Top Latino roofing contractors from across the nation gathered at the Hilton Anatole Dallas Aug. 14-15 for Owens Corning’s inaugural Pantera Pros Summit, marking a milestone in the company’s commitment to Latino business excellence.
“We’re gathering our top platinum preferred Hispanic contractors from around the country,” said Octavio Vazquez, program lead for Owens Corning’s Latino Program. “For us, it’s a chance to celebrate the community, to help them by giving them access to all of our tools, networking, resources, all in Spanish.”
Among the attendees were Juan and Angie Jaramillo, owners of Sky Light Roofing in Orlando.
“We’ve been with Owens Corning about eight years already, and I think it changed the dynamic in our company because we built a culture and we follow in the culture,” said Juan, CEO, and a native of Colombia. “The partnership with Owens Corning and what we have in our company, everything lights up perfectly.”
For the Jaramillos, the Owens Corning partnership extends beyond business—it’s about quality assurance and brand integrity.
“To us, it’s more importantly about building a relationship not just with our clients but also with our manufacturers, our suppliers,” said Angie Jaramillo, Sky Light’s vice president. “Every product that we put out there has the seal of quality that we want to give our clients.”
The Latino Business Revolution
To put the summit’s importance in perspective, Owens Corning invited Charlie Echeverry, founder of Los Angeles research and consulting firm Black/Brown, to share insights on why Latino entrepreneurs are driving unprecedented growth across all business sectors.
Echeverry’s journey to understanding Latino business power began during his tenure at Walt Disney Company, where he was tasked with selling digital advertising on the emerging internet. As a first-generation American born to Colombian immigrants, Echeverry had grown up across Latin America—from Mexico City to Buenos Aires to Caracas—before settling in the United States. It wasn’t until he analyzed audience engagement data at Disney that he experienced what he calls his “aha moment.”
“The younger you were and the more Latino you were, the better you performed,” Echeverry explained. “The better you pay attention to things, the more you engage, the more you share, the more you liked, the more you commented, and it was universal. Mientras más latino, más engagement, más performance.”
The statistics Echeverry shared with attendees paint a picture of unprecedented economic transformation. While Latinos represent 19% of the U.S. population, they created 36% of all new businesses in the past year—a rate of entrepreneurship that far outpaces any other demographic group. With more than five million Latino-owned businesses currently operating in the United States, this segment is growing 44 times faster than the general market and contributing nearly $800 billion annually to the American economy.
“We’re not just building companies,” Echeverry told the audience. “We’re creating a new model of American leadership, and it’s happening right now. You’re at Ground Zero of this revolution.”
Owens Corning’s Strategic Investment in Latino Market Growth
Mike Schneider, VP of strategic marketing at Owens Corning, emphasized the significance of the Latino community’s explosive growth and business acumen.
“Latino business owners represent tremendous opportunity and tremendous value drivers for the world,” Schneider told attendees, highlighting data showing this population segment will outpace virtually every other group from 2040 to 2050.
Owens Corning now employs five bilingual customer service agents, led by Vicky Ferris, to assist both contractors and Spanish-speaking homeowners. Additionally, the company offers Spanish-language website literature and has developed bilingual training platforms, including OC Connect and OC University.
Schneider also pointed to the entrepreneurial spirit that defines many Latino contractors: “Thinking of starting from nothing or starting in a trade and elevating to become an owner, elevating to become someone that brings in new resources and takes a business from here to here, that’s inspiring to us.”
The cultural connection proves invaluable for networking and professional development.
“As Latinos, we know the challenges that we face,” Angie Jaramillo said. “As a culture, I think it’s important to network, to connect. It gives us a space where we can all do that and share with each other what worked, didn’t work for us—and nothing better than doing it with your same culture, people that speak your language and just feeling more comfortable.”
Jesus Chavez, president of TelevisaUnivision Los Angeles, reinforced the importance of fostering entrepreneurial thinking from an early age.
“I look back and I wish I had embraced entrepreneurship much, much earlier in my career,” Chavez told attendees. “It’s something I have a 13-year-old and it’s something that I’m constantly trying to encourage her at 13 to think about.”
With the success of this inaugural summit and Owens Corning’s continued investment in Latino contractor development, the company plans to expand the program, continuing to provide elite-level experiences and fostering growth within the Latino roofing community nationwide.
As Vazquez noted, the goal is simple: “We want to help empower that community and make sure that they have everything they need to grow together.”
