With Hispanic Heritage Month officially underway, The Drum surveys top ad agencies on how they’re uplifting Latinx and Hispanic communities, supporting small businesses and celebrating the culture, food and art of the diaspora.
TBWA\Chiat\Day
As a member of the community, this month is incredibly important to me. We’re kicking off Hispanic Heritage Month with an episode of our internal podcast, Pirate Radio, dedicated to further educating the agency on its importance. In addition, we’ll be hosting food markets, cooking classes with our Latinx employee resource group as well as an agency-wide tequila tasting within our NYC office. For our satellite offices, we’re providing gift cards to local Latinx-owned businesses. To close out festivities, we’re aiming to host a thoughtful conversation with an external speaker from the Hispanic community.
And while it’s important to acknowledge Hispanic Heritage Month, the real work starts with ensuring there’s diverse representation within the organization. Over the past two years we’ve redesigned our recruitment process to reduce bias and ensure objectivity, making structural changes to how we recruit and interview, while underscoring the importance of being intentional while hiring. Our hiring managers across disciplines are trained on best practices for eliminating bias from interviews and the recruitment process. Take a peek at our open roles!
Nancy Reyes, chief executive officer, TBWA\Chiat\Day NY
Havas
Diversity and inclusion are cornerstones of Havas. This Hispanic Heritage Month, Havas is continuing the spirit of Vas Con Todos, a campaign initiated by Republica Havas in 2021 that embraces unity by recognizing the nuances that make Latinos so diverse – and calls on all to stick together despite these differences. Centered around the theme of empowerment through empathy and understanding, the campaign focuses on how we can move forward together. It speaks to allyship inside and out of the Hispanic and Latino community, reminding Latinos and other minority groups that their wins are not just their wins, but instead, their wins are for all – their families, their friends, their countries and their people.
In addition to the campaign, there will also be a variety of programming across the Havas network, such as ‘Havas Nights’ with music, dancing, food and drinks, trivia marathons, a virtual book club, employee highlights on social media, a panel with Latino leaders in advertising and media, a celebratory happy hour to round out the month, a digital art gallery showcasing Latino art and so much more.
Everyone has a village, and here at Havas, we have over 60 villages committed to ensuring that Hispanics and all minority groups feel understood and represented in the ways they want and are given the opportunity to shine and share their talents every day.
Stephanie Nerlich, chief executive officer, Havas Creative North America
Edelman
Edelman has an active and growing employee network group of approximately 100 Hispanic/Latinx employees called Inclusivo. This year, our theme to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month is #HopefulTogether, and our month-long calendar of events is meant to encourage everyone to show their pride and support while learning. We are kicking it off today with an external guest panel that brings together Claudia Romo Edelman from We Are All Human and Erika Soto Lamb from MTV and Comedy Central, moderated by Ana Ceppi, Edelman’s Hispanic marketing senior advisor. In addition, we have two internal employee panels on the impact of gun violence on Latino communities and on rethinking Hispanic voters and issues.
Lastly, our Edelman Media Network is hosting a special ‘Meet the Media’ event with prominent Latino reporters from both Hispanic and general market media outlets on the importance of Latinx representation in media and in the newsroom when covering breaking news. Edelman Inclusivo is creating the space for representation, inclusiveness and belonging that our Hispanic and Latinx employees deserve and want, and we are very proud to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month.
Carla Santiago, general manager, Edelman Miami
UM Worldwide
For Hispanic Heritage Month, UM is partnering with Paramount and purpose-driven marketing and advertising company Givsly on multiple activations designed not only to learn and experience Hispanic culture, but to give back to the community and support organizations. We’ll participate in donations to UnidosUS and the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights – two organizations that center their efforts around civil rights and advocacy.
We’re hosting chef Danielle Duran of Mexitalian pop-up Amiga Amore at our LA office for a live ‘Food for the Soul’ event, which is our ongoing experiential series for UMers to connect with culture through cuisine.
Back on the East Coast, we’ll host a panel entitled, ‘Capturing La Cultura: The Underrepresentation & Misrepresentation of Latinos in the US’ at our NYC office to delve into the multi-layered diversity of Latino audiences, going beyond numbers and demographic descriptions to uncover the passions, concerns and cultural anchors of the community. Lastly, we’re inviting our employees to join a virtual 5K race to raise donations for our nonprofits.
Jeff Marshall, chief diversity officer, UM
Stagwell
Throughout the month we’re giving a platform to Hispanic creatives in the network to share their artwork on Stagwell channels, with pieces reflecting a mosaic of perspectives on their Hispanic identity.
