Brown & Brown, Inc. Expands Leadership Development Department; Laura Simon Named Director

Market Wire, April, 2006

Linda S. Downs, CPCU, AAI, Executive Vice President for Leadership Development of Brown & Brown, Inc. (NYSE: BRO), is pleased to announce that Laura M. Simon, JD, MBA, has been promoted to the newly formed position of Director of Leadership Development. In this new position, Ms. Simon will be responsible for the day-to-day operations of the Company's Leadership Development Department.

Ms. Downs explained, "Earlier this year, we announced that as a result of our continued growth, we are placing even more emphasis on recruitment and the development of leadership. We want to have leaders in every position within the Company. As a result, anything having to do with people, our most valuable asset, involves leadership development. It is for this reason we have re-branded our human resources department as Leadership Development."

Laura Simon was selected to lead the activities of the department in this new direction in view of her experience with the Company, law degree and Masters of Business Administration degree (with an emphasis on leadership development). She has served in a supervisory capacity within Brown & Brown's Lawyers' Protector Plan® for the past six years, during which time she earned her MBA from the University of Tampa. Before joining the Company, Laura spent several years as a claims specialist and consultant with insurance underwriting companies in the Midwestern United States. She earned her Juris Doctor degree from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law.

Brown & Brown, Inc. and its subsidiaries offer a broad range of insurance and reinsurance products and services, as well as risk management, third party administration, and managed health care programs. Providing service to business, public entity, individual, trade and professional association clients nationwide, the Company is ranked by Business Insurance magazine as the United States' seventh largest independent insurance intermediary. The Company's Web address is www.bbinsurance.com .

This release may contain certain statements relating to future results which are forward-looking statements. These statements are not historical facts, but instead represent only the Company's belief regarding future events, many of which, by their nature, are inherently uncertain and outside of the Company's control. It is possible that the Company's actual results and financial condition may differ, possibly materially, from the anticipated results and financial condition indicated in these forward-looking statements. Further information concerning the Company and its business, including factors that potentially could materially affect the Company's financial results, are contained in the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Some factors include: general economic conditions around the country; downward commercial property and casualty premium pressures; the competitive environment; the integration of the Company's operations with those of businesses or assets the Company has acquired or may acquire in the future and the failure to realize the expected benefits of such integration; and the potential occurrence of a disaster that affects certain areas of the States of Arizona, California, Florida, New Jersey, New York and/or Washington, where significant portions of the Company's business are concentrated. All forward-looking statements included in this conference call are made only as of the date of this call, and we do not undertake any obligation to publicly update or correct any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that subsequently occur or of which we thereafter become aware.

Linda S. Downs Executive Vice President (813) 222 - 4243