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SEPTEMBER 27, 2000

MANAGEMENT

For Latinas, Business Is a Family Affair
Most Hispanic women business owners say spouses, kids, or parents play a role in their companies


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It's no secret that the ranks of female Hispanic entrepreneurs have exploded in recent years. From the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, the number of Latina-owned firms jumped more than 200%, while total sales by those companies soared 534%, to $67.3 billion.

What may be less obvious, however, is that for many Latinas success has largely been a family affair. In a recent survey of 404 Hispanic business owners, 75% said their spouses, children, or parents were involved in their businesses.

Sandra Hernandez Adams, who owns a five-employee computer-consulting company in Miami, says reliance on family is rooted in Latin culture. "The very first thing, if you need something done in your business, you're going to look to your family," says Adams, president-elect of the National Association of Women Business Owners, a sister organization of the group that sponsored the survey, the National Foundation for Women Business Owners.

BILINGUAL BIZ.  Two-thirds of the Latinas surveyed also said they saw their cultural background as an asset to their business. And in an indication of the way many Latina entrepreneurs move fluidly between the English- and Spanish-speaking worlds, 63% said they use both languages in business.

Yet for all the positive signs of growth among Latina-owned businesses, one figure in recent years has hardly budged: the percentage with access to bank loans. In a similar survey in 1998, the National Foundation for Women Business Owners found that 24% of Latina entrepreneurs had more than $100,000 in capital available. In this year's survey, the figure was 29%.


By Julie Fields in New York

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