Study: State Hispanic market booms
Posted on Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Arkansas is home to the fastest-growing Hispanic market in the country, according to a study released Tuesday by the University of Georgia.
The buying power — potential spending measured as income minus taxes — of Arkansas’ Hispanics has risen 1, 322 percent in the past 17 years, to $ 2. 3 billion in 2007 from $ 164. 4 million in 1990, according to the study conducted by the Selig Center for Economic Growth at the university’s Terry College of Business.
Nationally, Hispanic buying power rose 306. 8 percent from 1990-2007, according to the report.
But despite its strong growth, the state’s Hispanic community is still relatively small and has limited economic clout, with just 3. 2 percent of the state’s $ 74. 1 billion purchasing power in 2007. Hispanics made up 8. 6 percent of the national market in 2007.
Hispanic Arkansans ranked 34 th in buying power in 2007 among the states, compared with 43 rd in 1990 with a 0. 5 percent share of the state market.
Jeffrey Humphreys, author of the report, said the “explosive” growth of Arkansas’ Hispanic population was the main factor driving the increase in consumer spending capability.
Arkansas was home to an estimated 130, 846 Hispanics in 2006, up 558. 3 percent from the 19, 876 living in the state in 1990, according to the U. S. Census Bureau. Arkansas’ Hispanic community was the fastest-growing in the country from 2000-05, shooting up by 48 percent, according to an April study from the Urban Institute.
The Hispanic population is especially booming in Northwest Arkansas, where poultry companies such as Tyson Foods Inc. and George’s Inc. have drawn many Hispanics to the area for work.
“Jobs tend to be the magnet, especially in states where there was not an established Hispanic population back in 1990,” Humphreys said.
Kathy Deck, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, said rising income among Hispanics in Arkansas is also driving up their buying power.
Deck said the report shows that businesses in Arkansas that ignore the potential of Hispanic customers “are doing so at their peril.”
“I think we will probably see more businesses doing more to tailor their product offerings to the Hispanic community,” she said.
Rafael Bravo, president of the Arkansas Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, agreed, noting that businesses owned by or aimed at Hispanics are “opening and they’re growing” in areas such as Northwest Arkansas and southwest Little Rock.
“If you go to southwest Little Rock, you can see how fast little businesses are opening,” he said.
The number of Hispanicowned business in the United States grew by 31 percent between 1997-2002. The U. S. Census Bureau reported that the number in Arkansas fell 19 percent, though observers have said they are skeptical of the figures for the state.
Nationally, Hispanic buying power increased faster than any other racial or ethnic group measured by the study, though Asians, a smaller population overall, posted a 294. 3 percent gain in buying power. Whites ’ purchasing power rose 124. 1 percent from 1990 to this year, while blacks gained 165. 7 percent.
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