My choice to study Gay Latinos’ perception on gay-friendly advertising came after reading an article about the gay community as a niche market that companies are attempting to reach.  Most gay-friendly advertisements are directed at gay men but  that doesn’t necessarily reach the lesbian community. Aside from that, most advertisements directed at gay men feature mostly white men.  I know how I felt as a gay Latino about gay advertisements, but I wanted to find out the perception other gay Latinos had and how they experienced it.

The Latino community in the US is racially diverse, but has a collective culture where language, customs, and perceptions are the same. Therefore, racial categorization can be difficult because it’s possible for a Latin person to identify as White because of their race, but they may not feel White. So,  with this in mind I wanted to see how some gay Latinos felt about gay-friendly advertisements, whether they identified with them, and see if they identified more as a Latino consumer or a gay consumer.

I held a focus group with 2 participants (it was supposed to be 3 but the third person was sick) where we spoke for approx. 1 hr to discuss being a gay Latino and gay-friendly advertising.  During the focus group I showed the participants 2 advertisements to get their commentary. One was an ad from Miller Lite  which was a direct  advertisement to the gay community. The second was an “in-group” advertisement, which is an ad that features language or imagery that is unique to the market it’s aimed at but can go unnoticed by other consumers.

The focus group went really well and I found out that the participants were unaffected by gay-friendly advertisements if it was something they would buy anyway. One of my participants said  “Seeing a Latino in a gay-friendly advertisement would be nice but it  wouldn’t change my mind about buying something because Latinos aren’t featured in most advertising anyway”. It wasn’t what I thought I would get but interesting nonetheless.

Below you’ll see the advertisements I used

Courtesy of Miller LIte

Courtesy of Travelocity