A pair of studies on the readers of ethnically targeted newspapers affirms what many in the field have long claimed — mainstream newspapers are failing to reach this audience.

Dual studies conducted by Circulation Verification Council on both the Hispanic and African American newspaper markets appear to bear out this contention. According to a survey conducted among 15,000 readers of 110 African American community newspapers across the United States, 66 percent of readers cite their African American newspaper as their primary or only source for local news and community event information. In addition, only 12 percent of these readers subscribe to a daily newspaper.

Similarly, among 15,000 readers of 77 Hispanic community newspapers nationwide, 66 percent of readers cite their Hispanic newspaper as their primary or only source for local news and community event information, and only 14 percent subscribe to a daily newspaper.

The studies, which were conducted by Gemstone Communications Inc. and its subsidiary Ethnic Print Media Group (EPMG), which represents over 550 Hispanic and African American directed newspapers to advertisers, also touched on these readers shopping habits. Both studies found that these readers are inclined to respond to advertisers who embrace ethnic print.

In the Hispanic study, 79 percent of respondents said that they frequently purchase products or services as seen in their local Hispanic newspaper. Similarly, 72 percent of respondents in the African American indicated the same preference.

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The JCOC Explores This Topic in Its Next, Not-to-Be-Missed Virtual Seminar

Prior to the 2000 U.S. Census, Hispanic marketing was little more than an afterthought to most of corporate America. But the numbers speak for themselves: America’s 39 million Latinos spent nearly $700 billion in 2003 and are the fastest-growing consumer group in the country. By 2008, Hispanic consumer spending is expected to top $1 trillion, reports the University of Georgia’s Selig Center for Economic Growth. Faced with these astounding figures, the Jewelry Consumer Opinion Council (JCOC) garnered insight into the Hispanic jewelry consumer to help the jewelry industry take its piece of the pie.

The JCOC will host its third webinar on February 16, 2005. The topic will be “The Hispanic Jewelry Market in the USA: The Hidden Giant.” The 90-minute interactive virtual seminar will reveal the jewelry-buying habits and expectations of the Hispanic community. Research gathered from recent studies will reveal the types of jewelry Hispanic consumers purchase and desire, how much they typically spend on jewelry, the retail venues they’re likely to shop for jewelry, why they buy jewelry, and much more.

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Cal National Bank released this week the Community Banker’s Guide to Hispanic Marketing. The purpose of the Guide is to provide a roadmap to developing and implementing an effective Hispanic marketing program.

With 60 percent growth in population between 1990 and 2000, Hispanics have become America’s fastest growing minority group. After the 2000 Census, Hispanics became the largest minority group representing 12.5 percent of the U.S. population. This growth is expected to continue, with Hispanics projected to represent 25 percent of the U.S. population by 2050. In addition, the Hispanic market is becoming increasingly affluent. Research has found the rate of $100,000-income earners with assets in excess of $500,000, exceeding by eight times the non-Hispanic segment. While Hispanics are a large and growing population, they have historically eluded traditional financial institutions.

The Guide addresses questions such as who the Hispanic market represents, why the Hispanic market is so important to financial institutions, the challenges associated with Hispanic marketing, solutions to the challenges and the products and services that are appropriate for reaching the Hispanic market. The Guide is available for download at www.CalNationalBank.com/pdfs/hispanicmarketing2005.pdf.

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It should be a surreal scene, indeed, for the lads from Stockholm — playing in balmy temperatures in the dead of winter… playing Mexico in the United States… playing Mexico in a city where it has lost exactly once in 15 matches… playing in front of 40,000 rabid Mexican fans who sing the national anthem so loudly that it drowns out the music.

…Mexico soccer fans aren’t big on advance sales.

As of last night, sales were in the low 20,000s for a venue that can seat about 42,000 for soccer. And most U.S. sporting events will draw a walk-up ticket-buying crowd of a couple thousand, if that.

Not with the Mexican national team. The smallest walk-up crowd that local promoter Paul Mendes can remember for a Mexico game in San Diego is 9,000. Some were in the 15,000 drange. One year, Mendes says they sold 25,000 tickets in the 36 hours before kickoff.

“It’s cultural, and it’s very hard to change that,” said Alejandro Taraciuk, the director of international business for Soccer United Marketing, which owns the rights to Mexican national team games in the States. “The one thing Mexico fans want to see before they purchase tickets is that the ‘real’ players are coming, not a B team or a youth team. Once they see that the real players are coming, they start buying tickets in big numbers.”

A big marketing tool for promoters, then, is the images of Jared Borgetti and Pavel Pardo and the rest of El Tri’s regulars getting off the plane at Lindbergh Field last night on the evening news.

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Rupa Ranganathan’s job used to be a little easier. She is in charge of organizing Strategic Research Institute’s annual Hispanic marketing conference, held in Miami Beach every January for the past decade.

Back when the conference started, it was about the only one around. But today, thanks to the explosion of corporate interest in the Hispanic market, there’s a plethora of similarly themed pow-wows being offered around the country.

