Meet Joanne Santiago | co-owner of C.O EL NIGERIANO J.J

We had the good fortune of connecting with Joanne Santiago and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Joanne, is there something that you feel is most responsible for your success?
The factor behind the brand’s success is to offer a product as it is our value proposal; combined with a customer service loaded with honesty, respect, empathy and kindness. We treat our customers as people, having sympathy with them while others looks at them as a money bill

Also, I think that our success comes from autoinnovation. In our beginnings, we had a bottle that was not attractive to customers in our market. Today, we have a packaging that appeals to our customers and our final consumer. Before the Covid lockdown occured, we already had our website and had sales through our website and in our industry, we are the first in having a ecommerce global website.

So, if I could use 3 words to describe the factor behind our success will be: Autoinnovation, Respect and Empathy.
If it were not so, we wouldn’t have loyal customers from our beginning, such as Mrs. Victoria, who has been our customer since day 1 and has remained with our in our 12 year commercial and growth journey

Alright, so for those in our community who might not be familiar with your business, can you tell us more?
El Nigeriano was born in September of 2010. My dad (when I refer my dad it means my step-dad) presented the idea to my mom since he noticed that the spiritual products that were on the market on that moment, didn’t represented the real and how the spiritual products should be. My dad’s background is he was a private investigator and my mom worked in a call center. I was a almost a teenager watching my parents developing this new business idea and how to manufacture quality spiritual products. My dad always says that he had the idea but my mom made that idea into something real, She created the logo and the different products’ art and that’s why we say that she is the founder of C.O EL NIGERIANO J.J

When the business had a name, logo, clients, we wanted to learn more about business concept. Even though my dad was a private investigator and he had attorneys as clients, he gave a service. He didn’t knew the concept of inventory, manufacturing, cost per products and so on and my mom was a customer service employee in this call center and knew how to do marketing but she didn’t knew different business concepts. When they start looking for information people starting asking: ’oh, what is your business about?’ and when my parents or even me told them about the business it was a huge change in their face but in a negative way.

That was one of the challenges we faced; we were fast forward in time about energy cleanse topic. On Puerto Rico every person believes in superstitions; the first rain of May, don’t get marry on Tuesday, don’t open a umbrella inside your home, etc. but in 2010 decade that was still a taboo talking about that but they were people that they had no shame in saying ’I believe in this, I use this, I recommend this’ and we overcome the challenges having no shame on our business, having our head high and looking directly to the person’s eyes when saying who we are.

There are a ton of lessons that I have learned in the past 12 years of El Nigeriano that I take them personally and professionally but one of them that I always keep it on my mind is: Never have doubt of your business. Never doubt if you are in the correct industry just because people are discriminating you for your business concept. Always talk about your business with passion, pride and confidence about what is your goal, your business vision and achievements are.

Maybe people will say: ’How you are different from the rest?’ or ’How can I have the guarantee that your products are plant-based and that they work?’ Simple, number 1, people when don’t like something, they don’t buy it and we don’t only supply to spiritual shops and witchcraft stores in Puerto Rico, people from the USA and Spain buy our products through our website that is coelnigerianojj.com and on our website graphics shows us that people from Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela, even on Greece and Ireland they see our website and they stay on our website watching at our products. We are having a impact not only in Puerto Rico and USA, we are also globalizing our brand and making the energy cleanse and spiritual cleanse rituals a normal thing in our life because we are energy and we exchange energy every second doing work, cooking, cleaning and even having interaction with people. We exchange energy all the time.

The 2nd thing that make us different is that we not only manufacture products that are plant-based, we have a exclusive product call 2 in 1 and you can use it as a bath wash or to clean your floor and house. You can see the plants inside and the product it doesn’t get damaged, doesn’t ferment thanks to the secret formula that this product has. Our best seller from that product line is The 21 combo. Are 2 bottles, one has the bitter plants to clean all your energy from toxic negative energy and the other one have the sweet elements that restore your energy, attracting positive energy to your environment.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Being honest I’m more of a home chill movie stay at home with my dog vibe but sometimes I like going out. If you were coming to stay for a week in Puerto Rico this will be my plan (The orders of the places are not which is the best to the worst, not a day in particular for this activities but some only opens a day in particular)

Arrive at Puerto Rico international airport located in Carolina, Puerto Rico (SJU airport)

If you arrived at night, you can eat at the hotel restaurant but if you want pizza with different variations, you should go to a pizza place called La Masa Pizzería Conceptual located at Old San Juan (petfriendly)

Only Sundays: Finca Mi Diana. It’s a place that is only open on sundays and its located at Yauco, south of Puerto Rico. Its a farm where he sells all the fruits, vegetables and Puertorrican coffee that he grows and lets people walk around on the farm and its a family type activity

From Friday – Sunday: El Rancho de Don Nando. It’s a good place to eat typical food from Puerto Rico located at Naranjito. Its a go to place if you want to ‘chinchorriar’ (Puertorrican slang of saying eating in different typical food restaurants that are in the center of Puerto Rico) and to have fun listening to typical music and just having fun with Puertorricans that are there with their family, friends or just want to disconnect from the metropolitan world and have fun

Go to different beaches: A specific beach I cannot tell you cause all of our beaches are beautiful. You can go from west (Rincon, Aguadilla, Aguada, Isabela, Mayagüez) ’til East (Fajardo, Luquillo, Nagüabo, Humacao, Yabucoa, Vieques and Culebra)

