A - List 4007 - Keni Thacker

Today we’re serving up Tom's conversation with Mr. Keni Thacker, the founder of 100rosesfromconcrete.com, a network for men of color in the advertising, marketing, media and public relations industries. Keni is also a creative consultant, accomplished writer, director, documentarian, motivational speaker and tech guru. He’s speaking at the three percent conference. He’s judging the Next Creative Leaders Awards at The One Club for Creativity. And he continues to be an advocate for diversity and inclusion in the advertising industry. When Tom first met Keni back in 2009 he was doing Event Technology at J. Walter Thompson. (He was the guy who would run all the technology in big client meetings and pitches.) Keni was in every big meeting. And he was watching. And learning. Keni tells us about growing up as an American in Kenya. That's where he got his first taste of advertising when his mother took him to a studio to record a jingle she wrote. A passion for music, technology and pop culture led Keni to a career in audio and visual, which got him inside Ogilvy New York and then JWT, where he would eventually help the agency found their Young Commodores Program, aimed at getting more young people of color into advertising. ---- The A-List is sponsored by Adhouse Advertising School. We are finishing up our summer classes and they’re going great. All of our teachers will be back in the fall. Tom Christmann. Paul Fix. George Tannenbaum, creative team Mike Rovner and Soren Youngren and young upstarts Matt Low and Mani Schlisser. You get 10 weeks of zoom classes for just $600. Classes start week of September 14 and the application is live at adhousenyc.com. Applications are accepted on a first-come-first-served basis, so apply today at adhousenyc.com. ---- Thank you to Ross Hopman at Duotone Audi Group for the music. Thanks to Duotone Audio Group for the music. Thanks to you all for listening. If you liked what you heard today, you can help us out by sharing this episode on social media, subscribing on soundcloud or rating us wherever you listen to podcasts. Have a great day and please wear a mask. Peace.