That makes a tad more work for Ranganathan.

”I do keep an eye on the competition,” said the senior vice president and ethnic strategist for the New York-based firm. “I study who’s coming to conferences and talk to them about issues and challenges. I read whatever’s written. I have to keep in touch.”

Multicultural and Hispanic marketing has been a hot conference topic since 2000, when the U.S. Census underscored that Hispanics were the fastest-growing slice of the population. And heavily Hispanic Miami, a favorite spot for confabs of any type in the winter, is especially popular for multicultural-themed events.

There are now so many of these conferences around the country that executives have to pick and choose which to attend.

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Tennessee banks that delay development of a marketing strategy to reach Hispanic business owners risk losing access to the fastest-growing market segment in the state, says a report by MBA students at the University of Tennessee.

For six weeks last fall, 13 teams of students researched the existing data on the state’s Hispanic business community and interviewed hundreds of Hispanic business owners across Tennessee.

The purpose of the project, which was sponsored by First Tennessee Bank, was to find the best time to launch a Hispanic marketing strategy and what banking services should be included.

“Interestingly, all of the teams came back and said the same thing: Now is the time to jump. This is a rapidly growing market segment looking for financial services,” said Sarah Gardial, associate dean for academic programs and a professor in the Department of Marketing and Logistics.

The student reports also emphasized the need for banks to invest in hiring bilingual tellers and loan officers, as well as to develop Spanish-language materials.

But Gardial called that the “low-hanging fruit” of the research project.

“The real insights of the research is the desire of the Hispanic market to build relationships with financial service providers,” Gardial said. “It boils down to one word – community. If the Hispanic community feels they are being supported by a financial institution, they will support the institution.”

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The Census Bureau projects that Hispanic population on the U.S. mainland will grow to 103 million by 2050, more than double the present population of 40 million Hispanics. On the contrary, in just half a century, the population of European Americans is expected to decrease by 19%. That might explain why expansion strategies for stateside banks are tightly focused on reaching Hispanics. According to market researcher Simmons Inc., there is an even more attractive factor defining the future of the banking sector around the demographic issue. The researcher estimates 56% of the nation’s Hispanics have never had any kind of bank account. Hispanics’ wealth and population rising three times faster than the U.S. average translates into a whole new universe of business opportunities for the industry. According to research group Economy.com, that new universe is worth $200 billion in new business over the next decade.

This new business isn’t concentrated solely on individuals; the Hispanic-owned firms in the U.S. also are expected to grow 55% to 3.2 million by the year 2010. Total revenue for Hispanic-owned firms will increase by 70% to more than $465 billion in the same period, according to estimates by HispanTelligence.

As early as 2009, Selig Center for Economic Growth at the University of Georgia projects the purchasing power of U.S. Hispanics will reach the trillion-dollar mark because in 2003 purchasing power was already $653 billion larger than Mexico’s Gross Domestic Product. This aggregate income will be spent, saved, and invested, all of which will spur demand for checking accounts, consumer credit, mortgages, and investment services.

Many industry analysts believe more than half of all U.S. retail banking growth will originate from the growing Hispanic market. TowerGroup, a research and advisory firm that focuses on the global financial services industry, estimates up to 70% of the growth for U.S. financial services between 2003 and 2008 could come from the Hispanic market alone.

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This powerhouse of information and networking attracted over 350 last year and with the continued boom in the U.S. Hispanic market, cross-border marketing growth, proliferation of Latino media and new media channels, this year’s agenda is on the top priority list of major Fortune 1000 companies. The wide range of new and provocative sessions will include: Sergio Bendixen’s analysis of the “Hispanic Vote” in the 2004 Elections and insights for marketers “Lost in Translation –Exporting your message across cultural borders” by Draft New York’s Laurence Boschetto and Larry Harris GMAC Corporation’s Case study Segmentation Volkswagen America’s quest for Hispanic Drivers NBA and Motorola’s partnernship strategies Citibank’s credit cards and the Hispanic market- a case study Importance of English programming for Latino marketing by Jeff Valdez Future Hispanic Media trends by Monica Gadsby Cross Border expansion strategies for multinational brands by Sony’s Irving Plonskier Brand Prioritization and market opportunity- by Carlos Santiago Internet Usage of Hispanics and Budget Allocation Cross Cultural Strategies- An Anthropological lens by Rita Denny and Patricia Sunderland You’ll Meet Senior Decision Makers From: Cadbury Schweppes, Clamatto Cingular Wireless CitiCards, Citibank NA GMAC Miami Heat Motorola Volkswagen of America NBA Latin America Schieffelin & Somerset Co. Sony Pictures Television International Warner Bros. Plus: Research Ace Dr. Korzenny unravels a customized poll among agency heads on “2005 Advertising and Marketing” Strategies. A peek at what lies ahead Media Maven, Monica Gadsby outlines “Future Trends for Hispanic Media” Creativity – “Seven Proven Creative Directors Share Pathways To Success” Pre and Post Conference workshops on Research and Predictive Modeling and Segmentation tools Major clients and their key challenges and obstacles at an industry panel Seven award winning creative directors whose work has built success stories for clients.

