Thanks to the 2000 census, everyone in business knows the nation’s Latino population has become a hugely important market. The Latino base is growing in immigrant enclaves like South Gate and, increasingly, cities and towns far from traditional Latino destinations, including metro Atlanta.

The challenge is reaching this complex audience.

The nation’s Latino population remains little understood and little seen by much of the United States. While the country is 12.6 percent Hispanic, a large portion of the population is heavily concentrated in the West, especially states on the border with Mexico.

Georgia’s Latino population is about 5.3 percent.

By 2020, however, Latinos are likely to be 17.8 percent of the U.S. population. And Latino culture will continue to become a bigger influence on overall pop culture.

Latino spending power is huge: $700 billion in 2004, according to HispanTelligence, a research firm. That total is expected to grow to $1 trillion by the end of the decade.

Felipe Korzenny, founder and director of the Center for the Study of Hispanic Marketing Communication at Florida State University, said the U.S. Hispanic market is already the second-largest in the world, after Mexico itself.

“And they have more buying power than the gross domestic product of Mexico,” he said. “Just think about that.”

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