Press Releases

National Action Network’s National Executive Director Tamika D. Mallory To Join Olympic Gold Medalist Cullen Jones & Others In A Special Interactive One Conversation About African-Americans And Urban Consumers

Thursday, August 23, 2012 (New York, NY)–National Action Network’s National Executive Director Tamika D. Mallory is among a stellar list of panelists participating in a shared dialogue about African-Americans & urban culture in Chicago, Illinois, today as part of a special Interactive One “Digitas  X Culture” event.

Participants include Cullen Jones, Olympic Gold Medalist for USA Swimming, Issa Rae, creator/producer of the “Awkward Black Girl” YouTube smash, and Sadiq Bello, legendary digital strategist. The panel is being moderated by Smokey Fontaine, Chief Content Officer, Interactive One

Some of the issues that will be addressed includes what it means to be “authentic” to an African-American audience and why it is important. and why African-Americans have enormous purchasing power but are not fairly represented in ad dollar distribution and positions of management.

National Action Network has focused on fairness in the advertising industry for decades. In fact, Rev. Al Sharpton led his first national picket of A&P stores when he was 14-years-old because they were not employing or spending resources on blacks.

Today, NAN fights to make sure that the ad industry values the consumers that have the most buying power. Despite the fact that the buying power of African-Americans is expected to reach $1.1 trillion by 2015, according to The State of the African-American Consumer Report, NAN’s hope is that there are benefits proportionate to our buying power.

NAN launched The Madison Avenue Initiative or “MAI” in 1999–a program designed to address the inequities in the advertising industry.  NAN looks into the spending practices of corporations, specifically examining whether their advertising budgets with African-American and Latino publications and advertising agencies is commensurate with their consumer bases. MAI has successfully pushed for corporations to make advertising purchases that approach the level of minority consumer patronage of their products in specific markets.