Hispanic Enterprise - October/November 2007 - (Page 37)

construction has never been more than 20 percent of the company’s sales; most of its business today is export, designers and architects, ofﬁce construction and medical ofﬁces. Iberia even supplies the growing international dental care franchise, VitalDent. Today, the company manufactures less than 5 percent of the product it sells, the bulk of which is sold for use in pools and industrial settings throughout Europe. “We have lots of different types of customers,” she says. “When one is doing bad, another is doing well. We need to be innovators all the time. We have to adapt to the market, to be ﬂexible and move from one market to another.” Sugrañes has been lauded for her success. In a ceremony at the U.S. Capitol, she was named Small Business Person of the Year by the Small Business Council of America. But it didn’t take an award for local executives to know her successes. Newsman and businessman Alberto Ibargüen has known Sugrañes since 1995, when he was named publisher of el Nuevo Herald. Since then, Ibargüen has watched not only the growth of Iberia Tiles, but of Sugrañes’ stature in Miami’s business and cultural community, as well. VITAL TO THE ARTS Sugrañes’ participation is vital to the local arts community and she is an “important player in downtown business circles,” says Ibargüen, formerly publisher of the Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald, and now president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Among other projects, the organization funds community advancement in the 26 areas where the Knight family once published newspapers. As a former newspaper publisher, Ibargüen was accustomed to being pitched by people with various agendas, people who would spin their message to win favor in the press. Direct and honest, Sugrañes would have none of that, he says. “She has the courage to say what she believes,” he says. “You always know where you stand with Rosa.” Today, Sugrañes stands as chairwoman of the $2.5 billion philanthropy’s Miami committee. Little wonder. Miami is HISPANIC ENTERPRISE * a city of transplants, whether from Latin and Ibero-America, or from throughout the U.S., he says. Any organization that seeks to serve a market so diverse needs a leader who knows it personally. “Whatever you do involves people from a different background,” Ibargüen says. “Our funding efforts need to create a new community with opportunities that come from a common experience.” Though known best as a skilled businesswoman—she’s played a key role as an company, she brings an entrepreneurial spirit to every one of these endeavors that is very unique,” he says. “She has just a fantastic ability to very quickly delve through a myriad of complicated issues and narrow it down to the real critical matters.” ALL IN THE FAMILY For her part, Sugrañes doesn’t work in the family’s European operations. Her father passed away in 2003, leaving the privately held European operations to a board of directors and family council under the guidance of her brother Marcelino Sugrañes, as president, and two sisters, Montse, who handles legal affairs, and Marta, who’s in marketing. Rosa is chairman of the family council. “My job is the keep the peace,” she jokes. Unlike her father’s expectation that she would someday enter the family business, Sugrañes, who is divorced, has no such designs for her two children, Fernando Vila, 22, Elisa Vila, 20. Both are students at Boston College who spent their summers working at the family business—both in Miami and Spain. But neither has sights set on the business. Fernando wants to live and work in China upon graduation next year, and then earn his MBA. As a speaker of Spanish, English and Chinese, Fernando would be a rare commodity. Besides, Sugrañes doesn’t want her children to join the company fresh out of college. “I tell them, ‘If you ﬁnally want to come to the family business, you have to work in another company for at least three years,’” she says. “I want them to get the discipline of being an employee and showing up every day. If after that they want to come to the family business, they are welcome.” Sugrañes takes great pride in her business, the two children she raised as a working mother, and the respect she’s earned throughout her community. As for that MBA she didn’t get back in the 1980s? Maybe Sugrañes doesn’t have that piece of parchment. But she knows she has the degree. “I ended up getting my MBA in business,” she says, “just not in school.” 37 “WE NEED TO BE INNOVATORS ALL THE TIME. WE HAVE TO ADAPT TO THE MARKET, TO BE FLEXIBLE AND MOVE FROM ONE MARKET TO ANOTHER. ” ambassador fostering commerce between Miami and her native Spain—Sugrañes is also a respected patron and proponent of the arts. She traces that to her native Barcelona, where art and architecture reach back 2000 years. Sugrañes blends well her civic activism, the arts and running a successful business. She’s “masterful” at getting people to work together toward common goals, says Adolfo Henriques, chairman and CEO of Florida East Coast Industries, where Sugrañes was on the board of directors. They met when Sugrañes was chairwoman of the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce. Today, the two sit on the Miami-Dade County arts council; in fact, Henriques joined at Sugrañes’ urging. “As a person who had the vision and ability to start her own very successful October/November 2007

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Hispanic Enterprise - October/November 2007

Hispanic Enterprise - October/November 2007 Contents BIZBUZZ: Business Briefs Trendsetters BIZTECH: Personally Digital BizLife - Travel: The Mobile Meeting Motoring: Is What You Drive, Who You Are? Q&A - Fact Tank for the Hispanic Population Hispanic Commerce Cover Story: Tiles with Style Success & Motivation: Grammy Whammy Finance: Talking Code Event: Masterminds NCLR Report - Improving your Triple Bottom Line Politics & Government: Keep on Truckin' Managing: Avoiding an Identity Crisis Franchising: Beyond the Brand Finance & Investing - Talking Money Movers & Shakers Regional Report - Louisiana, Louisiana Chamber Focus - On the Island of Enchantment

Hispanic Enterprise - October/November 2007

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