Behind every Papemelroti branch, with its signature country-styled store displays and products, is the story of five siblings who decided to turn the phrases “corporation”, “profit”, and “family bonding” on their heads.
Operating in a time awash with corporate cannibalism and the consequential shifting of personal priorities, the Alejandro siblings managed to keep their heads above the water. Grounded upon personal values, creative drive, and the willingness to get hands dirty, Papemelroti proves that that a humble hobby-turned-business can change things for the better. It also proves that family coming together can only bring good – a notion that Papemelroti carries literally carries in its name (the Alejandro siblings are named Patsy, Peggy, Meldy, Robert and Tina).
Looking back on how unbelievable their family business flourished, their family gives back to their country and to the environment as they stitch on every nifty knick-knacks they make, their family’s intact personality, strong advocacies and a greater, more striking cause to become an agent of change for Mother Earth. From pioneering the use of brown paper for their stationeries, gift wrappers, planners and calendars, Papemelroti has set trends that their competitions urged to imitate. However, underneath all those copied designs and products, there is something that Papemelroti’s grasping with both hands – the family’s big heart to lend a helping hand to people who are in dire need of it.
And GabLifestyle was more than privileged to be invited in Alejandro family’s original shop cum ancestral house, to unveil how their family-centered business is now taking strides to further shape their advocacies; as told by one of the names in Papemelroti, Ms. Patricia “Patsy” Alejandro-Paterno.
Could you give us a brief description and historical background of Papemelroti?
It started as a hobby of my Mom. She likes making things with her hands, she likes using things that people would [actually] throw away. So when we were kids, [we witnessed her craft] when like toilet paper rolls would become dolls, Clorox bottles would become piggybanks. What she used to do was that she would make our clothes, the scrap cloths; she would make it to stuff toys and she’d sell it. So that’s how we started the business. And then when my father had to transfer to a place with a telephone, she said “get a space where we could have a store.” So we transferred to Tomas Morato, there was a space on the ground floor and we lived on the second floor.
The first store was named Corben from Corit and Benny but they made it a K, I don’t know maybe for style. So when we were growing up that was 1967, we were 5 [siblings] we said, “How come only you have a store, we also want ours.”
It was like a joke we made Papemelroti out of our names. I’m Patsy, I’m the eldest, Peggy, Meldy, Robert [and] Tina. So when Ali Mall opened, that’s the first mall, I think in the Philippines we put up a store in the second floor, [that was ] May 1976 and we were the sales girls. Actually my Dad said, your [store’s] name won’t survive because nobody can pronounce it, nobody can remember it. But I think within the first month, a lady came and interviewed us and it was in Women’s Magazine [where we’re given] one and half page [feature]. So people would come and say, “I know what this means it’s Patsy, Peggy, Meldy, Robert and Tina.”
From the start, people were already talking about us and since we’re the ones really [doing the actual work for the business] like I’m the cashier, Peggy was the sales girl, Meldy would make pillows. Tina she was seven years old [then], she would wrap the gifts and what was amusing was she couldn’t reach the counter and so she would wrap it on the floor. And then the people would say, “Kaya na ba niya? Baka mabasag?” *chuckles* But she already knows how to wrap, and then Robert he would draw things in the store and then put it on the shelf and then it would get sold. So that’s the first Papemelroti, now we have 15 branches.
What do you think makes your product different from your competition?
Well we like to design. So ever since, we always have different products. When we opened Ali Mall that’s when we started the brown paper. And back then brown paper was used for pattern-making and bags for the pandesal. So a lot of people would say, “Bakit niyo ginagamit yan?” So you know, there was resistance to it, especially with the older people. But we liked how it looked, it’s natural and we like natural things. Back then we didn’t even know it was recycled, we just like how it looks. We only found out that it was earth-friendly when we went to Australia. I forgot what year but at that time, Australians are [known to be] environmentally-conscious. So that’s when we realized we have to be more earth-friendly with way we do things and the things that we sell. That’s when we discovered na its recycled pala. Its’ not only recycled, it’s also [spending less on resources since] no bleach was used to make it white, cause when you have a paper, usually you use acid to make it white. And since it’s not white, [we thought] it was very good. And so we were thinking that God is guiding us through our business.
