Hispanic Marketing Report Shows Boom in Purchasing Power

By W.J. Hennigan
Phoenix Business Journal

The Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce released its annual report on Hispanic market trends Wednesday showing income and purchasing power are booming in Arizona.

More than 1,500 people attended the event at the Arizona Biltmore Resort & Spa to learn firsthand the latest information in the 2007 Datos: Focus on Arizona's Hispanic Market study.

Attendees at the 12th annual event were informed about how the Latino population, income and purchasing power are booming in Arizona and other parts of the country. Studies say these numbers are expected to climb, particularly in the Phoenix area.

According to the report, Hispanic purchasing power nationally is expected to surpass $1 trillion by 2011. The data also showed that Phoenix has seen Hispanic purchasing power nearly double from $3.6 billion in 2000 to $6.4 billion last year.

Latino-owned businesses are on the rise as well. Datos revealed that in 2002, Hispanic-owned firms' sales totaled nearly $246 billion and are expected to jump to $539 billion by 2012.
Small businesses make up the lion's share of Hispanic-owned firms. Studies show that 75 percent of these businesses reported less than $50,000 in sales in 2002, which leaves them plenty of room to grow.

The findings were compiled by Loui Olivas and a team of Arizona State University graduate students from the W.P. Carey School of Business. Olivas led a presentation on the data and outlined that in 2006, 50 percent of all Hispanic households earned $50,000 or more. This is expected to increase exponentially by 2011, he said.

Harry Garewal, president and CEO of the Hispanic Chamber, said releasing the Datos information is an exciting opportunity to look at what is going on in the Phoenix area.

"The idea behind this presentation always has been to provide data that gives us a localized perspective and helps us better understand the growing Hispanic community within our communities," he said.

The Latino population in Phoenix has more than doubled in the past decade and, by 2030, the Hispanic Chamber is expecting that Latinos will outnumber the white, non-Hispanic population. In addition, Hispanics are Phoenix's youngest demographic, which also speaks to their expected growth.

Keynote speaker at the event was Cynthia Nelson of Todobebé, a leading multimedia company that specializes in parenting within the Latino community.

"This is my last speech of the year and I guess they saved the best for last," she said. "I've never seen a Chamber of Commerce this big and organized."

Closing out the event was a panel discussion taking a closer look at the findings. The discussion included Edmundo Hildalgo of Chicanos por la Causa, Olga Aros of Ora y Dia Management Group, Rufus Glaspar of the Maricopa County Community College District, Don Henninger of the Phoenix Business Journal and Loui Olivas of Arizona State University.

For more: www.azhcc.com.

From: Phoenix Business Journal (www.bizjournals.com)