And at our global headquarters in New York, we’re curating a panel on the transformation in Hispanic representation in marketing, alongside Concentric Health Experience, a Stagwell healthcare agency, followed by a multicultural cuisine experience and mixer to help connect our talent across the month.
We know that Hispanic perspectives on heritage and identity are incredibly nuanced and diverse, and we’re excited to lean into two of our core superpowers – creativity and collaboration – in celebration of them.
Stephanie Howley, chief people officer, Stagwell
Deutsch NY
At Deutsch NY we celebrate 24/7/365, all cultures, lifestyles and people. One of our Hispanic Heritage Month activities, planned by our 24/7/365 team, is a community potluck lunch. Potluck will feature favorite family dishes, prepared by Deutschers, who will share anecdotes about what they’ve brought in. We’ll also create recipe cards that include an anecdote, family photos and additional information for anyone who’d like a copy of the recipe. To give back to the community, we’ll supplement lunch with food from local, New York Hispanic-owned restaurants and caterers. Everyone loves snacks, so our selection of treats will feature Hispanic-owned snacks, from Siete Foods and Nemi Snacks – Nemi’s Cactus Sticks are a favorite of ours, as well as Vero Mango Paletas. Around the agency, we’ll hang posters with quotes from Hispanic employees about their experience, culture and hopes for the future. It’s a great way to learn more about your coworkers.
Eden Zugel, manager of culture and agency experience, Deutsch NY
M&C Saatchi
In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month and our ongoing commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment North America wanted to celebrate the rich history, many contributions and diverse cultures of the Latin American community. With food being a major part of the Hispanic culture, we wanted to bring the staff together for a flavorful bonding experience through cooking. Food naturally brings people together and recipes allow a personal connection between generations across all walks of life. To celebrate, M&C is finalizing a partnership to bring a cooking class to our staff to experience more about the Latin culture.
Nijha Diggs, senior vice-president and diversity, equity and inclusion lead, M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment North America
R/GA
While last year’s events were centered around educating our allies, this year we want to take our planning to the next level and focus our attention on the amazingly talented Latin employees at R/GA and how their identities, intersectionalities and culture nurture sinergia, [or synergy]. For [R/GA’s Latin and Hispanic heritage culture collective] SOMOS sinergia represents the idea that by empowering each other, we can go further than we could by ourselves.
Hispanic History Month Celebrations will kick off with an internal global meeting introducing our new co-chairs, new executive sponsors, new guiding principles and our plans for the rest of the month. [Our programming] includes a SOMOS soiree at a Latine-owned restaurant in Manhattan, a fireside chat with three Latine R/GA executive leaders and a food tour collaboration with the Asian Voices culture collective.
We are very excited about all the celebrations we have planned, but we believe that the fireside chat with Latine Executive Leadership will be incredibly impactful, eye-opening and inspiring for many. We will be focusing on how our culture impacts the way we work, the struggles we face, the nuances we’d love everyone to know about us and our identities. And more importantly, we’ll talk about how the Latine community isn’t a monolith.
Daniela Herrera, Angel Mendieta, Anthony Venegas, Johanna Sajuk, Joyce Vazquez and Nathalie Tigua, co-chairs of SOMOS, R/GA
Digitas
Adelante, Digitas' Latinx business resource group, aims to bring exposure to the nuance, creativity and impact the Latinx population has on society by supporting, educating and celebrating their members, the agency and the community. We want people to feel heard, included, respected, supported – but most importantly, valued – for the unique perspectives they bring to Digitas. We celebrate all year-round, but most importantly, during Hispanic Heritage Month, we increase our efforts. For this year's Hispanic Heritage Month celebration, we organized events in partnership with our sister agency, Leo Burnett's BRG Casa.
Adelante and Casa will host a ‘Paint Your Own Alebrije’ interactive workshop with Puech Ikots‘ Carlos Orozco. Attendees will learn the history and origins of alebrijes, [figurines with roots in Mexican history], and they will be able to design their very own folk art sculptures.
We're also very excited about our Mexican Independence Day dinner at Ronald McDonald House. After spending a long day at the hospital by their child's side, returning to a warm meal at the Ronald McDonald House makes a big difference to families. Digitas and Leo Burnett volunteers will cook a tasty dinner for families staying at the Ronald McDonald House in Chicago, who are predominantly Latinx.
Lastly, we will host a virtual conversation with the curator of ‘Appearances Can Be Deceiving: Frida Kahlo,’ Luanda López Herrera. Luanda will speak about her experience working as a curator for this exhibition around the world, share interesting facts about Frida Kahlo and uncover behind-the-scenes insights about the popular exhibition.
Karen Rangel, senior social strategist and national lead for Adelante
For more, sign up for The Drum’s daily US newsletter here.
