LATINA Style Magazine, a national magazine for the professional Hispanic working woman, is proud to announce the results of the LATINA Style 50 – 2001, its annual national listing of the top fifty companies providing the best professional opportunities for Latinas. The result of an extensive search that involved researching more than 600 of the most respected corporations in the U.S., the LATINA Style 50 is the only national effort to evaluate corporate America’s responsiveness to the needs and aspirations of the modern Hispanic working woman. The LATINA Style 50 – 2001 marks the fourth year the magazine has evaluated corporate America’s sensitivity to Latina needs in the workplace.

Companies responding to LATINA Style’s survey were evaluated based on the issues LATINA Style readers identified as most important to them in the workplace. The principal areas of evaluation were: Number of Latina Executives, Mentoring Programs, Women on Board of Directors, Educational Opportunities, Dependent/Child Care Support, Leave for Childbirth, Alternative Work Policies, Benefits, Women’s Issues, and Hispanic Relations.

Anna Maria Arias, Editor and Publisher of LATINA Style Magazine, says that as the only national 100 percent Latina-owned publication on the market, we have a duty to keep working Hispanic women informed about corporate America’s best employment practices. “By the latest count, Hispanic women in the U.S. work force number 5 million, and the numbers continue to rise. We have gone to great lengths to evaluate these companies. Latinas can be confident that the LATINA Style 50 – 2001 represents the best corporate America has to offer to the Latina working woman,” Arias says.

The companies will be recognized at an awards ceremony taking place in Washington, D.C. during Hispanic Heritage Month.

THE LATINA Style 50 – 2001

Aetna Inc.

AFLAC Inc.

Allstate Insurance Company

American Express Company

Avon Products, Inc.

Bank One Corporation

Chevron Corporation

CIGNA Corporation

Citigroup Inc. *Company of the Year

Colgate-Palmolive Company

Coors Brewing Company

DaimlerChrysler

DuPont

Eastman Kodak Company

Fannie Mae

Federated Department Stores, Inc.

FleetBoston Financial

Ford Motor Company

General Mills, Inc.

General Motors Corporation

IBM

Johnson & Johnson

J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.

Kellogg Company

Kraft Foods Inc.

Lucent Technologies

Marriott International, Inc.

Mattel, Inc.

McDonald’s Corporation

Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc.

Morgan Stanley

New York Life Insurance Company

PepsiCo, Inc.

Philip Morris Companies Inc.

Pitney Bowes Inc.

Principal Financial Group

R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company

Ryder System, Inc.

SBC Communications Inc.

Sears, Roebuck and Co.

Southern California Edison

State Farm Insurance Companies

Target Corporation

Texas Instruments

The Procter & Gamble Company

Prudential Insurance Company of America

USAA

Verizon Communications

Wachovia Corporation

Washington Mutual, Inc.