How big is the market?

Trilingual Packaging on Oxford Tab Dividers

I picked up a set of these at work to organize the information on each of the courses I'm teaching this semester. I know, nothing out of the ordinary here.

However, I do find it interesting that the packaging includes three languages; English, French and Spanish. English and French are mandatory for the Canadian market, and with NAFTA we are seeing more products that also have labelling in Spanish, in theory for the Mexican market.

But is that really the purpose? I would propose another reason. I think that Spanish is included for the HUGE Hispanic market in the US.

The anti-immigration folks in the US get their knickers in a twist about the number of people who speak little of no English. And any efforts to cater to the Spanish-speaking population are deemed to be unpatriotic. So, if you can say that you are including Spanish for your customers in Mexico you are in the clear. The fact that the vast majority of your Spanish-speaking customers are in the United States is just an inconvenient truth.