ST. LOUIS • Not as well-known and certainly not as big as A-B InBev and Monsanto, Gonzalez Cos. is tucked between the two other businesses on a list of top sponsors of the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan St. Louis.
Sure, says company founder Anthony Gonzalez-Angel, the $10,000 a year his construction management firm pays to be a member helps promote his business. But he could do that with a lesser level of giving, or in different ways.
Gonzalez-Angel says he wants the chamber to have the tools it needs to continue its transition from more of a social entity to an agency that helps build and promote Hispanic businesses — and one that works to bridge the gap between small companies and large corporations.
“Economic empowerment leads to social empowerment,” Gonzalez-Angel said.
The chamber, around for three decades, has in the last few years raised its profile significantly. It has seen a surge in membership, made plans to buy its rented office space, scheduled a large-scale job fair for next month and has launched its first Latino Leadership Institute, supported by the chamber’s largest sponsor, Centene Corp.
Increasingly, larger and larger corporations are plunking down $5,000 to $25,000 to be bronze, silver, diamond and platinum-level members of the chamber.
But Karlos Ramirez, executive director of the Hispanic Chamber, said the organization is not forsaking the small storefront businesses that pay $150 a year to join.
“The majority of our members remain small businesses,” said Ramirez, who last worked as director of the university center and conference services at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio.
Partly in response to those smaller members, the growing chamber also is putting together its first restaurant guide, helping answer a common question: “Where do I go for good Mexican food?”
While becoming a resource for the region as well as its visitors, the guide also will give small businesses with small budgets a way to get their restaurants recognized. The guide will extend beyond Mexican to all Hispanic restaurants.
Gonzalez-Angel says he is pleased with the direction the chamber is headed and thinks its efforts can change the St. Louis business environment, which he describes as still “very black and white. Hispanics are the minorities of minorities.”
RAPID GROWTH
Hispanics continue to be the fastest-growing minority group in the region, but their numbers remain small. Of the 2.2 million people living in the region’s four largest counties and the city of St. Louis, 2.8 percent of them are Hispanic, according to the Census Bureau.
Gonzalez-Angel, whose Brentwood-based firm has 40 employees, says the chamber helps make the business community more aware of companies that are run by Hispanics as well as those that hire them.
“It’s critically important to St. Louis to have diversity,” Gonzalez-Angel said. “In the last four or five years, there have been changes. But there is resistance to change.”
The chamber has seen its membership grow by 80 percent in two years to 188. About half are Hispanic-owned companies, a balance Ramirez said the chamber would push to keep. Twelve of the 15 board of directors are Hispanic.
Ramirez said having full-time paid staff on board to promote the chamber and increasing the ways it gets involved in the community are among the reasons behind the growth.
Although 30 years old, the chamber did not have an executive director until 2010. A year ago this month, Ramirez became the second. There also are two other staff members, including an assistant director hired since Ramirez came on board. The annual budget is just over $200,000.
In late 2009, the chamber moved into nearly 3,200 square feet of office space in the old South Side National Bank on South Grand Boulevard, not far from Cherokee Street, the unofficial Hispanic neighborhood of St cash advances pay day loan. Louis. Earlier chamber locations included a small office on the University of Missouri-St. Louis campus, and the basement of a bank on Gravois Avenue, about a block from the current offices.
The chamber has just begun a $300,000 capital campaign to buy the office space.
“It shows that we have a home, a set place,” Ramirez said, “and that we are a committed part of the community.”
The chamber received a $500,000 federal grant to lease the space as well as the build-out and furniture.
GROOMING LEADERS
John Sondag, president of AT&T Missouri, said the chamber is making moves that position it to be more influential in the region’s business world.
Sondag was one of several corporate executives asked about a decade ago to sit on a chamber advisory committee. The chamber wanted to better tap into corporate St. Louis and better define its role, Sondag said.
“Up until then, it was more of a social club,” Sondag said. “Members would join but do more socializing rather than traditional chamber work to develop businesses. It’s important for us as a business to help other businesses grow. If the communities we serve grow, we all prosper and benefit.”
A grant from AT&T in 2009 was used to buy 30 computers for the chamber’s technology center. The chamber’s board president, Emma Espinoza, is an AT&T manager. And the company is sending one of its customer service representatives through the chamber’s Latino Leadership Institute, a nine-month professional development program which began in October with 11 applicants.
Ramirez hopes the institute becomes a staple of the programming and training offered through the chamber. The goal is to groom young Latinos early in their careers to better navigate the corporate world and become community leaders.
“Ten years from now, think about the difference that would make in St. Louis,” Ramirez said.
Longtime chamber board member Michael Zambrana said corporate involvement with the chamber is about more than offering experience, money and other resources.
“There is a more fundamental reason and that is for recruiting purposes,” said Zambrana, president and CEO of Pangea Inc., a construction and environmental services firm. “A lot of these companies do international business. They are looking for a connection to bring culture into their companies. It’s required in the international marketplace.”
CREATING VALUE
Ramirez said joining is appealing because it allows members to “tap into the workforce and the Hispanic buying power” and “helps companies with their diversity initiatives. Value means different things to different people.”
At La Vallesana, a Mexican restaurant on Cherokee Street, owner Hilario Vargas says the chamber has been a supportive partner in promoting the expansion of his business. The chamber held a ribbon-cutting to coincide with the September opening of the new addition. Two more expansions, including enlarging the dining room and adding a courtyard, are expected to be completed by summer. The dining guide will be an easy way to update the restaurant’s progress, Vargas said.
“They helped get the word out that we are no longer a little taco stand and now we’ve grown,” Vargas said of the chamber, with translation help from a manager.
The job and business fair next month at a downtown hotel is expected to have at least 60 vendors. Ramirez said it will be the largest hiring event held yet by the chamber, and one that he wants to grow each year.
“I genuinely believe diversity is valued in this region,” Ramirez said.
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