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Burger King Corp. has partnered with Latin music stars Pilar Montenegro and Obie Bermúdez to promote a new sweepstakes…

The company will feature the pair in Spanish-language TV, radio and P-O-P materials targeting Whopper eaters in the Hispanic community to enter the Un Dia A Tu Manera sweepstakes in February.

The promotion continues Burger King’s partnership with Latin music. The fast food chain served as the corporate sponsor of the 2004 Latin Grammy Awards.

Montenegro and Bermúdez are the first Hispanic celebrities to endorse a consumer marketing campaign for the Burger King Corporation. TV and radio spots will feature the duo asking for the original Whopper sandwich to be made “their way” and show how the Latin idols would most like to spend a day. The two will make personal appearances in select Burger King restaurants nationwide as part of the promotional campaign.

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“Most housing growth will be driven in the future by immigrants and Hispanics,” predicted James Johnson, professor at the Kenan-Flagler Business School of the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

This will result in non-white residents rising to almost half of the U.S. population by 2050, Johnson said at a seminar in New York sponsored by the Urban Land Institute, a nonprofit real estate research and education organization.

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HMW Online, the Hispanic Marketing Source, has upgraded its Market Profiles section and expanded its geo-demographic population and household data from 21 to 40 selected DMA’s. HMW Online now provides the latest and most complete information including population, language, economics, origin and education. The information, prepared by Geoscape International, provides data for 1990 and 2000, and projections for 2005 and 2010.

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Univision’s dominance of the U.S. Hispanic TV market isn’t deterring Spanish- and English-language competitors. More than five dozen cable and broadcast networks now are vying for a share of the market, according to industry reports, with the most recent new offerings aimed at an increasingly acculturated community.

The entrepreneurs behind the moves are banking that English-dominant Hispanics will prefer culturally attuned English-language shows over Spanish-language and mainstream network fare.

And the market continues to be increasingly attractive. Ad spending targeting Hispanics on all network and local TV is expected to reach nearly $2 billion this year – up almost 22 percent over last year. Many industry watchers see a growing market for relevant English-language programming to capture younger, acculturated Hispanic viewers.

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Census respondents could choose from six racial categories, including an interesting option listed as “some other race,” and could choose more than one category. That meant that there were 63 possible combinations of the six basic racial categories.

The Census Bureau recognized that in a diverse country, Americans should be given the liberty to identify themselves on their own terms, not the government’s.

Tafoya found that of those choosing to identify themselves as Hispanic, 48 percent identified as white and 42 percent saw themselves as “some other race.” In fact, the vast majority of Americans choosing “some other race” were Hispanics.

In Texas, where Latinos experienced both Southern-style racial segregation and the civil rights movement, 63 percent of U.S.-born Latinos identified themselves as white. In the rest of the country, particularly California, 45 percent of native-born Latinos identified as white.

Tafoya explored the differences between Hispanics who described themselves as white and those who did not. Through a 2002 National Survey of Latinos, she found that those who are more educated, affluent and involved in their communities and who consider themselves Americans are more likely to identify themselves as white.

Millions of Latinos who were younger, less educated, poorer and less likely to speak English tended to find themselves socially and economically marginalized and chose “some other race.”

Tafoya’s report highlights the danger of viewing Latinos as a homogeneous population.

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Influenced by the growing Spanish community, the importance of Spanish food in the cuisine of other Hispanic groups and more aggressive marketing by Spanish food manufacturers, more and more South Floridians are discovering the taste of Spain.

While some stores have long stocked a few Spanish products such as olive oil or the nougat candy turron, now an avalanche of products from la Madre Patria — as Hispanics call the Spanish motherland — are making their way to South Florida homes and there are even stores that carry Spanish foods exclusively.

Imports from Spain more than doubled from $332 million to $679 million at the Port of Miami-Dade from 2002 to 2003, according to the most recent figures available. Food and beverage imports accounted for more than 20 percent of the increase.

Food industry analysts say Spanish delicatessen foods and wines are now competing for the same shelves that French and Italian products have occupied for decades.

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When Jorge Fiterre started his company Condista to distribute Spanish-language television channels in the United States, he had one client in hand and had to hunt down more. Now he’s representing 15 channels and they come to him.

“Five years ago, it was a nice idea to have some Spanish-language programming. Now it’s a must-have for the cable operator,” said Fiterre, who’s based in Coral Gables.

To say Hispanic pay television is booming may be an understatement. There are now 75 networks, both Spanish-language and English-language, catering to U.S. Hispanic viewers, according to Multichannel News and Broadcasting & Cable.

Nineteen networks were launched in 2004 alone. And they followed 14 new entries in 2003. Still more are coming — five channels are slated to go up this year by the trade journals’ count. The new Hispanic entries represent just a fraction of the hundreds of English-language channels available and going on line, but it’s a hefty number for a market that’s still emerging.

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