Hailing from the community of Soufriere, thirty year old Maria Jackson is the proud owner of Cacao Sainte Lucie, currently based in Belvedere, Canaries. After graduating from Soufriere Comprehensive Secondary School, she moved on to work at Sugar Beach Hotel, then to Anse Chastanet and finally Jade Mountain, where she worked as pastry chef and gathered her experience in chocolate making and pastry art to start her business.
Dazzle: What inspired you to create Cacoa Sainte Lucie, and how long has it been in operation?
Maria: I’ve been doing Cacoa Sainte Lucie for about five years now. I’ve always been driven to own my own business, even at a young age. My family has a business oriented background and growing up I figured that one day it might be what I see myself doing as well. I loved cooking and being in a kitchen and it was only a few years ago that I realized there weren’t any locally produced chocolates in St. Lucia. I decided to bring the two together; business and confectionery.
Dazzle: How did you know that Cacoa Sainte Lucie was the right idea and what was your support system like?
Maria: It made sense for me, being that it was such a unique product to St. Lucia. Given the history of cocoa beans in St. Lucia, I figured that it was something locals would definitely appreciate, as well as visitors to the island. Knowing that the cocoa is not only being grown in St. Lucia but the product is being made right here, I thought it would be great.
My family has been supporting me from the very beginning; my mom, step father, my sisters and my husband. They’ve been by my side up until this very moment and although it hasn’t been easy, I’m grateful for them and the opportunity to do something I love. I accept where I am right now and I understand that this business is something that I’ve grown into and I absolutely love it.
Dazzle: How did you first realize this was what you wanted to do?
Maria: I did the research and the groundwork and I realized persons would be appreciative of the strictly local aspect. Local chocolate isn’t easily accessible in
St. Lucia so I saw it as a viable option to go into that industry. With my family’s support I didn’t have to ponder on it too much; I started the process almost immediately.
Dazzle: What outlets do you have your products at?
Maria: My chocolate bars are sold at Massy Gourmet (formerly GL Supermarket in Baywalk Mall), Excellent Stores and Nature’s Discount for now. Considering the nature of the product, it’s an alternative towards the commercially produced brands. It’s not something that you will find additives and preservatives in. That makes it different from the commercial brands and has more added health benefits.
Dazzle: How was your company impacted by COVID-19 and how did you overcome it?
Maria: At this point, we’re not post COVID as yet. With the entire country being shut down, we had to come to a production halt altogether. It has affected us tremendously and we’re basically riding out the storm right now. We’re looking at other options; we’re getting quite a few requests for online sales so we’re looking at that. We have a website available but it’s not set up for online purchases as yet. We’re working on adjusting that.
Dazzle: Did you experience any failure, and if so what has it taught you?
Maria: There have been a few obstacles along the way. What it’s taught me so far is that I need to take it one day at a time. I understand that Rome was not built in one day and a brand doesn’t just blossom out of the blue. A company takes time to build and grow. It’s taught me patience and understanding that we need to take things one step at a time. We need to look at things realistically and figure out the problems, and how we’re going to overcome them.
Dazzle: What are you most excited about at work?
Maria: Everything in my life revolves around my chocolates. The free time we have gives us the opportunity to come up with new flavours and figure out how we can better our product. We’re looking at better packaging and how smoother we can make our chocolates; we’re creating a local product but we still want to meet international standards. That’s a lot for someone who didn’t have any formal culinary training. For me, everything is a learning process and both the product and brand have come a long way.
Dazzle: How do you keep updated with various manufacturing trends?
Maria: The world is at our fingertips right now. There are quite a bit of platforms that we follow. We follow the chocolate makers that produce the machinery we use. They’re the ones guiding us on how to better our product.
Dazzle: How long did it take you from your idea to actually producing?
Maria: It took me about one year. To be honest, the final product was chocolate, but it wasn’t something that I would’ve been able to present to a consumer. There was still a lot of tweaking that needed to be done with the product at that point. It is a very scientific process and I had to learn all of that from scratch to produce something I’m proud of.
So it took one year from my idea to my first chocolate and a few months from that to something I could show a consumer. I had an article written about three years and I had a tester for my chocolate. She made her reviews and stated that it came a long way in terms of the flavor profiles that come through the chocolate bar. There is a lot that goes into the fermentation stage; if the beans are not fermented properly then it definitely affects the end result of the chocolate bar. I had to go back to my farmers to understand how the beans are fermented and help them do that in a way that would benefit my end product.
Dazzle: Who was the first company to buy your product?
Maria: Caribbean Naturals was the first. They approached me, and we had that sort of understanding that yes, this is a small business and the quality is growing but it was very satisfying to know that they were going to work with me knowing where we were at with the product.
Dazzle: How do you advertise your product?
Maria: We use social media platforms but I could say easily that it’s mostly by word of mouth. We don’t have many followers but people talk and that’s arguably the most effective way to get the word around. We have Instagram, Facebook and a website as well.
Dazzle: What has your entrepreneurial journey taught you?
Maria: Patience and humility. I’m always eager to learn. I can’t say at this point I’ve reached where I want to be. That’s far from the truth. It can be the simplest of advice; you wouldn’t necessarily be ready to take it, but you can use that advice to meet your current situation.
Dazzle: What does the road ahead look like for your company?
Maria: I would like to say we’d love to develop a regional presence. As for international, I’m going back to what I said about taking it one step at a time. For me, it’ll be a regional presence and only then can we expand to international markets. I’d like to see my product right beside our regional brands.
Dazzle: What advice would you like to give to up and coming entrepreneurs?
Maria: You have to be passion driven. There are times when you want to really throw in the towel but passion allows you to see the end goal rather than the present struggle. The journey won’t be easy but the end result is always worth it.
We’re excited to see where this local brand heads next! Good luck to Maria and Cacoa Sainte Lucie!
