History of Advertising in Nicaragua

Organized Advertising in Nicaragua began in 1944 with the Creation of the Advertising Agency “PALO” by
the poet Joaquín Pasos and the controversial caricaturist Toño López.

The press medium at that time was the most developed medium and had great significance due to the
political vicissitudes of the time. Radio was transmitted on shortwave, and we can classify it as incipient,
television did not exist in Nicaragua and was just being introduced in the developed world of the time. The
Second World War froze some television experiences in Germany and the United States.

So with a Press that had been developing since the appearance of Journalism with the Newspaper “El
Nicaragüense”, it is logical to assume that a writer like Joaquín Pasos and a cartoonist like Toño López
were the first to organize an Advertising Agency.

Old beer advertisement

The Bohemian atmosphere of the 1940s in that provincial Managua was not fertile ground for
PALO, our first Advertising Agency, to come to fruition and the partnership barely lasted a year.
But Toño López insisted and founded the second Advertising Agency and called it “LAPIZ”, the
most powerful weapon that Toño wielded, in his fight for daily life.

The “LAPIZ” Advertising Agency also lasted a very short time and although Toño did not officially work in
an advertising agency again, he continued his career as a caricaturist and advertising artist who is now
called Free-Lancer. He returned to Nicaragua after a long exile and the last time I had the honor of seeing
him was during the celebration of the 30 years of ONAP (Nicaraguan Organization of Advertising
Agencies). Today Toño López rests in peace.

In 1948, the “Krumo” Advertising Agency was founded, a name formed by the first two syllables of its
founders, Mr. Erwing Kruquer, a Nicaraguan musician and composer, and Mr. Don. Manuel David
Morales.
The composition of the media had already changed, although there were still shortwave radio stations in
Managua and some important cities that monopolized the Nicaraguan audience.

This does not mean that newspapers had gone into the background, but there were already two important
media outlets in the country. The newspaper and the Radio.

We said at the beginning that Advertising in Nicaragua has developed alongside the media and this is
why when Radio emerged, the founders of “Krumo” were a Radio director and a musician and Composer.
Between the two of them they prepared the musical advertisements that began at the time and were
broadcast on the radio.

A conceptual analysis indicates that advertising pursued brand establishment without market strategies.

In this regard I will give some examples:

The following text is attributed to former President of the Republic Dr. René Shick Gutiérrez before
starting his political career. LOC: Blue in English is blue; Bell in English is bell; Whiskey the pagan song;
Blue Bell the Blue Bell Whiskey. The Campana Azul Whiskey was a product of the Licores Bell SA
factory.

Another advertisement of the time was: Pure water breeds frogs. Take it with Rica Nica. As you can infer,
basically Advertising did not communicate anything, it only established a brand.

old advertising
Let me tell you here a Tasting Strategy that the owners of Krumo Agency, Don Erwing Kruger
and Don, came up with. Manuel David Morales, by taking over the Licores Bell advertising
account and advertising Cañita Aguardiente. They decided to have their birthdays, both, on
alternate weekends and invite different groups of friends to the party. The liquor and expenses
were provided by Licores Bell, many drinkers tasted the product and Bim Morales and Erwing
Kruger each turned 26 years old, during that year of 52 years.
With the economic crisis of 1949, the Romantic stage of Advertising in Nicaragua ended. Logically,
advertising businesses suffered a decline since commercial warehouses had to lay off 45% of their
workers and the tremendous drop in salaries had an impact on the industries. TOBACCO, liquor, beer,
matches and sugar.

At the beginning of the 1950s, the Nicaraguan economy entered a period of clear recovery with respect to
the long phase of stagnation in which it had been mired since the 1930s. Cotton ultimately consolidated
Nicaragua's agro-export character.

The accumulation of substantial surpluses facilitated the formation of the private financial system, the
consolidation of the State and its economic activities influenced the development of industrial and
commercial activities and promoted the growth of the main cities of the Pacific.

TAKEOFF STAGE

47 years ago the first Survey began

In this state of affairs, the second Stage of the Development of Advertising in Nicaragua begins, which we
will call STAGE OF ADVERTISING TAKEOFF, which spans from 1950 to 1962.

The old Krumo advertising that was founded in the last stage has become Publicidad Morales whose sole
owner was Don. Manuel David Morales.

Don Vim comes into contact with McAnn Erickson at an International Advertising Agency and
globalization, so fashionable today, began in Nicaraguan advertising 47 years ago. The Surveys, so
criticized by the media that turn out badly and so praised by the media that turn out well, were started by
Don Vim Morales at that time with the technique and Now How by MC.Cann Erickson.

We begin to hear and read the great Campaigns of the World Giants Procter and Gamble and Colgate
Palmolive.

