I first interviewed Vicky a month ago over breakfast at the Mandarin Hotel coffee shop. We ended three hours later with mango crepe from the lunch buffet. Tonight, over a delicious tempura dinner prepared by her Japanese chef, I remember flitting images of Vicky in decades past when she was younger and without a care in the world. I am amazed that in spite of the battles she has fought, she has not lost her happy disposition and her youthful looks. I take that as proof that indeed nothing can bring a good woman down. Not the painful past. Not even the business ordeals that "have been charged to experience." Today, her line of beautiful wicker bags has kept her so busy that continuing problems, personal and otherwise, have failed dismally to faze her.
Vicky will not talk about her life and its attendant trials and successes, without first talking about her parents. It is the Filipino child in her that seeks first to honor them before speaking of herself. "My mom, Segundina Cornejo Vizcarra was unlettered but was an expert embroiderer who could turn out the most delicate and most beautiful hand embroidery on piña," she begins. "She was the very first woman to ever receive the Panday Pira Award, a national award for outstanding entrepreneurship." Her dad, Zacarias Amalingan, on the other hand, was a sculptor who trained under National Artist for Sculpture Guillermo Tolentino.
Together, her parents founded S.C.Vizcarra in 1925 and located their first store in Fort Statsenberg, now known as Clark Air Base. Because of their closeness to the American military, they soon branched out to other US bases in Hawaii, Guam and Japan. S.C.Vizcarra continued to be the most popular chain store that offered a wide array of excellent quality of Philippine hand-made products. The main attraction of the stores was, of course, the beautiful hand-embroidered jusi products of Segundina which were sought after by the rich and famous like General Douglas MacArthur and General Dwight Eisenhower.
The Vizcarras had become very successful and brought up their only child, Vicky, amid a life of plenty. She studied at the Philippine Women’s University, and as was expected, she married and had five lovely children. "I was naive in concluding that life was perfect, and would always remain to be so." After her turbulent 25-year-old marriage collapsed, and through the aftermath of the stormy parting, she stubbornly believed that life was not through with her. Neither was she through with life.
During this sad episode in her life, Vicky went on running her parents’ business. They were getting on in years, and she was their natural successor. Besides, the S.C.Vizcarra stores kept her busy, distracted her from her personal woes and allowed her to travel constantly to the military ports where their store branches were located. She single-handedly brought up her three daughters who opted to remain with her.
But in time, even her business began its downspin of disappointments and failures. "From 1983 to 1986," Vicky tells us, "tourists stopped coming to Manila. The death of Ninoy Aquino in 1983 caused the slow down. Our stores, which catered to foreign visitors suffered tremendously," she continues.
With sales coming to a virtual halt and bankruptcy staring her in the face, Vicky had to make a wise but painful decision: She closed all the stores, putting an end to a memorable 65-year-old retail business. "It broke our hearts, but it had to be done," she recalls. "We closed our last store in Clark when Mt. Pinatubo erupted in 1990." It did not help that big-name debtors who owed her millions of dollars, reneged on their promise to pay. "I had nowhere to go and no one to run to. My greatest ally, my mom, had died in 1985 and I didn’t know what to do," she says. She, however, stood firm in her belief that there is a God who will never abandon her.
It was easy enough to close the business; knowing that her community of trained workers would all soon be unemployed was the difficult part. So, she began training her workers in earnest to weave baskets using wicker (the inner core of the rattan vine). She allowed them to set up house in her 2,000-sq.m. factory and warehouse compound. "They were ‘family’ to me," she says. "Their parents faithfully worked for my parents and being an only child, I grew up with these second- and third-generation workers and played with them when they were kids my age. I could not let them down."
Through the second half of the ’80s, they plodded on, succeeding in exporting nominal amounts to some loyal customers abroad. It was barely enough to get them by. Through it all and with faith in God’s providence, a break came in 1988, when a buyer from the USA ordered $20,000 worth of wicker baskets. "I took on the challenge and successfully delivered the order after three months," she recounts. Encouraged by that important breakthrough, Vicky’s workers honed their talents in weaving. A Vicky-designed "watermelon basket" became a very big hit in the US. To this day, the American market has not had enough of it.
