Hispanic-owned businesses continue growth

Oct. 15

There are estimated to be 4.2 million Hispanic businesses in the United States, the tendency shows Hispanic-owned businesses are growing fast, seeking financial fuel for that growth. Here to talk more about the Hispanic businesses trends in Arizona is Christina Gonzalez, vice president of corporate partnerships at Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

“One of the phenomena that we continue to see despite the pandemic is that Hispanic businesses are really fueling the business growth in the United States and in Arizona. Hispanic owned businesses continue to be concentrated in a couple of areas, like administrative services, waste management and construction trades.” Gonzalez said.

Hispanic businesses are being fueled by an immigrant mentality, Hispanic owned businesses do not necessarily have one business sometimes they have two or three, but we do know that Hispanic are very entrepreneurial as a community and that is chiefly what drives business growth, according to Gonzalez.

Are Hispanic getting the capital they need to start a new business?

“The number one challenge for Hispanic entrepreneurs is the access to capital and this became worse during the pandemic. Because many of the businesses were in the service industry, a lot of them had to go out of business. Businesses were also disproportionately impacted by the inability to receive funds. Our chamber was very active in that area. We were able to give grant funds to some small businesses and through some other wonderful organizations in our community, we really tried to help them access those funds that they needed so badly.” Gonzalez said.

Why Hispanic Businesses are so important?

According to Gonzalez, Hispanic businesses are contributing to the economy of the United States and to the state of Arizona, they are adding jobs to our community. If we look at the growth trend, Hispanic owned businesses are growing by 34% while non-Hispanic businesses decreased by 6%. We need Hispanic businesses because they drive growth of the U.S. economy.