NAGA CITY, Philippines—A cum laude graduate of of AB Development Communication at the Ateneo de Naga University in 1997, Marianne Olaño, was confident she could achieve the financial status of a top television broadcaster.

Olaño immediately worked as a cub reporter of a defunct regional daily right after graduation, then as a writer of the local ABS-CBN’s feature program “Ini an Kabikolan,” and later went to Manila and worked as segment producer-writer of the daily noontime show “Eat Bulaga” over GMA-7.

Burdened by the hectic schedule and the demands of the television program, she applied at Ever Gotesco as a marketing and advertising officer, which involved promoting its products by organizing events.

Olaño eventually found her place in marketing. She abandoned her dream to become a journalist when she realized she could earn more in that field.

Middlewoman

Finding a job at the advertising and marketing department of Ever Gotesco, she was able to close a deal with management for the supply of Christmas baskets made of native materials, which her parents had been producing for years as part of their handicrafts business in Naga City.

In that deal, her parents earned P120,000 for an order of 2,000 pieces at P60 apiece. She was rewarded by her mother with a P15,000 commission. It was her first taste of good earning that sealed her career change from journalism to entrepreneurship.

She then transferred to a shoe company as its advertising officer, but she later quit this job. After a while, Olaño decided to return home to start a business in Naga City.

Business organization

It was in one of the trade fairs where her parents participated that Olaño finally got the idea of producing and selling costume jewelry and accessories. She was attracted to the business because of their affordability and year-round salability.

“In that trade fair, almost all stores were not selling except this one store where you could not even see what they were selling because there were so many people there. I joined the fray and discovered it was selling costume jewelry and accessories. I myself was enticed to buy more than P1,000 worth of goods before I knew it,” she related.

Through the Internet, she gained enough information and instructions to create her own costume jewelry and accessories.

Olaño then visited Cebu, the center of costume jewelry and accessory industry.

She scoured the place, collected samples and sealed deals with various suppliers that gave her product line variety and quality.

When she got back to Naga she started her own line and was able to sell her products. Later, the orders started to increase and she started hiring workers. The problem she then faced was the very low sales volumes as Naga is not a tourist destination at par with the likes of Cebu, Boracay or Baguio.

She started selling online with the hope of getting wholesalers and retail clients via the Internet.

Online store

Olaño started selling her wares on Ebay, but later decided to put up a website.

“A website is the perfect solution. I don’t have to relist every week unlike on Ebay, and it also serves as a catalogue for every new design I come out with. It was my storefront 24 hours a day, seven days a week,” she explained.

To help her maintain her online store, Olaño asked her brother to help her and offered him a commission for every sale that she made through the website.

Slowly, online sales came trickling in. To facilitate immediate cash transfers, she enrolled in Globe Telecoms’ G-Cash service, where transactions are processed in seconds. She also asked for a credit line from her courier, Overseas Courier Service, to facilitate billing.

Her first Internet store buyers were her same buyers from Ebay. Then came sales from Multiply site friends, then from the fora where she posted advertisements.

“We started in December 2005, and so far, traffic has increased by a hundredfold,” Olaño said.

Four years after Olaño started with a P10,000 in capital and subsistence income from producing and selling pieces of costume jewelry and accessories, she is now able to maintain 12 workers in a small workshop and a decent air-conditioned showroom where she holds office and displays the Baycrafts creations.