Several years later, her eldest daughter Catherine helped redesign her mom’s wicker products. The result was an extraordinary line of finely-woven and beautifully-designed wicker throw pillows, a first in Philippine weaving. These rattan pillows, which surprisingly are soft to the touch, were chosen to be one of four Philippine hand-made products that would represent Filipino genius and creativity at the 1999 Asean Exhibition in Tokyo. The pillows won the hearts of exhibit visitors and became "the star of the show," which resulted in a harvest of big orders for the company. Again, Vicky was asked to join another exhibit in Japan. This time the invitation was for a fashion accessories show.
I wanted to decline the invitation because my products were household items. I was not in fashion merchandise," she said. Thankfully, she agreed. With the keen intuition of an entrepreneur, she redesigned her baskets and transformed them into great-looking handbags by adding leather straps on them. This second exhibit in Japan launched her entry into the international market of high fashion. The Japanese market went wild over her wicker bags causing her to export 90 percent of her entire bag production to Japan. Soon after, Natori also placed its first order for a line of exclusively designed bags bearing the world-famous Natori name.
One day, it dawned on her that the Philippines had never been known for fall or winter products. "So I got challenged to design a wicker bag for fall. It was in the shape of an upo (gourd). I wrapped some deerskin around it to give it an ethnic Indian flavor," she recounts. She called the bag Tekakwita ("Catherine" in English), the name of the first American Indian saint.
In the Philippines, Tekakwita won for S.C. Vizcarra the Best Handbag Award for 2000 from CITEM, and in Milan, Tekakwita was a huge commercial hit. Today, a leather version is being developed for Parisian buyers who are eagerly awaiting its arrival.
Vicky smiles at the memory of a recent trip to Milan. Leisurely window-shopping in the city, she chanced upon the posh Giorgio Armani store and decided to have a look-see. Her heart skipped a beat when she saw, prominently displayed in an Armani tropical-inspired home setting, her rattan throw pillows. "My pillows had a $400 price tag on each of them," she lets out a hearty laugh. "But truly, it felt so good seeing my products accepted internationally," she adds.
Vicky attributes the breakthroughs in her life to prayer. When she thought she would not survive the spiraling downfall of her business, she turned to God. Often she would impart the value of stewardship to her workers. "I tell them we are all stewards of the resources, abilities and opportunities that God has entrusted to our care," she informs us. "One day, we will each give an account of the manner in which we have used them." Vicky’s showroom on Roxas Boulevard teeming with beautiful wicker products, is proof that her workers have imbibed this valuable teaching.
Unexpectedly, heavenly favor continued to come Vicky’s way. In 1988, her name was given to a Korean company manufacturing hepatitis vaccines. They were looking for a Philippine distributor that would represent them in the country. At first she wasn’t interested, but after remembering that her mom succumbed to hepatitis in 1985, as did her grandfather and an uncle, she acceded. The businesswoman in Vicky knew a market study was important and the advice of a medical doctor was valuable, so she sought both.
"When I was ready, I went to Korea to meet the company president. I told him the truth that I knew nothing about vaccines. I had no experience in selling medical stuff," she remembers confessing. "But I told him I was convinced that the Philippines needed this vaccine because my mom had died of the disease." Her honesty touched the man. "He too was not a medical person. In fact, he was a metallurgical engineer and had become involved in hepatitis vaccines because his wife had died of it," she adds. Today, Vicky’s medical company successfully distributes a line of vaccines from this Korean company and a line of "biologicals" from Germany.
What does she advise entrepreneurs like herself? "Do the best in everything you do. Do not cut short your processes for the sake of profit," she advises. What are her strong points, I ask. "I am hardworking and believe in the inherent skills and artistic capabilities of the Filipino. I also believe that God will always be with me." Her weakness? "I have a weak spot for poor people. Maybe it’s from my mom who came from very poor parents. Her mom was a lavandera and her dad, a kutsero," Vicky says. Her full support for her workers’ families has become her all-consuming personal crusade.
Are her designs copied? "Yes, but there is nothing I can do," she shrugs. "As long as I am ahead in terms of design, product innovation and excellent quality, that is all that matters." She adds, "By the way, I am not afraid of China."
As we wind up with a cup of Japanese green tea, I take a good look at this petite, pretty and strong-willed lady blessed with the indomitable spirit of a survivor. Her smiling eyes reveal that indeed she has left the past behind. Vicky Vizcarra Amalingan is proof that a grateful heart opens the door to a new life filled with new challenges and new beginnings.