Fashion icon keeps connected via Globe Business

MANILA, Philippines - Fashion icon and Globe Business ambassador Amina Aranaz-Alunan recently launched the Aranaz Mercato bag, which is made from recycled materials by the women of Payatas, Quezon City. Amina creates the designs while the Payatas women produce the bags. Being a socially conscious designer is just one of the ways in which she lives her life creatively, passionately and with joy. How does she do it?

According to her, she does this by knowing her priorities in life — her husband and kids are at the center and she schedules her work around them. “The key,” she says, “is balance.”

Such balance is no small feat, considering that she runs two businesses, raises three kids and takes care of her husband, businessman Rafa Alunan.

Fashion is in Amina’s blood. A daughter of a successful bag manufacturer, she owns the Aranaz boutique that showcases and offers her sought-after collection of bags and accessories. She is currently creative director and designer of the Aranaz brand as well.

Amina not only designs bags, she also helps students at the School of Fashion and Arts (SoFA) design and map out their future in the fashion industry. She is co-founder and a faculty member of the school.

She considers SoFA an advocacy because she puts her heart, mind and effort into the school to create more fashion entrepreneurs like herself.

Mobile lifestyle

Amina says modern communications technology allows her to keep harmony and balance between her responsibilities at her designer bag business, her fashion design school, and her family.

In order to communicate with her workers and school colleagues, she depends on modern technology from Globe Business.

“With Globe Business, I really experienced a big difference in the way I live my life and the way I do business. The best advantage I have as an entrepreneur is my mobility and freedom — I have simplified the ways I do business and fulfill my commitment to the school,” she says.

Amina has subscribed to Globe Business TXTConnect, which allows her to send high-volume SMS broadcasts to groups of employees, workers and colleagues using the Web-based TXTConnect service.

The service lets her send text message blasts, birthday alerts and pre-scheduled messages quickly and securely. TXTConnect is much easier to use because it is Web-based; it also costs a lot lower than regular mobile phone SMS rates.  

With business solutions from Globe Business, Amina is also able to give time and energy to her social advocacies — like sourcing out indigenous Filipino raw materials and giving livelihood to both local suppliers and workers. She does this sort of thing for the Payatas women who produce her Aranaz Mercato bag from recycled materials.

“Without e-mail and chat, I would not be able to set aside mornings with my children. Using modern technology lets me do business from home just as well, if not better than when I’m in the office,” she says.

In the afternoons, Amina is either at the office, the bag factory or at SoFA for her teaching duties. In the evenings, if she’s not with her family, she’s attending events and other occasions.

Communications technology also allows Amina to free up her time to be with her husband. They could have dinner, watch movies or spend time with friends because e-mail, chat and mobile phone features allow her to work faster and more efficiently, so she’s still able to enjoy her life as a wife and mother outside of the office and the school.

Before she retires in the evening, she makes sure that her cellular phone is always at her bedside table, along with a glass of water. She never goes to sleep without checking her e-mail, Facebook, and of course, praying.

Globe Business, the corporate arm of Globe Telecom, provides wireless and wireline solutions for a diverse set of industries, businesses, and commercial enterprises. It assures SMEs of affordable, reliable, and dependable services for all their communication needs to generate the highest possible profit at the lowest possible cost.

Experience the benefits of having customized solutions to support your business. Consult a Globe Business account manager, visit Globe stores, call the Globe Business hotline at +632 730-1288 or log on to http://www.globe.com.ph/business.