BY GREGG FIELDS
gfields@herald.com

Carlos Gutierrez showed an affinity for new cultures early on -- like when, as a 6-year-old Cuban exile in 1960, he first learned English from a hotel bellhop in Miami.

Later, he started a career at the Kellogg Co. by driving a truck delivering Frosted Flakes in Mexico City. That began a trek that would take him to several global postings before he became chief executive of the Battle Creek, Mich., food industry giant.

Monday, he was tapped once again for a top post when President Bush nominated him to be U.S. secretary of commerce. In that position, he would be the de facto emissary for American business at home and abroad. And Gutierrez's multicultural ease makes him the perfect candidate for the job, President Bush said in a White House news conference.

''He understands the world of business from the first rung on the ladder to the very top,'' the president said. ``He knows exactly what it takes to help American businesses grow and create jobs.''

Gutierrez must be confirmed by the Senate before assuming his new title. He would replace Donald Evans, who is returning to Texas.

After fleeing Cuba, Gutierrez's family initially settled in Key Biscayne, then moved to Mexico City, New York and back to South Florida. He graduated from Fort Lauderdale's Northeast High School in 1972, according to a Kellogg spokesman.

Gutierrez, who turned 51 earlier this month, came from a prosperous background in Cuba, where his father ran a pineapple cannery. The family lived in the Havana suburb of Miramar.

He became a U.S. citizen in New York several years after arriving according to a White House spokesman. The family never quite regained its former prosperity and eventually settled in Mexico City in search of opportunities.

''I left Cuba to come to this great country in 1960 as a political refugee,'' Gutierrez said Monday at the White House. ``I left with my parents and my brother, and we started, essentially, from scratch at that time.''

GUTIERREZ'S ROOTS

In a Hispanic magazine interview earlier this year, Gutierrez said he was proud of his roots.

''Cuban families talk a lot about the fact that they're Cuban,'' he said. ``Cuba and the culture were really drilled into me at home, and I've probably done the same with my kids.''

In Washington, he will join a growing roster of prominent Cuban Americans, including Florida's newly elected U.S. senator, Mel Martinez.

Several Cuban-American political leaders said they already know and admire Gutierrez.

''I just do not know of a more qualified person,'' said U.S. Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Miami. ``He made it to the top of the corporate world after starting at the bottom.''

Diaz-Balart got to know Gutierrez when the Kellogg executive's son, Carlos Jr., worked on the congressman's staff.

''He is one of those guys who doesn't try to show you how good he is,'' Diaz-Balart said. ``He's simple, humble and incredibly talented.''

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, also a Republican member of Congress from Miami, concurred. Ros-Lehtinen, senior member of the House International Relations Committee, has met with Gutierrez numerous times on subjects like trade and international development.

''He can see economic policy, and how it affects Joe Lunch Bucket and Corporate America,'' she said.

Although the commerce secretary traditionally focuses on economic policy, she added that Gutierrez has shown a keen interest in areas like the Cuban embargo and strengthening dissidents on the island, as well.

Gutierrez went to business school at the Monterrey Institute of Technology in Mexico before joining Kellogg in 1975. He later was given wide credit for engineering a turnaround at its troubled Mexican unit.

He headed Kellogg units in Canada and the Asian Pacific before becoming chief executive of the whole company in 1999. Kellogg surpassed General Mills as the No. 1 U.S. cereal maker in 2002 after Gutierrez introduced new products targeting health-conscious consumers.

With his success at Kellogg, Gutierrez was recently mentioned as a possible candidate to lead the Coca-Cola Co.

BUSINESS REPUTATION

During his tenure at Kellogg, he developed a reputation for effective communications and tough decision making. He shocked Battle Creek by closing a historic, but outmoded, cereal plant. But he later earned plaudits when the merger with Keebler brought hundreds of new jobs to town.

''The community just thinks he's fabulous,'' said Dr. William C. Richardson, chief executive of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. A separate entity from the famed cereal company, the foundation elected Gutierrez co-trustee. ``He's a wonderful people-person who can make the tough decision.''

Richardson said a key to Gutierrez's success is, simply, an unbounded curiosity.

But others add that his climb to the top also reflected a rock-solid work ethic.

''He's a very hard-working man,'' said his mother, Olga, who lives in Miami. ``He goes to the office on Sunday all the time. He's always been like that.''