Former Coyotes CEO on the pivotal role of Latinos in shaping sports industry

PHOENIX (STN) – Xavier Gutierrez couldn’t bring himself to attend the last home game for the Arizona Coyotes.

“It was disappointing,” he said. “It was very, very sad.”

Even as the NHL club’s president and CEO at the time, Gutierrez knew the Coyotes’ game against the visiting Edmonton Oilers on April 17 was likely the franchise’s last home game.

“Unfortunately, we were unable to fulfill this vision of a permanent facility in this community,” he explained during the October episode of ‘It Happens at STN.’

But the man who was the first Latino president and CEO in NHL history hasn’t been defeated by the disappointment of the Coyotes’ departure. He learned from it, and now, he’s building on it.

“I was incredibly proud that we used this platform of sports for more than sports,” he said. “Ultimately, it’s a community asset. It drives community. So we need diverse voices at the seat of that decision-making.”

True to his word about supporting diversification in the sports industry, shortly after his tenure with the Coyotes ended, Gutierrez launched ImpactX Sports Group.

According to its website, ImpactX aims to strategically leverage the positive impact of sports on commerce, culture, and community to achieve business and financial success.

“This is the business plan,” he explained. “We’re going to go after these growth cohorts: young, female, tech-savvy, and, obviously in this community, we’re going to target this growing cohort of Latinos.

“Sports are important, and Latinos are important to sports.”

The numbers Gutierrez shared show that Latinos are passionate sports fans. They are 31% more likely to be avid WNBA fans. Nearly three-quarters of Latino sports fans are Gen Z, compared to half of the general population. They are also digitally savvy, with more than a third using TikTok to keep up with their favorite teams.

Most importantly, from a business standpoint, Latinos are 11% more likely to buy from a brand that sponsors their team.

Gutierrez said it is essential for the success of sports organizations and franchises—and the communities that support them—to understand how diverse their audiences are and to build leadership teams and marketing strategies that reflect that.

“You serve the fan by being competitive, by being compelling, by being accessible,” he said. “Then you go after the fan and win by being authentic, by being intentional.”

Gutierrez sees the ImpactX mission as a model for other organizations to follow.

“It’s a proxy for why we need diverse voices in banking and finance and in corporate boards and in community leadership—the heads of foundations and endowments and pension funds,” he said. “We need those diverse voices, not for performative reasons, but because they lead to better decision-making processes.”