By BROOKLYN BROWN
One Feather Reporter
CHEROKEE, N.C. – In December 2023, Kituwah, LLC officially launched their advertising company, AllTribe Advertising which is a Cherokee-based all-inclusive advertising agency with a leadership team comprised of Chris McCoy, Matt Levin, and Luke Swimmer.
McCoy, a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (EBCI), is the president of marketing and brand development for Kituwah, LLC. He is also head of brand development and media for AllTribe, a daughter company of Kituwah, LLC. “I have about 15 years of experience professionally working in media, marketing, and business development. I, myself, have businesses, so my intent in forming AllTribe was to bring that expertise and bring the right people to the table who can make AllTribe something positive for our tribe and hopefully other tribes as we expand down the road.”
In December 2023, Kituwah, LLC officially launched their advertising company, AllTribe Advertising which is a Cherokee-based all-inclusive advertising agency with a leadership team comprised of Luke Swimmer, Chris McCoy, and Matt Levin. (BROOKLYN BROWN/One Feather photo)
Levin is the creative director of AllTribe and a business partner of the EBCI for nearly two decades. “I have 25 years of experience in the advertising, branding, the marketing world, and about 16 years of those have been with the EBCI. I’ve worked at two different ad agencies serving the Tribe, the last being Element Advertising, which I was a partner and owner of. We worked with Chris McCoy and the Eastern Band for 10 years, and we did some great work together.”
“Chris and I loved working together. We thought we should start our own company to keep all the revenue in-house in Cherokee. So, I left Element and started AllTribe with Chris and Luke. We’ve been getting clients already, some in Asheville, some in Cherokee. We really want to start in Cherokee and build out because we hope to prioritize business in Cherokee over everybody else. We also want to expand to other tribes, and we are hoping to grow the company with mostly Eastern Band employees so that we can mentor people and grow it as a mainly Cherokee staffed firm.”
Swimmer, a member of the EBCI and local Cherokee artist, is the art director for AllTribe and a designer for Kituwah, LLC.
“I’ve spent most of my time working with the tribe as a contract worker doing branding and logo design. My wife and I also own Buffalo Town Clothing. We’re always talking about giving back to our community and what better way to do that than doing what we’re doing here,” Swimmer said. “We can start out locally and then grow that out to something much larger than what I can do as a small business owner.”
McCoy says the formation of AllTribe stemmed from a need for in-house advertising for the EBCI. “Kituwah, LLC is the economic development entity created by the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians to diversify the revenue streams of the tribe. Subsequently, Kituwah LLC will form companies underneath it that will perform certain functions in certain areas of industry. We formed AllTribe Advertising as we saw a need in the market for our own advertising companies. We’re excited to be bringing that to the stage for the tribe and for the people.”
McCoy wants to assure the community that AllTribe will contribute positively to the economy of the EBCI, “Kituwah, LLC is an entity that’s wholly owned by the EBCI. AllTribe Advertising is a company formed under Kituwah, LLC. Revenue spent with Kituwah and AllTribe and any of our companies are reinvested within our community, including the profits that are generated,” he said. “They contribute to dividends that we give to the EBCI through revenue allocation plans. For right now, the revenue allocation plan is very similar to gaming, and so 50 percent will go to the general fund and the other 50 percent of our profits go to GenWell, or ‘percap,’ as people may know it.”
AllTribe hopes to center their efforts on the Qualla Boundary and expand from there. “We want to assist our cultural partners, our tribe, our entities like the Cherokee Indian Hospital, the Cherokee Boys Club, Cherokee Central Schools, or anybody that has a product to sell or a reason to bring people to this community,” McCoy said. “If there’s a company in the community that needs a new logo, or an introductory website, even a complex website, or needs help with marketing or branding, we’d love to be there to offer that expertise.”
AllTribe believes their cultural understanding is what sets them apart from other advertising agencies. “One of the things we’re most proud of is our cultural uniqueness. We will put that in the forefront of what we’re doing and all the work that we present to the public. We want to integrate culture as much as we can, to build that pride in who we are, and to protect how we are represented to the world,” McCoy said. “One of our strengths as an agency here on the Boundary is that you can access us. We’re Cherokee, we’ve worked in Cherokee for many years, and we’re excited. We think that’s an invaluable piece of the puzzle that a lot of companies don’t really have access to.”
Swimmer values the connections that the leadership of AllTribe has with the Cherokee community. “We have that sensitivity to be able to approach Cherokee artists or families to collaborate and bring a collaborative effort to what we’re doing,” he said.
Levin, whose work can still be seen around the Qualla Boundary, believes the team’s combined years of expertise will elevate AllTribe, “We love what we do. I think that’s really important for people to know, and hopefully they will see that in our work. It’s win-win when we can enjoy the process and create something that really helps them out. And if that’s making them money, that’s great, because their success is our success,” he said.
The team is excited for the future of the new endeavor. “We’d like to be a full-service agency with a full-time staff who works on everything from media production to media buying, client services, public relations, graphic arts, and everything in between that an agency can offer,” McCoy said. “I can see us fully staffed with several big clients annually, getting the EBCI on the map and producing enough profit for the EBCI to make us a relevant competitor in the marketing world.”
Visit their website at AllTribe.com to learn more.