The International Advertising Agencies used Cuba as a Pilot plan to test the campaigns that they would
later spread throughout Latin America. And we were not exempt.
I remember the titanic struggle at that time between Procter and Colgate introducing Palmolive Soap
respectively.

Palmolive Soap launched an Advertising campaign whose basic promise was “Fourteen days of
Treatment with Palmolive is enough to beautify any complexion to which the Great Cuban Advertiser
Ovelleiro Carbajal responded with an advertisement singing that said “Camay beautifies from the first pill.
Ovelleiro Carbajal, in addition to being a publicist for Procter, wrote the famous Radionovela Tamacun the
Wandering Avenger.

A Granadino Don Raúl Quadra Chamberlain owned a musical group called “Shampoo de Cariño” and at
the same time he printed a songbook that was so fashionable at that time. These two activities gave life to
another of the great Nicaraguan Advertising Agencies “Publicidad Cuadra Chamberlain” whose symbol
He is still a rooster and his slogan is always ready.

The economic flourishing gave rise to the founding of other advertising agencies such as Publicidad Life,
Publicidad Roca de Don Rodolfo Cardenal, which later became, with other partners, Publicidad
Centroamericana, directed by the remembered publicist Don Carlos Cuadra Cardenal, the name that the
Agency carries today. They are directed by their children Olga Cuadra de Saravia and Carlos Cuadra.

Wilmor Advertising by Wilian Morales and Pedro Rafael Gutiérrez, Art-Technical Advertising by the
Architect. Samuel Barreto, Miller Advertising and many advertising agencies that were managed by a
single person.

During this stage, an event of great importance to the media and Advertising in Nicaragua occurred. The
Radio that during the 1940s transmitted on short wave, today called international wave, began its
transmission on medium wave. The first radio station that transmitted on medium wave was a world radio
station owned by Don Manuel Arana Valle and possibly the only radio station that has made history in our
country. With Radio Mundial, the famous radio soap operas reached their peak, which at the time had
equal or greater acceptance than current soap operas.

Although most of the scripts were foreign, all the actors were Nicaraguan and the Radionovelas were
recorded in Nicaragua. In the area of radio news, some stations had small experiences, but it was in
Radio Mundial where Radionoticieros such as Radio Noticias, La Verdad and Radio Informaciones were
established, today called the Dean for having completed forty years of broadcasting, and the Radio Extra
Newscast that generated the current TV news programs Extravisión and Nicavisión.

First Television Channel

In 1954, the first television channel was founded, directed by Don Luis Felipe Hidalgo and whose owner
was Somoza García. This Channel first transmitted on the channel 8 frequency and then on Channel 6m,
considered one of the important events in the history of advertising and the country.

Advertising at the time went from “shorts to long pants”, the image and likeness of the Mexican and
Cuban Advertising Agencies were organized. The Advertising Departments had an Art, Radio,
Administrative, Media and Account Executive department. The Account Executives and the Heads of the
Radio Department were the Creatives of the Agencies. Those were times when very few businessmen
believed in Advertising, much less in marketing and Market Research.

They were practically doing the Advertiser a favor by entrusting him with their advertising account.
Conceptually, advertising improved significantly compared to the Romantic Stage, some market
objectives were pursued and it was more efficient, so efficient that it influenced the speech of the
Nicaraguan. Readers and listeners adopted many slogans for products that have already disappeared
from the market.

All the products from the house of Laman and Kemp ended with a slogan that said Legitimate from
Laman and Kemp and Nicaraguan speech adopted this slogan to demonstrate an assertion.

Example “What I am telling you is the legitimate opinion of Laman and Kemp.”

Another example that illustrates this is the following.

At that time, some pink pills from Dr. Ross were sold that were very small but very efficient for digestion –
the slogan was “Small but compliant” our speech adopted the phrase to refer to a short and very pretty
woman.

The advertisements sung on the Radio were predominantly with trios and the most famous composers of
“Ingles” were precisely the members of trios.

Nicaraguans with a specialty in National music.

In the Press medium, they work with clichés and matrices and all the newspapers printed on a flatbed
press. There was a great development in Advertising for points of sale and Lithographic companies stood
out that, without forgetting the traditional printing press, made great advances in Color Separations with
Photomechanics based on Film developed with acid and transferred to printing plates.

The Pérez Photogravures stand out. The San José Publishing House of Don Julio Hernández in
Managua and the Hospicio Publishing House in León, which is run by the Christian Brothers of La Salle.

In cinema we worked with slides made by hand and protected with glass so that the beam of light from
the Reflector would burn us. On Television they were advertised with smaller slides and in Black and
White. But Television at the time was a tertiary medium surpassed by Radio and Newspapers. Television
was in the waiting circle until its turn came.

