An Inside Look at Hispanic Owned Business and Chambers of Commerce

This is an article I wrote a while back for The Huffington post Latino Voices, although it was in 2011, the theme and information here is still relevant pertaining to small business, chambers of commerce, the dynamics and growth of Hispanic owned businesses in the United States.

The Hispanic Chambers of Commerce are doing a good job with their intent, however, when we survey Hispanic small business owners in NY, many say they don’t know of the Chambers, and many more would like information and help with their challenges, and still others feel they are now past the stage of needing help.

They can do better:

Take, for example, Jose Geraldo, who is a former corporate executive and current entrepreneur in New Jersey. “The chamber of commerce has become too political; because of it, they are removed from reality. They can do more with business owners. They get lost in the national agenda and forget about the local agenda which is where all the businesses are. -Said Jose

 

Another comment from an active business owner:

Paul Fernandez, former National Supermarket Association President and current partner in Rayuela, upscale fine dining Latin food restaurant, and the owner of NSA and Met Food supermarket s in Chelsea and Little Italy, agrees. I am not involved with chambers now or in the past as I was growing my business. This not to say they do not or cannot help, but I just never really knew much about them as I was building my businesses and felt that I just needed to focus on what needed to be done. You could say I never did because I was never approached by them. I guess if they did approach me and it made sense that they could help my business, I would have gotten involved,” -said Paul

I just came back from the 32nd Annual Hispanic Chamber of Commerce convention, and it showed what the power of organization, or should I say working in an organized manner, can do. It was my first time attending the convention and I must say, I was impressed.

Dozens of Fortune 500 companies participated, along with hundreds of community business owners, although not as many small business owners  as I would have liked to see, elected officials and professionals from many disciplines were also in attendance. They came from all over the country to network, learn, schmooze and further their business, all while basking in the beautiful Miami weather and scenery at the classy Fontainebleau Hotel.

Others came to be in the mix because of what may very well be the beginning of the greatest time in America to be Latino or and in business servicing Latinos…and here is why

• A U.S. Census report issued late last month confirmed that the U.S. Hispanic
  population ballooned 43% during the past decade, surpassing 50 million.
  • Hispanics accounted for more than half of the overall population growth of 27.3
  million between 2000 and 2010
  • Hispanics continue to be the largest U.S. ethnic group at 44.3 million and
  account for almost 15% of the U.S. total population. Overall purchasing power of
  Hispanics is expected to reach more that $1 trillion by 2011.
  • 79% of US Hispanic Internet users are bicultural and the majority of these
  bicultural Latinos are online every day.
  • One in five US mothers are Hispanic.
  • From 1980 to 2010, US Hispanics grew by 7.8%, Asians 4.8%, African Americans
  .09% and Whites decreased by -15%

The U. S. Hispanic Chambers of Commerce and especially  the local chamber chapters, have a great opportunity here to service the needs of so many diverse entrepreneurs at many different levels. This is great time to be in business and an even greater time to be an Hispanic in business. It is the small business owners that are collectively infusing the US economy, and the world for that matter, while bringing much needed innovation to the market place.

Some local chambers do their due diligence in connecting and assisting their area business owners, but others (to be absolutely frank) do not, in part because they lose sight of why they exist: to assist and service businesses and business owners. To be fair, it’s not easy work and it’s even more difficult to sustain one’s self and an organization by trying to help small business owners, and even more difficult to do this and actually run a cash flow positive chamber, but it is doable!

For example, on too many occasions, chamber presidents are at war with rival
chambers because of competition, in-fighting, internal and external politics, and/
or habit. Sometimes, they are fighting each other because of money or presence and the corporations that they seek funding from see or hear it. This is not good for their fundraising efforts; in fact, it hurts them in the long run.

myself, as an entrepreneur involved in the community for decades, would certainly advise against this type of practice. These are the sort of practices that keep us from working constructively with one another. Unfortunately, as a community, we don’t have the voice that our numbers command, but we are not being left behind because we have never been at the top of the food chain in the US to begin with. What we need to do is work with one another and stop fighting each other so much; it not only consumes energy, it deviates one from the agenda and mission, it hampers success, and it kills opportunity.

I happen to be a fan of constructive criticism; it’s how one grows. As a community, we need to stop being so critical of each other.( Hispanics) Let’s show a little bit more love for one another — there is enough room for all of us to do, create and prosper.  When we do this, good things will come, great things will happen and outstanding stories will be told, stories for generations to come…positive stories of inspiration, motivation, prosperity and success, not just individual stories of success (we have them), I am speaking of collective success…so let’s dream, but much more important than the dream. Let’s work! Hay trabajo que hacer!

Today Latinos represent  19 percent of the nation’s population, with 62.1 million population, this explosive growth of the Latino population has made it the predominant “minority” in the country. With numbers that have risen a surprising 23 percent since 2010 and represent a significant consumer base of over 1.85 trillion dollars.

Unknown to many, Latinos entrepreneurs start businesses at a much higher rate than other groups. Specifically, in the last 10 years, there has been a 44 percent Latino growth rate compared to just 4 percent for non-Latinos! This resulted in a robust $2.75 trillion economic output generated by Latinos.

It has not been easy. Significant challenges remain. Using acronyms to identify Latino-owned businesses (LOBs) and White-owned businesses (WOBs), the report points out succinctly that:

• Latinos are important job creators, growing their number of employees at a faster rate than White-owned businesses.
• The number of employees at LOBs has grown 55 percent since 2007, compared to 8 percent growth at WOBs. The roughly 5 million LOBs employ over 2.9 million people.
• Latinos are 1.7 times more likely to start a business than other demographic groups.
• Roughly 5 million Latino-owned businesses comprise the fastest growing segment of the small business ecosystem.
• In 2018, some 350,000 Latino-owned businesses generated over $460 billion in annual revenue and employed 2.9 million people. Although hard hit by the pandemic, there are today between 400,000-450,000 Latino-owned businesses.
• Latino business ownership has created significant wealth. To be precise, Latinos with business assets have an impressive personal net worth of $314,380. That is nearly nine times the wealth of Latinos overall.