Bill Uglow, President

Bill Uglow is recognized by many as the top intellectual property and brand executive in the industry. While attending business school, he began his retail career with JC Penney Co. in 1967, alternating between full time and part time. After receiving his Bachelor of Science in Business and an MBA from Florida Atlantic University, he accepted a position with The Walt Disney Company in Orlando, Florida to open Walt Disney World. Barton K. Boyd (Bo), recently retired Chairman of Disney Consumer Products for The Walt Disney Company has said, "Bill is the top entertainment retail merchant in the world today."

Bill began with Disney in retail operations and was then promoted into the merchandising and product development department, which, in time, led Bill to the position of Merchandise Manager, Walt Disney World. He was then asked by Bo Boyd, future Chairman of Disney Consumer Products to join him in relocating to Burbank to open Disney's new Corporate Retail Headquarters. Bill was then promoted to Director, Disney Merchandise for the east and west coast operations. Following his tenure with Disney, the seeds were planted to begin developing new and original retail entertainment concepts of his own.

If he earned his entry level retail operations and middle management merchandising experience with JC Penney and Disney, he gained middle management retail operations' experience as Director of Operations for The Akron, a 23 store chain in Southern California. Following that, he was asked to pursue a start-up as Vice President/General Manager of Royal Orleans, a division of United China and Glass Co. UCGC, as it was called. UCGC was America's oldest giftware importer/distributor having been established in 1851. It was the first company in its class of business to be approved by General McArthur to trade with Japan after WW II. Bill was then recruited by an executive search firm to found what was to be another start up, Vice President/General Manager of Tomy Toy's gift division. This division became the fastest growing company in its industry in 1985.

Bill's wholesale experience continued with Collins Trading Company in Irvine, CA where he was named Vice President. Collins, a trading company based in Taipei, WHICH supplies the mass market with a diverse range of product from Christmas lights to furniture. Collins typically has 23 different showrooms in its offices.

In 1993, Bill was asked to start up the retail division for Kirk Kirkorian's new MGM Grand Resort in Las Vegas, as its Chief Retail Operator. There he conceptualized and designed each of the 24 stores, a 12,000 item product range and hired the staff which came onboard "just in time", 30 days before opening. Bill was promoted to President, MGM Grand Retail in 1997.

In light of his success with MGM, Bill was asked to repeat the process with a company which became known to the world as Mandalay Resort Group. He was named Chief Retail Operator and Corporate Vice President. He lowered the cost of goods for nine consecutive years. The retail cost of goods finally settled to 70% of its former cost level, saving the Company in excess of $100,000,000. At Mandalay Resort Group, he was in charge of a 220,000 item product range, 109 stores and 1000 employees.

Bill retired as a full time corporate executive when the acquisition of Mandalay Resort Group by MGM/Mirage was completed. Bill now runs a licensing and consulting company.