Pearl & Dean

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Pearl & Dean is primarily known as a British cinema advertising company. It was founded in 1953 by brothers Ernie and Charles Pearl, and Bob Dean. It is currently owned by SMG plc (which also owns STV).

[edit] Brief corporate history

Pearl & Dean was formed in 1953 by Ernie and Charles Pearl and Jack Dean to sell advertising on British cinema screens prior to the showing of the main feature. The short adverts with which British cinema audiences quickly became familiar, were the idea of Joe Morris (born Joseph Iglitsky) one of Pearl & Dean's in-house advertising executives.

In 1966 Pearl & Dean formed a subsidiary company called Radiovision Broadcast International (RBI) to represent the marketing interests of the American Broadcasting Company radio and television stations in Europe, and during that same year the company signed an exclusive contract to represent the sale of advertising time on the offshore pirate radio stations Swinging Radio England and Britain Radio. This contract with the offshore stations became mired in controversy due to lack of sales and it led to the headline making bankruptcy of the original London management company for the two offshore radio stations that had been created by a private investment group formed by Don Pierson of Eastland, Texas.

Pearl & Dean is now a subsidiary of SMG, the company which also owns stv and Virgin Radio.

In September 2006, SMG plc announced its decision to dispose of Pearl & Dean. [1]

[edit] Trivia

Pearl & Dean is well known for its distinctive theme tune entitled Asteroid, composed by Pete Moore which, according to the company, has become as instantly recognisable as Big Ben's chimes [2]. It was sampled by Goldbug in their 1996 cover version of "Whole Lotta Love", which peaked at number 3 in the UK Singles Chart. This tune can be heard on their website, below.