13 December 2017
By Efleda P. Campos / Senior Editor
Photos by Roy Domingo
Published also in Business Mirror
In Photo: Sisters Cherry and Pia Galang show visitors the bags and purses they design under the newly formed Piastorey brand.
TWENTY local companies, some already exporting their products and others still looking at shipping out their first orders, are currently participating in a bazaar in front of the Department of Trade and Industry Building along Gil J. Puyat Avenue in Makati City.
NELS + Cole owner Neliza de la Cruz shows visitors earrings, handcrafted bags, blouses, dresses and gowns designed by daughter Coleen.
The companies joined the bazaar organized by the DTI’s Export Marketing Bureau Employees’ Association (EMB-EA) as a side activity to support this year’s celebration of National Exporters Weeks held from December 4 to 8 at the DTI International offices in Makati.
The bazaar, which started on December 4 and ends on December 15, seeks to give the participants added exposure to the local market, said Franclem Peña, president of the EMB-EA.
Participating are Nutratech Biopharma Inc., AFMC Enterprises, Magical Blends, Gloanse Handicrafted Products, Glamorosa, Piastorey, Galo Organics and Naturals, Top Notch Apparel Corp., DTG Pearl Royale Jewelry Shop, Pasciolco Agriventures, Neli + Cole, Lancaster Colors International Inc., All in One Boutique, MH Food Corp., Happy Ice Cream, The Old Zaniga, Casa Classica, RCC Amazing Touch, Terry’s Shoes and MJ Pack Trading.
They are producers and sellers of health products, arts and crafts, Christmas and holiday decorations, garments, fashion accessories, processed food, gifts and houseware, home décors, kitchen and tableware, leather goods, linens and organic and natural products. Karen Fami, EMB-EA’s vice president for External Affairs, said her group has been organizing trade fairs and exhibitions supporting major DTI activities for the past seven years.
Pasciolco Agriventures is an exporter of locally made food prodcuts.
“This is our way of helping local manufacturers make domestic buyers aware of their products. We also assist them through seminars, workshops and personal advice to help their business take off,” she said.
Pia Galang, an events organizer counting DTI among her clients, just a month ago diversified into bag manufacturing and joined the fair to gain exposure in the domestic market. Along with her mother Theck and sisters Cherry and Charm, she formed Piastorey with the belief that every bag has its story, hence her business theme “Your Bag, Your Story.”
“My mother, my sisters and I decided to go into the bag-making business for the main reason that we love bags, and not only bags per se, but bags made by Filipinas in the Philippines,” she said.
“We take pride in the fact that our workers are elderly women living in Taguig. We help them earn, and they help us by making quality bags and purses,” she said. “We design our bags using local materials, but we also customize them, according to our customers’ specifications.”
Galo Organics and Naturals is an exporter of coconut-based food and health and beauty products.
Aside from bags and purses, Pia also creates bracelets that she herself designs.
She said they only planned to exhibit during the first week because they are very new in the business, but Fami, convinced her and her family to return for a second week because of the many inquiries received regarding their products.
Occupying the stall next to Piastorey is the mother-and-daughter team of Nels + Cole. Daughter Coleen de la Cruz designs their one-of-a-kind creations, which mother Neliza sells proudly, always pointing out the styles are made by her daughter. Included in their merchandise are earrings, bags made of twisted t-shirt materials, blouses, gowns and casual dresses.
Situated prominently at the entrance of the DTI International Building is Magical Blends Marketing International, selling healthy and delicious natural juices and coffee. Owned by its president, Tirsa L. Macinas, the company sells herbal coffee and juices, green tea with carnitine, red-tea mangosteen wellness juice and guyabano herbal juice with collagen. It has clients based abroad and has a wellness shop in Taguig.
The exhibitors also include a health-service provider, Amazing Touch, owned by Filipino inventor Rolando C. de la Cruz.
Reneliza Francisco, a derm technologist, uses a patented natural herbal-cream preparation derived from cashew invented by de la Cruz to remove unwanted warts, moles, syringoma and other skin imperfections. She said many of their clients only require a single treatment to remove unsightly pigmentation, cutaneous growth and the like. While it is true that warts and the like can never be totally removed from one’s system, the treatment is topical and has minimal side effects.
Allan Fami, a grandmaster of local martial arts, also exhibited traditional weaponry through the Kalahi FMA Gear. Filipino martial arts is a combination of boxing, taekwondo, jujitsu, karate, judo and arnis. He showed an assortment of aluminum training knives, bolo, rubber weapons, arnis sticks, dulo-dulo, kamagong sticks, and polymer training weapons.
Fami willingly conducted demonstrations on the use of the weapons on display, adding these were mostly for self-defense.