Anita Santiago has devoted her career to channeling the power of the media, particularly through television commercials. And that’s no small feat, considering that she grew up in a South American jungle without newspapers, television or radio. Born in New Jersey to an American father and Spanish mother, Santiago moved to Cuba as an infant and then to a jungle camp in Venezuela, where her father worked for Standard Oil. As an adult back in the states, she was hired by a Hispanic agency in Los Angeles. In 1987, she launched her own full-service company. Anita Santiago Advertising, in Santa Monica, specializes in Spanish-language advertising for such clients as Wells Fargo Bank, Carl’s Jr. Restaurants, and the California Milk Processors Board. Santiago’s background affords her a particular sensitivity to this market. “A lot comes from experience and instinct,” she says. “I am bicultural. I grew up with both languages and both cultures. I can see from both angles.” Take, for example, the Milk Board’s familiar “Got Milk?” slogan. With the exception of one campaign targeted to teenagers, that line is nowhere in evidence. Why? The Spanish translation is, “Are you lactating?” and also emphasizes deprivation to people who may have family in Mexico who truly can’t get milk. Instead, the campaign is directed toward mothers and their families. Wells Fargo commercials focus not on finance, but on the bank’s long history and its concern for the future of families. Carl’s Jr.’s (English-language) sloppy-eating campaign, which translates as rudeness, was replaced by high-energy dancing and multi-generational performers who denote the importance of family. Santiago’s work has brought her more than 70 awards, but when she started out, those years of jungle living came in handy. “When I first went into business, I had kind of a naive sense of do-ability –‘I can do this.’” she says. “I worked very hard every day for a year. I was a woman alone. Financially, I had nothing. Advertising is rough and tough – you have to have a thick skin, which I didn’t. I developed it.” “And to top it all off, I was in an ethnic world. Back then, the odds of finding someone who believed in that world were slim. So I was selling not only what I did, but why. When I look back, I was up against so many odds, I guess an element of luck was involved, too.”Santiago first saw the influence of the media in the early 1980s, after receiving her master’s degree in Spanish literature from the State University of New York. Returning to Venezuela to write a dissertation on Venezuelan authors, she was hired by a television station to write telenovelas (soap operas). Her pro-democracy story of the oppressive regime of a 1950s dictator garnered higher ratings than the moon landing.“I saw how people were stirred up by it.,” she says. “That’s when I said, ‘Oh, gosh, you can influence one night, one hour.’ It was such a powerful experience.” Santiago turns down certain clients, including lucrative beer and alcohol accounts, and does pro bono work for social causes. Having earned a master’s degree in clinical psychology last year, she does volunteer counseling as well. “I plan to be doing this for quite a while,” she says. “I was doing this before it was hip. Now it’s hip – (Spanish-language) KMEX is the number-one station (in Los Angeles) in all dayparts with adults 18 to 49. I need the adrenaline, the deadline rush, the satisfaction of being in a room with people and their ideas. I balance it with vacations, but I don’t know what I’d do without it.”

December 2001