NewsTaco

By Stuart Miller, New York Times

Every March the N.B.A. reaches out to the country’s fastest growing minority with Noche Latina, a campaign to celebrate Hispanic heritage. And every March some bloggers criticize the league for its most visual and commercial aspect: the jerseys worn by certain teams. Instead of translating team names like Heat (Calor) or Bulls (Toros), the N.B.A. simply puts a definite article in front, for a Spanglish touch, with El Heat and Los Bulls.

“Does the N.B.A. really think fans would be baffled by ‘Los Toros,’ ” asked one blogger. “It’s like saying, ‘Yeah, I speako Español.’ La N.B.A. can do better.”

Click on picture to read full story.

By Gustavo Razzetti, ClickZ

Click on picture to read story.

[Photo by LotusHead]

By Julito, Latino Rebels

The current wave in marketing has agencies everywhere telling brands that if you don’t go “Latino,” you will miss out on the NEXT BIG THING. So in a world where agencies are looking for business and brands are now ready to spend on the “Latinization” of their offerings, it is getting messy out there.

Add to the fact that when brands finally go “Latino,” they have only one shot to get it right, and you can understand the pressure. In the rush to embrace the U.S. Latino market, many brands will get bad advice. Such is the case of brands like Clorox Latino. If the Latino connection doesn’t fit, don’t force feed it because most of the time, the brand will just stumble out of the gate and it will look unauthentic and stale.

Which brings me to what everyone in the Latino space is talking about this week: Rolling Stone’s bilingual issue, which will hit the stands later this week. You can read the reasons why it is such a GREAT IDEA somewhere else. Here is my five reasons why I think this is just another example of a interesting initial idea that got lost in the execution phase. And another example of a “Latino” idea gone bad.

1. Pitbull? The best that Rolling Stone can do for its first cover is Pitbull? I can understand if this were another magazine, but this is Rolling Stone,  a brand that I have known since the early 80s, when I became a loyal reader. To me, the magazine and the brand have always tried to take risks. You would think that when it came to its first bilingual issue, it would have taken a risk. If Rolling Stone REALLY knew what was up and if it wanted to gain some cred in this first issue, choosing Calle 13 over Pitbull would have been the way to go. But I guess Calle 13 is too edgy for a magazine/brand that earned its chops from being edgy. Lost opportunity. Just gets us some ads to place and we can say we are down with Latinos. Yawn.
2. The “Café Tacvba is the Radiohead of Mexico” Headline: Really? This is the problem with mainstream English-language U.S. magazines. Being hip means you come from England (Radiohead), but Café Tacvba, who I will argue was just as influential to bilingual and bicultural kids growing up to different types of music, is just a second-class band that reminds you of Radiohead. Hey, you think this is just me who is saying this? Univision News mentioned the poor comparison in a profile about the legendary band, and the head of Rolling Stone México basically had to tell his readers that the main Rolling Stone brandhas no flipping clue about Café Tacvba (mistake #1: the U.S. magazine spelled it “Cafe Tacuba”), as well as anything else about rock en español in Latin America. The letter even said that the list of the 10 Greatest Records of Latino Rock sucked. Imagine that when other magazines in your family basically tell you that your knowledge of music in Latin America is awful. Ouch. (Advice to Rolling Stone: maybe you should actually have your Latin American properties develop the next bilingual issue?)
3. Any magazine that features Sofía Vergara these days is just shilling to a PR agency: Once again, yet another English-language publication celebrating the “amazing” contributions of Sofía Vergara. The Charo Factor lives on! Is Sofía a stereotype or is she more than that? As if making it an intellectual debate will gloss over the fact as to why she is in the issue in the first place. You have male readers. Putting Sofía in the issue will attract those male readers. If Rolling Stone really wanted to gain some respect, it would have added  Ana Tijoux’s name to the cover? Yes to Sofía, but no to Ana? Come on.
4. The ads and the rational behind them: I am not making up the next few sentences. This is what Sundar Raman, marketing director for North American fabric care at Proctor & Gamble, told The New York Times about why it was running Gain ads in this “Latino” section: “Gain scents are more expressive, more emotional, and it just so happens that both Hispanics and African-Americans are more predisposed to scents being more experiential.” W… T…. F. Dear Mr. Raman, please don’t talk to the Times any more? Thanks.
5. The Lost Opportunity: It is clear that Rolling Stone just didn’t dig deep enough into its initial Latino issue. Why assume that its growing Latino readership wants to read articles in Spanish? Why overlook so many big musical themes that actually are deeply connected to young bilingual and bicultural music fans? For example, you know what would have rocked? A piece about why almost any true rock fan in Mexico LOVES and WORSHIPS Morrissey and the Smiths. Or what about The Clash and its history of incorporating “Clash Spanish” into its music? These are just two of many interesting and nuanced stories that go beyond an issue that would rather segregate its “Latino” content than celebrate it within the pages of the “mainstream” issue.

Sometimes it’s the most unexpected, unplanned things that happen to you in life that will be the most important. At least, to this listener, that’s what seemed to happen to Becky Arreaga, parter in the Latino marketing agency Mercury Mambo, small town Texas girl, and inadvertent superstar. Recently I had a chance to sit down with Arreaga to talk about her work, her education, her family, and her path to where she is today. Hers is a story in an occasional series on News Taco about how people achieved their American Dreams.

Arreaga grew up in Waco, in between Austin and Dallas in what she called a “truly bicultural world” with two sisters and the expectation that one day she’d go to college. Although she told us she wasn’t sure what school she’d attend when she applied, after she graduated, she found her way to San Antonio and into the growing field of Latino marketing. After branching out on her own and attending graduate school, she and her partner started Mercury Mambo in Austin, Texas.

“We lived in Waco with no Latino community, but growing up, that expectation was there. It was never ‘if’ you’e going to college, but ‘where.’ My sister Liz had blazed the path before me, so when I graduated and wanted a job, she recommended me for a job at a Hispanic agency in San Antonio. I didn’t even understand that Hispanic marketing was a career path. But [my employers] had a great hand in convincing others marketing to Hispanics was profitable.”

After 10 years in San Antonio Arreaga told us she began to see her life in a new light, as one of unexpected opportunities. She knew she didn’t want to work in another agency, but she wanted to try something new, so while in graduate school she and her sister started a consulting group. With hard work came success, and she and her partners decided to open up their own shop.

“I never thought about owning my own business seriously until I came to the end of my 10 years at the agency. I knew I wouldn’t find better bosses than them. I’m very passionate about Hispanic marketing; if we can empower our community with information that helps them along their journey — especially when you’re talking about first generation Hispanics and immigrants,” she said.

“It’s all about pivoting. If you’re going down the path, and something stops you, pivot. It’s a wide open field and there’s lots of opportunity. We are fortunate to work here in Austin at a Latino agency because it gives us a really unique perspective.”

Arreaga gives lots of credit to her mentors and her partners, and has become involved in efforts to help Texas kids be successful in school and beyond both with her work with Generation Texas and Latinitas. For more information about Mercury Mambo, visit the website.

Follow Sara Inés Calderón on Twitter @SaraChicaD