IN 1964 ONAP WAS FOUNDED

Bonifacio López Executive Director ONAP

In October 1964, the Nicaraguan Organization of Advertising Agencies (ONAP) was founded
and to defend themselves from MC Cann Erickson, a group of Central American publicists founded a very
short-lived organization called APCU. Only Guatemala persisted and is called throughout Central America
APCU – JM THOMPSON.

Television, although in black and white, published products made in 16-millimeter film and cinemas
throughout the country showed 35-millimeter color commercials.

It was a stage of Technicalization, the famous surveys increased with the Coincidental Technique, we
calculated the advertising impacts to which a person was exposed during the day and part of the night,
we sent competition reports, invested more or less advertising and in which media. Contact Reports so
hated by account executives proliferated and in campaign presentations he began to talk about Basic
Promises, Auxiliary Promises, Story Line, Story Board and a series of Anglicisms that denoted modernism
and fashion.

Market Research was the order of the day, it was tabulated on huge IBM computers with punched cards
or with the manual system called Royal Mc Bec. It was the time of travel, there was no fax, mail was late
and insecure and plane tickets, hotels and travel expenses were very cheap. We constantly received
Advertisers to supervise their campaigns or we traveled for training and reporting.

New Agencies emerge, others are consolidated and many disappear. Publicidad and Itsmo Publicidad
Pep are founded, MC Cann Erickson, Aspi, Publicentro, APCU and other Central American Agencies are
installed.

Some European agencies such as Kenion and EKAR – CPV, which at that time managed the accounts of
Shell, Colgate Palmolive and Shulton, came looking for correspondents.

We began to talk about Split Commission which consisted and consists of distributing the Commission in
distributing the Commission that the local Agency receives from the Media with the International
Agencies. At the end of the sixties, Nicaraguan Advertising was recognized at the Central American level,
the International Creatives were contrasted with the National Creatives, the Creative Department began in
the Agencies and the Comprehensive Publicist moved on to the Specialized Publicist.

The Account Executive was only contact with the client, the Creative did only Creativity, the Art Director
and graphics only did Art and the Media Directors only made Media plans, monitored, made competition
reports and maintained relationships with the Media.

The billings of the time in dollars were double the current billings of Advertising Agencies. Advertisers'
salaries were comparable to the best salaries in other professions.

Many Business Administrators joined the ranks of Advertising Agencies and with their knowledge and
Techniques they dignified our profession.

In 1970 ONAP organized the first Congress of Central American Advertisers and it is here in Nicaragua
where the Central American Federation of Advertising Agencies (FECAP) was founded. An organization
that contributed to the approach and improvement of Advertising in Central America – today FECAP
practically fulfilled its committed and having no work content it had to disappear.

On December 22, 1972, the great tragedy of the Managua Earthquake occurred. When the capital falls,
businesses, industries, distributors, media and Advertising Agencies practically disappear.

Fifteen days later, in January 1973, small signs began to be read in the streets that said “We Are Already
Operating” “We Are Open” and commercial and industrial activity restarted, we had to produce, we had to
sell, therefore we had to advertise. .

The Advertising Agencies are grouped together and in the first months, as the situation improves, the
Agency workers are rehired, some do not return and found their own Agencies. GAP, Cerebro, Moderna
Noble y Asociados are born, Istmo Pepcon is associated with Publisa Advertising Creativity is born and
little by little Managua and Nicaragua are reborn and Nicaraguan Advertising reaches the biggest BOOM
in its history. At the Central American level, FECAP is at its peak and Nicaragua is holding another
congress of Central American Advertisers.

On January 1, 1974, Nicaraguan Television Channel 6 and Channel 2 began their color transmissions. It
was a radical change in the history of Advertising in Nicaragua. From that date on, you would be able to
see the products as they are, the colors of food, beverages, fabrics, vehicles and appliances.
The change is gradual, although it is true that the transmission is in color, the receiving devices will
continue to be in black and white, but little by little color receivers are appearing in Nicaraguan homes
until reaching this date with 80% of Color television and 20% still black and white.

With the arrival of color to Nicaraguan Television came portable Video Tape and those huge black and
white Video Tape players moved on to small portable cameras and recorders that facilitated the
production of Commercials at low cost and the birth of the Extravisión and Teleprensa Newscasts. .

Conceptually, Nicaraguan advertising improved to such a point that it was the subject of International
awards and for the only time ONAP organized an advertising contest called “the Golden Atabal.”

Starting in 1978, as a result of the political situation, the economy began to decline and so did
advertising.

Strikes, unemployment, political activity and lack of production force the devaluation of the córdoba with
respect to the dollar, from 7 córdobas to one dollar it goes to 10 córdobas to one dollar. This situation and
the war mark the end of the stage that we have called The Advertising Mercomún.