THE MARKET
For millions of people around the world, the familiar yellow-and-black signs of Western Union stand
as a symbol of trust. Building on the invention of
the telegraph, the company
transformed the way people
send messages and provided a
way to send money. Today,
Western Union enables consumers to prepay for a variety
of services and to send money
and bill payments.
With approximately 200
million people living outside their country of
birth, the Western Union Money Transfer® service
proves vital. Millions of people around the world
rely on Western Union to transfer their money to
help family members in need, share the joy of a
special occasion, or manage monthly expenses.
Headquartered in Englewood, Colorado, the
company is a worldwide organization with a presence in more than 200 countries and territories.
Together with its subsidiaries, the company’s network includes more than 312,000 Agent locations.
As more individuals search for broader economic opportunities and travel internationally,
Western Union continues to play a vital role in
helping keep people connected with family
and friends — whether around the corner or
around the world.
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ACHIEVEMENTS
Western Union pioneered many “firsts,” paving
the way for later global advances in numerous
industries. In 1861, Western Union completed the
first transcontinental telegraph line. Ten years later it
launched a rapid money transfer system that allowed funds
to be sent and paid out at the
many Western Union offices
in the United States. The company offered one of the industry’s first charge cards for
consumers and introduced teleprinters in 1923 to
speed message delivery. Singing telegrams, intercity faxes, and commercial intercity microwave
communications soon followed. In 1974, Western
Union launched Westar I, the first U.S.-commercial
communications satellite and became the first company with five satellites in orbit.
THE PRODUCT
Since 1871, people have counted on Western
Union to get their money where it needs to go —
quickly, conveniently, and reliably. Consumers
and businesses can transfer funds and send payments using Western Union® services.
The Western Union Money Transfer service
is available at hundreds of thousands of Agent
locations worldwide, online in twelve countries at
westernunion.com, and in the United
States via telephone at 1-800-CALLCASH®. With this money transfer
service, consumers can send money
in minutes to loved ones virtually
anywhere in the world.
Western Union Payment Services offers several easy payment
options that millions of consumers
use to send payments for their mortgages, auto loans, utilities, and
more. The company also provides
services to send cash payments for
airline tickets, TV infomercial products, catalog purchases, and child
support payments.
Prepaid Services continues to be
a growing area for Western Union.
Consumers can go to any participating Western Union Agent location and
purchase a prepaid long-distance phone
card, recharge their wireless phone
minutes, or prepay for local phone
service. They can also purchase a
Western Union® Prepaid MasterCard®
at participating Western Union Agent
locations, and use it at millions of retail locations
where MasterCard debit cards are accepted.
HISTORY
In 1851, a group of New York businessmen
started the New York & Mississippi Valley
Printing Telegraph Company. In 1856, following
the acquisition of a series of other telegraph
systems, the company changed its name to the
Western Union Telegraph Company, symbolizing
the “union” of eastern and western telegraph lines
into one system.
In the 1870s, Western Union entered the
international telegraph business, providing service to Canada and Mexico. Following the Civil
War, westward expansion created a need to move
capital, leading Western Union to introduce the
first money transfer service in 1871. In 1873,
Western Union purchased a majority of shares in
the International Ocean Telegraph Company,
marking entry into the foreign telegraph market.
Western Union became known in 1877 as
“The Nation’s Timekeeper,” when it first introduced its Time Service — sending out electronic
impulses that regulated clocks in government
buildings, schools, and banks, ensuring that they
always displayed the correct time. Eventually,
over 100,000 subscriber clocks would be in service. In 1884, Western Union became one of the
original stocks listed on the Dow Average.
RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
In 2006, Western Union completed its transformation from a communications company to a
provider of financial services when
it discontinued its historic telegram
service. In October, the company
spun-off from First Data Corporation, again becoming an independently owned and operated entity.
Western Union continually strives
to offer new and different services
that respond to the needs of consumers and businesses. A recent
example includes the Mobile Money Transfer
service. This new offering capitalizes on the growing reliance of mobile communications, but goes
one step further to use a cell phone to send cash.
While this segment of the market differs from
who Western Union traditionally serves, Mobile
Money Transfer is a natural extension of the
brand’s consumer base and well positions Western
Union to gain new customers as a result. The
company has already built a prototype and proven
this technology on its network.
Another area on which the company is focusing is using The Western Union International
Bank to enter the micro-lending space, which
involves loaning or advancing money to consumers. Because of intimate consumer knowledge
and the millions of cross-border transactions that
the company conducts daily, Western Union has
a unique approach: in a country where it would
be expensive to borrow money, Western Union is
exploring opportunities to make loans at a more
competitive rate.
Many of these recent achievements have occurred under the direction of Western Union President and
CEO Christina Gold. With her executive guidance, the company has now
reached an operational performance
of $4 billion from an employee base
of nearly 5,000 employees in 44
countries. BusinessWeek named Gold
one of the top 25 U.S. managers in 1996, and she
was recognized in 2003 and 2006 by Fortune magazine as one of America’s 50 Most Powerful
Women in Business.
PROMOTION
Western Union consumers don’t just transfer
money; they send love, help, solutions, a future,
or medical care. Speed, reliability, convenience,
and trust — Western Union continually reinforces
and builds on these brand attributes, ensuring that
everything Western Unions offers supports these
messages to consumers through point-of-sale
pieces, signage, advertising, and media relations.
“It’s important that regardless of how or
where in the world someone comes in contact
with Western Union, they’ll
receive the same consistent message about the company,” said
Donna Rossi, director of global
branding for Western Union.
“Our focus remains on delivering value and service, responding to the needs of global
consumers today while anticipating the needs of tomorrow.”
BRAND VALUES
Entrusted to further global
brand values by contributing to
the improvement of health, education, and human services for
those most in need, The Western Union Foundation has become an important ambassador for
Western Union around the world. Through the
generous contributions of Western Union, its
many business segments, employees, suppliers,
and Western Union Agents worldwide, the
Foundation fulfills its mission with compassion
— one community and one person at a time.
Much of Western Union’s history has been set forth in
various historical documents as well as through oral renditions by long-tenured employees; the facts as represented
here are accurate to the best of the company’s knowledge.
THINGS YOU DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT
WESTERN UNION
❍ Orville Wright used a Western Union
Telegram message to announce to his father
that he and his brother Wilbur achieved the
first successful controlled, powered and
sustained flight.
❍ Western Union exploration of a western
route to connect North America with Europe
via telegraph sparked discussions that led
to the U.S. purchase of Russian territory
that today is the state of Alaska.
❍ Norman Rockwell was one of the artists
who created artwork for Western Union
holiday telegrams.
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