BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – African Americans have found a place on Pennsylvania Avenue. But they are still fighting for much-deserved spots on Madison Avenue. At a time when 85 percent of the nation’s population growth over the last decade has been minority, (according to the 2010 census estimates), black and Hispanic representation in the advertising industry is still inexplicably miniscule, particularly within the management ranks.
That’s why Tiffany Warren is a woman whose time has come. Warren, founder of ADCOLOR and The ADCOLOR Awards & Industry Conference and senior vice president, chief diversity officer for Omnicom Group Inc., is working to reverse that trend and make African American and other minority faces, in front of and behind the camera, a more normal occurrence. Through these powerful vehicles, AdColor is able cast a powerful spotlight on the accomplishments and innovative breakthroughs of scores of people of color in the advertising, marketing and media industries.
In a nutshell, the Adcolor Industry Coalition promotes this singular, but powerful theme — diversity in advertising fights prejudice and discrimination and attracts new consumers.
Warren and the AIC will celebrate the fifth annual AdColor Awards at the Beverly Hilton hotel on glitzy Wilshire Blvd. in Beverly Hills. It is hoped by all within the AdColor Industry Coalition that this kind of programming becomes heavily contagious. Some analysts and critics say the industry still mostly resembles pre-Civil Rights Mississippi. In fact, radio personality Sanford Moore went so far as to refer to the industry’s hiring and promotion practices a couple of years ago as “the cotton curtain of discrimination” as perpetuated by “the men in the gray flannel suits,” he said. “It is time for the last corporate bastion of Jim Crow to fall.”
Warren doesn’t just want to make it fall, she wants any barriers to break into a thousand pieces.
“We have two very distinct goals through ADCOLOR: to celebrate the achievements of talented communications professionals who are making a mark in business and giving back to their communities, and to redefine diversity,” said Warren. “For us, diversity is truly about bringing together people with a variety of experiences, backgrounds and points of view, regardless of any ethnic or cultural background. We are looking forward to receiving nominations for ADCOLOR honorees who are bringing their distinct experiences to bear in their work and in their communities.”
The dynamic Renetta McCann, the former CEO of Starcom MediaVest, one of the largest U.S. media companies, once told rolling out that the greatest obstacles to minority hiring and advancement were a conspicuous lack of mentors and role models, lack of informal networks and a lack of visibility on successful projects.
These are the very issues that Warren’s AdColor Awards and Industry Conference address on a variety of fronts. From its very first year in Boca Raton, Fla., when they honored NBA legend-turned-business-mogul Magic Johnson and then paid homage to hip-hop icon Russell Simmons the next year, Warren has been able to consistently spotlight celebrities and industry reps who achieve in their fields and help alter the complexion of their workforce, all while paving the way for others to follow in their footsteps.
For those who came to the fourth annual AdColor Awards last year in South Beach, you would have thought it would have been hard to top the festivities that took place at the utterly breathtaking Fountainblue Resort overlooking the Atlantic Ocean in Miami Beach, Fla., and where Warren honored Grammy-winner and Oscar-nominated Queen Latifah and Hispanic media pioneer Cristina Saralegul. Even NBA champion Dwayne Wade of the Miami Heat made a brief appearance.
But for the momentous fifth year, Warren and the AIC may have topped themselves, hosting the two-day conference and awards program at the Beverly Hilton hotel where Hollywood comes every year to celebrate the Golden Globes. This year, they are paying the highest respects to the likes of Bill Cosby, Spike Lee and George Lopez at the fifth annual AdColor Awards.
With all the star power being generated at these awards shows, and for all of the awards being given to many of the ad industry’s best, Warren says it is all for one purpose: to generate change.
“AdColor is what the industry should be like,” Warren says. “The face of America is changing, and we want the ad world to change with it.” –terry shropshire
