency’s accounting, information technology, human resources, and administration functions. She considers African American youth to be the new leaders: “African Americans tend to lead in all of the areas that young adults are into today, and they should be shaping images.” Conner agrees, adding, “Our culture is always giving birth to innovations from the street up, and we export that culture internationally.” All say they feel an awesome responsibility as purveyors of African American culture to the mass media and want to keep Burrell on the front lines of shaping how messages about African Americans are conveyed. But, while they will continue to build on what they know best — the African American consumer — they want to move Burrell into new areas like proprietary research that will capitalize on its brain trust.
“We want people to come to us for our smarts,” declares Williams, who came to Burrell in 1986 after a series of positions on
the corporate side of the business and who will continue to oversee research, account planning, media, engagement marketing, and the agency’s Atlanta office. “Late this summer,” she says, “we will release the Moms Report, our first huge proprietary research initiative that provides extensive consumer data on African American mothers.” Williams says the agency wants to be at the forefront of research that shows that the African American culture is not a monolith but one of various subcultures with different ideas, needs, and desires that translate into marketplace behavior. “What lies ahead for us is incredible opportunity for every single person that is here at Burrell, and we want no limitations.”Smikle, who expects a smooth transition for the firm, says we’re in a different creative era than even 10 years ago and the new leadership will try to “set a tone for the next stage in Burrell’s development.” Says Conner, “When the change hits, it’s going to be amazing. Just keep watching us because the future of African American advertising is here.”