Tom Burrell was one of the first black men in advertising in the 1960’s. He first broke into the ad industry at Wade Advertising in Chicago, worked his way up to junior editor and then moved on to Leo Burnett and many more before founding Burrell Communications in 1971. His mantra was/(is), “black people are not dark-skinned white people.” His message was similar to Vince Cullers where agencies should be marketing to black Americans through their culture. He worked with massive companies,such as McDonalds and Coca-Cola to change their messaging to a more relevant one. In 2005 he was inducted into the American Advertising Federation’s Advertising Hall of Fame and the New York Festival’s Hall of fame more recently. He’s also the author of, “BRAINWASHED: Challenging the Myth of Black Inferiority about the power that messaging plays in attitudes toward race-related issues. He is a visionary and leads the movement to positively change media messaging about black culture. Cheers to you Tom!