Castillo San Felipe El Morro: This is one of the most classical places to go. For us Puertorricans this is our baby. Besides being a big place, is rich in history. When commercial ships enter to Puerto Rico, that’s the first thing that they see before going to Cataño (that is where most of the merchandise arrives by ship)

Anita La Mamma del Gelato: It’s a gelato place at Old San Juan next to La Fortaleza. They have different great gelato flavors and also they have options for doggies too

De Varona: If you want to have a brunch while your dog is having fun at the park, definitely you should go to this place. They are located at Guaynabo. Its a private dog park, they take very seriously the security of different dogs and their owners and you can have your coffee while playing with your fur-baby

Casa Bacardi: Its a rum distillery. They will tell you about their story, they give mixology classes and tastings. They are located at Cataño (I personally have never been in Casa Bacardi but I’m planning to go soon)

Caffellatte Lares: They are a coffee shop located at Lares next to Cafe Oro. Cafe Oro is a local company who process the 50% of the coffee here on Puerto Rico and they distribute to different supermarkets. At Caffelatte there’s a window where you can see part of the warehouse and sometimes, you can smell the roasting coffee.

Chocobar Cortés: This is a place for chocolate lovers. Chocobar is literally a chocolate bar. They serve different types of chocolate beverages with or without alcohol. Besides that they serve brunch. They are located at Old San Juan. The chocolate that they serve is from their Chocolate factory founded in 1929 in Dominican Republic and on 1931 they started exporting chocolate to Puerto Rico and on 1937, Sir Pedro Cortés Forteza expanded operations here on Puerto Rico.

El Yunque National Forest: This is one of my favorite places to go. El Yunque is on Rio Grande and it’s a place to have a family day also with your fur-baby. Not only you can have a cold water splash in our waterfalls but also you can walk and have a little tour around. The only thing that I recommend is that dont get out of the sidewalks that are already marked in the Forest. Sometimes people want to adventure inside the forest and gets lost. Its a big mountain so in a moment you can be in Rio Grande (northeast) and in a while you can be in Las Piedras, Nagüabo or Ceiba (East, southeast)

Distrito T-Mobile: It’s a place where you can have fun, eat, go to the movies and their is the Coca-Cola music hall where they do concerts. Its located at Convention Center at San Juan

La Marqueta: It’s a place where they have different restaurants and bar next to the beach at Condado and its petfriendly

To finish up, I’m going to mention some other places to go because Puerto Rico has a large varieties of places to go:

The mall of San Juan
Panadería España
Casa Serrallés
Parque de Bombas in Ponce
La Granja Guajataca
Plaza del Mercado de Rio Piedras
Condado Vanderbilt Hotel
Hacienda Campo Rico
Jardin Botanico de Caguas
La Concha Hotel
Fairmont El San Juan Hotel

I think my go to places are very calm. Maybe somebody will say “those places are boring” and maybe their fun place is Placita de Santurce or La Perla. I personally don’t like Placita de Santurce, it’s not me. Instead buying beer or cocktails in a bar with people that I don’t know, I prefer having quality time with my dad and my dog and eat Ice Cream or just have a nice walk.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I dedicate this interview to a person who I will ALWAYS have in my mind and heart. A woman who showed me that you can achieve anything that you want in life with effort, dedication and to prove yourself and others that your daughter or the person that you love is your inspiration. That person is my mother, Caroll Santiago who passed away 3 years ago from a terminal brain cancer. Even on her painful treatments day, she had a smile on her face and for me, more than a mother, she was my sister, the sister that I never had. She is the founder of C.O EL NIGERIANO J.J

Also, I want to dedicate this interview to a man who showed my mother the real definition of love of a husband and who was by her side during difficult moments in her life. A man who has raised me since I was 8 years old and I always say he is my father even though I don’t have he’s last name or DNA, my step-dad, Omar Abdel-Hadi . Without him this awesome business will not exist.

He made my mom mentally strong and was with her during her sickness but also, helped her healing emotional and psychological abuse from her past husband and that’s something I will always be grateful for. Everybody will be in your biggest moments and on the beautiful side but a little amount of people will be with you in your battles and Omar is the man who stood with my mother during healing period and who has being very supportive of my profesional entrepreneur growth and during personal moments.

I want to give a shoutout to our customers, tiktok viewers, social-media followers, suppliers and the whole team behind El Nigeriano.

Last but not least, the Puertorrican entrepreneurs, us included, we are brave in this journey where is not easy, you have up’s and down’s, smack your head in the ground and then you celebrate out wild your achievements.

I dont have the permission to shoutout them with their names and job titles but I want to thank to the entrepreneurs that I have had the honor and the privilege to meet and ask them a tip and some motivational words for me to continue growing in my entrepreneur walk and path. They have been open in giving me advise and motivational words that every young businesswoman/man should listen and take note. They have been the ones that are supporting the small and medium businesses in Puerto Rico and one of them I had the honor to meet him still being alive.

Thanks to all the entrepreneurs that I’ve asked advise and motivational quotes so I can keep reaching beyond far my goals and thanks for never denying me one. From the bottom of my heart, Thank you! I am forever grateful

Website: coelnigerianojj.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/coelnigerianojj

Twitter: https://twitter.com/coelnigerianojj

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/COELNIGERIANOJJ

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@elnigerianopuertorico1277

Other: Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@coelnigerianojj