It's About Time

If you think about it, it's been a good month for the Philippines - a civil servant gained a conscience and shed light on the extent of corruption in the government, the bishops admitted their shameful complicity in the ouster of a democratically elected president and the installation into power of a dwarf-sized devil, and protests against a rapacious regime have begun to pick up momentum.

But that's not all.

Filipino fashion blogger Bryanboy, the Third World's most outrageous fag, received the fashionista's highest honor: Marc Jacobs has named an ostrich bag from his Fall/Winter 08 collection "BB", after him.

And finally, an in-depth look at luxury retail in the Philippines came out in Tuesday's Women's Wear Daily, authored by... me! The stories appeared in a special section called Asia In Depth.

The first story, Manila: On the Retail Radar, focuses on the key players in the luxury retail industry, including Ayala Land. In a country saturated with malls, their own Greenbelt, particularly Greenbelt 4 & 5, truly is a world-class retail showcase. Talk about a case of "if you build it, they will come"!

As Anton Huang of SSI put it

... it is no longer accurate to regard the Philippines as an insignificant player in Asia-Pacific retail. In a WWD List in December ranking projected clothing and footwear retail sales in the region, the Philippines placed ninth with $1.5 billion.

"In the beginning," Huang recalled, "SSI was very active in approaching the brands and strove hard to sell the Philippines as a potential market opportunity. However, we are no longer as 'under the radar' as we used to be a decade ago. Although SSI still relentlessly pursues quality names that our market has grown sophisticated enough for, it is not uncommon for us to be contacted by brands that want to expand in the region."

The second story, Luxe Goes Local, is much shorter, and concentrates on local brands and homegrown talents, with the two levels of Greenbelt 5 designated as "The Filipino Zone" as their showcase:

"You could say that it was a kind of returning to their roots," agreed Ayala Land president Jim Ayala. "The elite of the fashion world have recognized their talent. Now it was time to bring them back home."

Incidentally, most everyone who is anyone in Philippine retail makes a cameo, from the indefatigable Anton Huang of SSI to the fabulous Rafe Totengco of Rafe to the incomparable Ben Chan of Bench. Of course they make more than a cameo - without them I wouldn't have been able to write the stories. I could have gone on and on and included much more, but space constraints and word counts made that impossible!

As the first line goes, The international luxury community is taking notice of the Philippines.

All I can say is, it's about time!

PS It's possible that the articles may be accessed via subscription only. If you'd like to see the stories in their entirety, please leave a comment and I will email them through.

(Photo courtesy of Ayala Land)

Comments

[manuelbuencamino]

Amazing! Where is all that money coming from? It's the same thing I asked this banker from Singapore. Many of the multinational banks based there have Filipino acct. execs whose main job is to tap the Filipino market. They are even pirating acct.exec/marketers from each other. I didn't know there was so much liquidity in this country.

[Toto Gonzalez]

That's great, Bambina!!! I want to read it NOW!!! :D

[claudia shaw]

as soon as you get back I'll b there!!!

[CD]

Wow, exciting times for the Philippine retail scene! I am not surprised, I have a fashion blog and even I get inquiries from foreign labels asking about the Philippine market. I enjoyed your articles! Thanks for posting about it!

[bambinawrites]

Thanks, CD, for dropping by the blog. I like your Suzie Bubble photos too!

[CD]

Btw, I super loved your articles and made a post about it in my blog. With proper links of course. I hope you don't mind! I just had to share it! =)

[bambinawrites]

CD, thanks so much for the post on your blog and the links. The feedback from the two articles has been tremendous. Definitely a career high for me in all the years I've been writing for WWD!