Baltimore-based creative agency TBC announced three major milestones: the agency’s 50th anniversary, the transition of agency ownership to its CEO, Nichole Baccala Ward and the retirement of co-founder Allan Charles. Ward is the first sole owner of the agency in its 50-year history.
Although her sole ownership is new, TBC’s CEO has been with the company for more than two decades and became the agency’s president in 2014. Ward has led marketing efforts for numerous brands over the years, including Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal, Haribo USA and Pearson Education and stewarded TBC’s recent appointment as the American Diabetes Association’s first agency of record in the organization’s 80-year history.
“We’re taking advantage of our spirit of creativity, curiosity and resilience as we move forward,” Ward said. “We know that TBC’s future holds even greater promise built on a foundation of 50 years of excellence. Together, we’ll continue to deliver integrated solutions and inspire success for clients of all sizes.”
Founded in 1974 by Ed Trahan, Tom Burden and Allan Charles, TBC opened as Baltimore’s first advertising agency founded solely by creative professionals. Doubling down on the bet to be a successful creative-focused business, Charles also opened an affiliate, in-house TV and broadcast production company, Charles Street Films, to further strengthen TBC’s reputation for creativity with a focus on superior capability in film and video. It put TBC on the map as one of the first agencies in the United States to have an in-house production studio that shot and produced its own commercials and videos.
The agency began working with major media players such as Westinghouse Broadcasting Company and the Baltimore News-American, and quickly started earning national recognition with work for the national clothing retail chain Merry-Go-Round and the Holocaust Memorial Fund. In the early 1980s, TBC became the first agency to make a multi-year, multi-million-dollar deal with MTV.
Other major clients over the years have included the Maryland Lottery, Miller Brewing Company, the National Aquarium, Harrah’s Casinos, the Baltimore Orioles, the Baltimore Ravens, McDonald’s, CVS Pharmacy, Visit Baltimore, The Baltimore Banner, Smart Balance, the NAACP, MinuteClinic, Micron, KT Tape, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, University of Maryland Global Campus and University of Maryland Eastern Shore. TBC was also one of the first agencies to work with the Ronald McDonald House.
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