Brands & Bands: How WME’s Shari Lewin Helped Build A First-Class Music Brand Partnership Department

For Shari Lewin, Partner and Co-Head of Music Brand Partnerships at WME, a pivotal career moment came in the early-2010s when she worked in what was then a booming part of the industry that today is all but forgotten: Ringtones.

After interning at Long Island venues Westbury Music Fair and Jones Beach Amphitheater and Clive Davis’ J Records label, she landed a job at an entertainment marketing agency working with Verizon. At the time, ringtones were wildly popular generating significant music business revenues and even having their own sales charts.

“It was pre-Spotify and pre-streaming, so people were downloading music on their phones,” Lewin explains. “Verizon was one of the most important partners to the music industry because of ringtones. They were spending a ton of money in the space. We were working on their tour sponsorships, so I got to work on Taylor Swift’s first tour, “The Fearless Tour” and we did Keith Urban, Pearl Jam, Green Day, The Jonas Brothers’ early tours. That’s when I fell in love with the interaction between branding and the music industry.”

It’s a good thing, because Lewin is a trailblazer in the agency music branding space who helped lead its exponential growth. Thirteen years ago, when she moved to Nashville to join WME’s nascent music branding department it was a vastly different business.

“When I started, it was just myself and Todd (Jacobs, partner, WME Global Brand Partnerships, who she build the department with) and nobody else doing music,” says Lewin, who is back in New York. “Now we have probably 20 music brand partnership agents. We have people in Latin, hip-hop, international out of London and three agents in Nashville—it’s grown exponentially.”
Today, music brand partnerships are indispensable, especially with rising costs and lower margins for many touring artists.

“When I first started, the focus was on the big headliner talent. It was ‘How do we do a tour sponsorship with Luke Bryan?’ What I’ve seen over the past 13 years is that there’s an appetite to work with artists at every level. There are more developing artists, mid-tier artists, people who stand for certain things and brands that are open to working with people who maybe aren’t the biggest name, but are really big on TikTok. That’s the biggest change, social media has helped amplify people who aren’t the biggest ticket sellers, but have a really strong brand identity and online presence.”

Lewin says today there are more women artists breaking through and finding success in live than ever before. “Brands have wanted to work with female headliners, but it’s been a struggle because they’re haven’t been that many unfortunately that have broken through,” she says. “Now with Lainey Wilson, Kelsea Ballerini, Kacey Musgraves and Maren Morris there are more women for brands to work with.”

A recent deal Lewin recently worked on was with Tanner Adell, a developing artist. “She had a massive year, but she’s still building her touring business and that’s expensive. It’s hard to go on the road, have a bus, do all the things you need to do as a young artist. She was a huge fan of Crown Royal, they worked in the country space and we introduced them. They fell in love with each other and ended up sponsoring her tour, which helped offset costs that would have come out of her pocket.”

Lewin cites two mentors who also worked for WME: Becky Gardenhire, who co-heads the Nashville office, and Jessica Thomas, who formerly ran the brand partnership group. “I’ve always watched what they do and how they lead and been inspired by the how they stand for something. They’re no bullshit and they also are very empathetic. That’s the way I want to lead my team, with empathy. These jobs are hard and the best thing to do is tell colleagues and people we manage we’ve all been in their shoes, and we know what it’s like to deal with difficult situations.”

As a mentor herself who teaches music business, Lewin is paying it forward. “My number one piece of advice is don’t turn any job down, every job is a great opportunity to either a figure out what you like or learn what you don’t like….any foot in door is a foot in the door.”
Even if it’s ringtones.