Fast Start for a Latino Monthly

Alfredo J. Estrada hooks up with Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis on Friday for a 3-day campaign trip through Texas, California and other states. Along the way, he’s scheduled to have an exclusive interview with the Democrats’ newly anointed leader as Dukakis makes his first post-convention bid for votes in the fall election.

Later in the political season, Estrada says he will interview Vice President George Bush, the all-but-certain Republican nominee.

Not bad for the editor of a 4-month-old magazine with 10,000 subscribers.

Of course, that’s only part of the story.

Estrada is editor-in-chief of Hispanic magazine, based in Washington, and aimed at a market of 3 million middle-income and upwardly mobile Latinos. Former New Mexico Gov. Jerry Apodaca is the magazine’s publisher.

With $2-per-issue newsstand sales thrown in, the English-language magazine’s circulation is about 150,000 and subscriptions ($18 per year) are coming in at the rate of about 2,000 a month, Estrada said.

Ultimately, Estrada calculates that circulation could grow to around 500,000. Los Angeles, he said, is the magazine’s “main market,” accounting for 25% of its potential subscribers. In a bow to Southern California’s large Latino population, the big story for September will be “Hispanics in Hollywood” and will feature actor Edward James Olmos on the cover, Estrada said.

Access Shows Clout

The 29-year-old Cuban-born editor figures that his access to the presidential candidates is one indication of the emerging political clout of this country’s Latino population, estimated to be 20 million.

“I think this is the first election that people are saying, ‘My God, you can’t be President without the Hispanic vote,’ ” Estrada said, adding that the candidate interviews will run in the magazine’s October issue. He also noted that the August issue, due out in two weeks, will carry interviews with the candidates’ wives, Kitty Dukakis and Barbara Bush.

Because it is the only general-interest magazine for the nation’s Latinos, Estrada said the monthly, which averages about 70 pages, has been able to attract some big-name advertisers, including Coca-Cola, Budweiser, Chevrolet and a number of cigarette makers.

All are interested in tapping more of the $130 billion in purchasing power of the U.S. Latino population, he said, throwing out another statistic to bolster his claim of the magazine’s demographic niche.

Focus on Personalities

Editorially, Hispanic magazine seems to owe at least some of its appearance and content to publications such as People magazine.

It tends to focus on personalities--Gloria Estefan of Miami Sound Machine, Miss Universe Deborah Carthy Deu and Raquel Welch, for example--with additional articles on travel, history, how-to tips and a survey of Latino-related news around the country.

In its June issue the magazine dutifully reported that one critic had found some of the content, including the cover story on Latina actress Welch, “worthless froth” and “fawning puffery.”

Writer Jose Armas conceded in his column, “The negative reviews made us pay close attention and helped us keep one foot in the real world.”

Published in English

Ironically, the magazine’s most controversial move has been to publish in English rather than Spanish. In a letter to readers last month, publisher Apodaca acknowledged that many readers wondered if Hispanic is “supporting the ‘English only’ movement currently sweeping the country? Don’t we think that we will lose our culture if we do not use Spanish language in the magazine?”

Apodaca told readers that the magazine supports “bilingual efforts in this country” and added that “the ‘English only’ movement is a misguided effort that inflames the real issue.”

But he defended publishing the magazine in English because “the vast majority of Hispanics today buy, work and conduct their business in English. It is a safe statement to say that successful Hispanics speak English .”

Editor Estrada cited another statistic--72% of Latinos in the United States speak English. Most, he added, are second- and third-generation citizens of this country. English vs. Spanish is “the kind of issue that’ll always be around,” he said.