Ceramic maker cashes in on Davao fairs

Fe Sarabello had no idea that the small business her family started 11 years ago would grow big enough to serve the demand for ceramics in two regions in Mindanao.

SM Ceramics today is the only refined ceramic shop operating in Southern Mindanao and Cotabato province.

The 62-year-old Sarabello says sheer hard work and a steely determination to succeed made her family surmount the odds and build the company to where it is today.

“We started merely as a small family business, with the children helping out,” she says, recalling how she borrowed a small electric kiln from her brother more than 10 years ago just to start SM Ceramics in Digos, Davao del Sur.

“We market tested the products at the Victoria Plaza mall in Davao and my husband and I were amazed by how fast they sold. In two days, everything was gone,” she says in an interview during the Araw ng Dabaw agri-fair at SM City here, where her glazed ceramic pottery was displayed.

Initially, she and her late husband supplied nightingale lamps, which are used for the capping of nursing students, in Davao, Cotabato and General Santos.

While the sales were good, it was when they met the former regional director of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) that their luck really turned.

Learning that they have been producing ceramics for some time, former DOST regional director Constancio Canete told them of the agency’s program aimed at assisting small entrepreneurs.

That was how her late husband, who used to work for a bank, ended up submitting a project proposal to the DOST to avail himself of a loan amounting to P375,000. With their loan proposal approved in less than two weeks and some P300,000 they shelled out as their counterpart, they purchased a gas kiln which can produce some 100,000 ceramic pieces a week.

“Unlike the electric kiln, which can only produce 20,000 a week, the gas kiln we purchased can produce five times the volume,” Sarabello says.

“Since we no longer had to pay for the electricity, the gas kiln we purchased was much cheaper and much better,” she adds.

After five years, the small family enterprise temporarily ground to a halt when her husband died.

The hiatus did not last long, however, as Citi Hardware, which owns a chain of retail stores in different parts of Mindanao, placed a big order and paid half of the fee in advance.

“That small amount started the ball rolling again,” she says.

Sarabello’s son has taken over the production of glazed ceramics, supervising 10 workers just as his father had done.

Since then, the small enterprise has been enjoying brisk demand from bonsai collectors, growers of ornamental plants and even housewives.

The demand for nightingale lamps, which used to be in high demand at the height of the world’s demand for Filipino nurses, has slackened recently, so the store has turned its attention to glazed ceramic products for bonsai collectors and ornamental plant growers.

Sarabello also says that taking part in various agri-trade fair events scheduled in the city throughout the year, from the yearly Araw ng Dabaw, Kadayawan and numerous industry trade fairs, also help boost sales, thus she makes it a point to join them.

SM Ceramics, which has its main factory in Digos City, mainly supplies bonsai collectors in Davao, General Santos city and even as far Cebu.

She says her ceramics, which are noticeably more fine-grained than locally-produced ceramics, are more expensive as she imports the refined, pre-mixed ingredients from a Manila supplier.

“The technology of producing these ingredients for refined ceramics is not yet available here,” she explains.

She says that maybe someday, after paying all of her debts, she might just become the first to invest in that technology in Southern Mindanao.