Transcripts

SPEAKER 1: Start there.

ART HUGHES: With a head for numbers and a fluency in both Spanish and English, Rudy Trujillo recognized the burgeoning Hispanic market early.

RUDY TRUJILLO: I saw a need, a need that the Latino community was being underserved at that time. And being from Texas and being totally bilingual and bicultural, I started the business.

ART HUGHES: Trujillo's Tax Service started 10 years ago, when there were only four or five Latino-owned businesses along Lake Street. Now there are more than 300. Trujillo provides a wide variety of services, the sum of which don't seem to have a parallel in the non-Hispanic world.

In addition to preparing taxes, his staff facilitate real estate transactions, process mortgage loans, and provide Spanish translations for any document. The office buzzes with customers waiting under a large bronze-framed painting of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Trujillo says the business future looks strong.

RUDY TRUJILLO: I don't think it's going to slow down. In fact, I think it's going to go the other way. I think they'll be more and more Latinos coming into Minnesota.

ART HUGHES: The University of Georgia's Selig Center for Economic Growth estimates the combined buying potential of Minnesota's Latinos at $3.1 billion. That's nearly $20,000 for every Hispanic man, woman, and child. They predict that number will double in the next 10 years. St. Thomas graduate Tim Martinson recently returned to Minneapolis from Miami to start his own Hispanic marketing business. He notes the increase of Spanish language media in the Twin Cities, including six publications, one community access television show, and commercial AM radio station radio ray

SPEAKER 3: [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

TIM MARTINSON: The bigger ad agencies, they can have LA, and they can have Miami. I want this developing market niche, Milwaukee, Des Moines, Minneapolis, Mankato. That's really where a small group like my company can really benefit.

ART HUGHES: Martinson says the growth of Latino buying power in Minnesota is the sixth-fastest in the country. He describes himself as a gringo. He learned Spanish throughout high school and college before learning business. He remembers getting hired at a Twin Cities food company to teach English to Spanish-speaking employees.

TIM MARTINSON: The Spanish-speaking employee said, well, then they should be the ones taking Spanish. I think that the market isn't quite there yet in Minnesota, but I think it's getting there. And I think it's maybe right around the corner.

ART HUGHES: Martinson is the newest member of a growing industry in Minnesota, showing companies how to reach Hispanic consumers. He says it's more than just learning Spanish.

TIM MARTINSON: Beyond that, it's really speaking to different values, speaking to family, tradition, culture. You've got people that have been in the country for fewer than eight years, 10 years. What's it like trying to assimilate to a new culture? It's extremely difficult.

ART HUGHES: Martinson may be new to the industry, but marketing to Hispanics is not.

RICK AGUILAR: We always remind these companies now that this is long range.

ART HUGHES: Rick Aguilar runs Aguilar Productions. For the past eight years, he's organized a conference in St. Paul to introduce businesses to the idea of selling to Hispanics.

RICK AGUILAR: I've been with some companies now. They'll hire a Latino, one Latino, and they'll go and put some ads in a newspaper for six months and maybe do some radio, and nothing happens. They say, well, we tried.

ART HUGHES: Governor Tim Pawlenty appointed Aguilar to the Twin Cities Metropolitan Council. He's a St. Paul native. His father was one of the Mexican migrants who pioneered the successful enclave of Latino culture on St. Paul's West Side. Aguilar says the combination of established Latino residents and the continually growing new immigrant population puts the Twin Cities on a path to developing a more sophisticated and integrated Hispanic presence, as has already happened in cities such as San Antonio.

RICK AGUILAR: We've got some great entrepreneurs coming here. Now we have to learn the general market skills of running a business, the five-year plan, making sure that we're mentoring the managers, and that type of thing. I think that's the next step for us.

ART HUGHES: Hispanic business owners often face obstacles that most others do not. Mexican President Vicente Fox's visit to the United States highlights the role immigration laws play for both Hispanic businesses and industries, such as agriculture and construction. Bills under consideration in Congress would grant illegal immigrants temporary worker status.

South Minneapolis businessman Ramon Léon entered the country illegally in 1987. He moved to Minnesota from California in 1991 to find a less-saturated market for his upholstery skills. He says he's never been without a job, never relied on public services. Even after buying a house, starting his own business, marrying a US citizen, and having two children, he remained an undocumented immigrant, subject to deportation. He says it's better for society if all taxpaying residents can reap some reward for their role in the American economy.

RAMON LEON: We are paying taxes, but we realize that our children are properly educated. So we need to find a solution, and we need to hold people accountable for that, too. I mean, we all face the same issues. The only difference that make this more difficult for us to overcome is the lack of knowledge of the system and the language.

ART HUGHES: Without education and other such tools, Léon says children are especially easy targets for gangs or a life of dependence on others. Léon was also undocumented when he and others held meetings after the Sunday Spanish-language mass in a South Minneapolis church. The group grew tired of complaining about police or immigration officials or other obstacles. He says they inventoried their skills to begin satisfying the Latino market's ready demand. In the process, they learned they had a more widespread appeal.

RAMON LEON: We started realizing that the market was not only Latino, and we could also sell them to Anglos, to the Black community, to the Hmong community, to the general community. And we could also use the economic development as a tool to fight for social justice issues. And we could use it also to build political power.

ART HUGHES: The group helped secure $10,000 micro loans from neighborhood groups. One of those loans turned into a business that now achieves sales of more than $5 million a year. Léon, who now heads the Latino Economic Development Center, says American immigration laws are forcing new arrivals to stay hidden as dishwashers, cooks, and hotel housekeepers, instead of encouraging their natural entrepreneurial spirit. Art Hughes, Minnesota Public Radio, Minneapolis.