Jose Molina spent months preparing his Woodburn, Oregon, businesses for the World Cup, organizing giveaways and raffles, arranging tables and screens to show the games and using social media to promote his food truck, El Pariente Mariscos y Mas, according to Molina. “If you want to market to Latinos,” he said, “TikTok and Facebook is what hits.”
El Pariente’s menu and online posts reflect the community it serves: aguachiles, carne asada, chorizo and bistec tacos, and flaming-grilled octopus. Molina showed a first video on the truck’s TikTok from April 2025 that he said helped sell out the opening weekend, and some posts include voiceovers that say, “estamos en Oregon pero el sabor es 100% Sinaloense.”
The truck sits off North Front Street in downtown Woodburn, where sidewalks narrow between carts selling fruit and vegetables and banners read “Bienvenidos” and “Welcome.” Spanish is commonly used in the town’s conversations and signage, and 95 percent of downtown businesses are Latino-owned and operated; some residents refer to the area as “Little Mexico.”
Soccer is woven into that public life. Molina recalled children playing near El Pariente and said the game resonates because it is played outdoors and “it feels like they’re home again, like in our country.” The World Cup prompted questions among residents about whether people would return to downtown to watch and celebrate the matches.
Anthony Veliz, who grew up in downtown Woodburn and moved to Portland a year ago, said he still recognizes faces across town. Veliz noted he was the first Latino elected to the school board and only the second city councilor, adding, “we were the majority at that time.” The town’s demographic shift traced back decades, the result in part of labor movements during World War II, including defense-industry draws to Portland and Seattle and the forced internment of people of Japanese ancestry that reduced agricultural labor; Woodburn once billed itself the “Berry Center of the World.”
