Interesante … “tiran la piedra y se esconden” on the controversia “Brown is the new Green’.

We have received an incredible amount of responses to our opinion piece we ran last week on George Lopez’ “Brown is the new Green”.

Interesting the majority of the responses seem to encourage the views that Phillip Rodriguez (filmmaker), Mr. Lopez and the documentary brings forth. It is our obligation and intent to never endanger or expose the names and companies that the individuals work for that willingly would allow us to do so.

Basically the majority agree that “Americans are in a collective state of confusion about Latinos. In Brown is the New Green, Rodriguez argues that Latino image is stage-managed by marketers and media companies. Mainstream media have largely ignored them, while Spanish-language networks and Hispanic ad companies have served up an exoticized image that has no basis in contemporary American reality. While Lopez advocates Latinos’ move into the media mainstream, Hispanic marketers have a different agenda: to present Latinos as a separate America. Whether their target audience is elderly immigrants or predominantly English-speaking youth, these Hispanic marketers are pursuing Latino dollars via the myth of cultural otherness. Brown is the New Green reveals clips of their programming – from “folkloric” commercials to cheesy Latin American soap operas to butt-shakin’ bicultural videos.”.

The interesting point here is the amount of supports by individuals within the agencies and the media that earn their living in the advertising, marketing and media targeting US Hispanic predominately in Spanish.

When asked if we could publish their thoughts, none would allows us to to do so and/or would not respond to our requests.

To those of you who do not agree with the current directionality of the industry and agree with George Lopez we suggest the following:

1- Take a hard look at yourself and what you stand for.
2- If you believe that Mr. Lopez’ views are correct (you have a right to do so), create and be part of internal company strategic thinking sessions and try creating strategies that possibly demonstrate the viability of targeting Latinos not as Latinos
3- If you feel creating ROI for clients is achieved efficiently and effectively this way, voice it.
4- If you do not believe in the directionality or strategic focus in servicing clients based on your company’s philosophy, then do not work there.
5- Be true to your views, thoughts and self.
6- We need to analyze, create and present strategic initiatives that will helps us continue to build our Industry.

But do not be part of any group that ”Tira la piedra y se esconden” (throws the stone and hides). George Lopez isn’t part of this group, regardless if we agree or disagree with his views. So why should you be?

We do believe that the reason we have this ‘bye ven” (back & forth in island speak) on the language and cultural mix differences in targeting our consumers is that we need as an industry to table all of these issues and come up with a comprehensive Industry understanding that is back by ‘best standards’ research so that we can the begin to move forward to help grow the business to levels we have yet to imagine.

We also challenge agency heads and media management to not suppress strategic thinking and lets begin to work on an open process of understanding and strategically preparing models that address the changing US Hispanic Consumer. Invite your talented employees to create strategic think tanks in your organizations and become the leaders of the future our industry needs to begin fomenting for our next phase of growth.

Hopefully the Association of Hispanic Advertising Agencies conference in New York in November 2007 will be another stepping stone to a better understanding of these issues. Joins us there!

But if they are willing to ‘tirar la piedra y esconderse” we have a problem. Let’s fix it, since we owe to ourselves, critics and especially our clients.

We at HispanicAd.com and our sister publication ADnotas.com (Puerto Rico) offer a platform for the exchange of ideas, thoughts and strategic think. Your thoughts are important and should be heard, but we cannot bring them to the forefront if you do not agree and/or have the courage to be recognized.

Maybe George Lopez might want to share his own personal conclusion with us without the comical slant, send me an e-mail George.

Gene Bryan
CEO
HispanicAd.com
ADnotas.com