History
Interpublic Group’s lineage goes back to the 1870s. Foote Cone and Belding, now part of Draftfcb, is one of the United States’ earliest advertising agencies. Alfred W. Erickson and Harrison K. McCann set up shops under their names in 1902 and 1911, respectively. Lintas, founded in 1929 as the in-house advertising agency for Lever Brothers, is now part of Lowe and Partners Worldwide.
Interpublic Group was incorporated in Delaware in September 1930 under the name of McCann Erickson. The company has operated under the Interpublic name since January 1961 when it became the world’s first marketing services management holding company, with McCann-Erickson and McCann-Marschalk as its two subsidiaries. The company went public in 1971. It goes by ticker ‘IPG’ on the New York Stock Exchange.
In the mid-2000s, McCann-Erickson, the oldest and largest of Interpublic Group’s subsidiaries became embroiled in an accounting scandal. This scandal uncovered over US$600 million of inflated income from 1997 to 2004; moreover, it led to sanctions of US$12 million by the USA’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), shareholders’ lawsuit against the company, and a precipitous drop in the price per share of stock from $55.54 on December 1, 1999 to $9.65 on December 1, 2005. Following these events, a new management team was brought in by the Board of Directors in 2004-2005, and since that time, management has worked to turn the company around. In 2007, Interpublic founded its own media holding company under the name of IPG Mediabrands to manage all of its global media-related assets (US$34 billions in media billing in 2011.)
The advertising industry was severely affected by the global economic downturn in 2009, and the sector saw a decline of 7.5% over the course of the year. Interpublic revenue dropped from US$6.9 billion in 2008 to US$6 billion in 2009.
In 2010, the company began to demonstrate growth again, and revenues increased US$6.5 billion for of the year. In February 2011, the company initiated a quarterly stock dividend program - its first in nine years.
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“Universal history is the history of a few metaphors.”
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