So that was just one of the things. There are so many things that we came up with and people would follow. Like [when] we used fine wood even from before, that’s recycled woods from crates. Like when people bring in, elevators, car parts they put that in crates. So we used those crates to make our furniture, our accessories, shelves, stuff like that. Before my mom used to paint flowers on the shelves and then some people would copy it. People get to use it more and more, so we would stop. And then we also have these mounted figurines on wood and we would write on it. Kami kami talaga yung writing, and people would copy it then we would stop. So we always try to come up with new things, all the time.
You mentioned that first and foremost, you guys love to design and the earth-friendly aspect came later when you discovered it. Do you think that after all these years of operation; would you consider Papemelroti as somewhat of a corporate-environmentalist advocate of sort?
Well we try to make people conscious of it. We come up of products [that helps its promotion], like we have this game. A game [which] my sister Tina came up with, it’s about the animals in the Philippines that are endemic in our country so that kids would get to know [what our country has].
Cause you know it’s very hard to take care of your country, if you’re not proud of what we have. So we have to be aware that are so many beautiful animals and we have to take care of it. Like people from England come over just to watch birds, they go to Palawan, they go to the provinces just to look for our birds because they cannot find this in other countries, but we have so many here.
So other things that we do aside from the products is that we also encourage our customers to [be more aware of our country] like we have newsletters, [moreover] we try to encourage our customers to join activities not only environmental [related] but there’s also Gawad Kalinga or when Jimmy Carter came over for the Habitat for Humanity. We joined that and we also asked our customers to join [and our Papemelroti branches served as the place] where they could get application forms. We have many advocacies.
Papemelroti isn’t not only more of an environmental advocate, but it’s more of a social-responsibility.
Yeah, social-responsibility. And we believe that in fact everything [we do, we have to be socially-responsible] we try to help with livelihood. You know a lot of shops [just to save] because it is cheaper to buy in China, they will order things from China. But we believe that, we want [first] help Filipinos, because if you’re order from Thailand or China, then you are helping families from other countries and not here. So what we try to do is, we try to think [for instance] this group comes and [says] that they want to have livelihood [activities]. So we think what are they capable of doing and then we think of products so that we can help them. And also, [there’s an underlying yet consequential] impact there; like when you buy abroad there’s much more oil is used for transportation [therefore] it’s also interconnected. Not just the livelihood aspect, but also environmentally [speaking] it’s good if we source things from the Philippines.
Going back to your products. Most of them are handmade, is it most of them or are they all handmade?
Well the furniture you can’t really make them that’s why you have machines also for the furniture. But for the figurines, you have molds [to shape them]. The paper products, when you print of course you use big machines to print it.
What about the paper?
The paper we do not make ourselves because this requires huge paper mills. So we buy the paper from paper mills.
Since it was first established about 30 years ago, how much do you think it has progressed in terms of how you envisioned it, your goals when you first started and how it became now?
Actually we’re not a very ambitious family. Like my mom says it’s a miracle that we have a building now, and we have several stores [which we barely imagined] because we’re very close as a family and that is what’s important to us — family. And we’re not really [thinking of making it big here] like a lot of people might say, “why don’t you export? Did you know that export is such a…” headache? And because of that you have a lot of white hair and [there are] deadlines to meet. And some people can get bankrupt [soon as they start exporting]. [In fact,] I know several people who used to be so rich and now they lost their cars, their house because they didn’t meet the deadlines so they are stuck with so much stock. And sometimes, they even [try] to send it [to their partner company abroad] but it’s not accepted.
Why [choose that kind of operation when] we are doing okay. It’s not like we were envisioning this huge business you know, we’re happy that it grew this way, because we’re [accustomed and contented with this kind of setting.] It’s good to have a family business, because you know you can make your families [grow as one] not like other families [that] they work so much in their lives [to a point] na naiiwan na lang yung iba.
So the good thing about this is that you’re family is integrated into the business. It’s not a separate life.
Yes. Just like my Dad and my Mom, they come to work [though] not regularly, [then] my sisters are also here. My brother is actually the only one who is doesn’t really work for the business; oh well [partly] because he’s a boy.
What about the rest of your siblings? How involved are they?
[My siblings are] very involved, but mostly in designing.
Does each of you have particular delegations?
Yeah. We have [different responsibilities], like my sister Peggy she designs but she’s also in-charge of personnel, [while] my sister Tina, she designs but she’s also in-charge of our website and [store] displays. And then Meldy, she’s also a designer but she’s in-charge of the Vintage [shop], she set it up. So I’m in-charge of all the things that they don’t want to be in-charge of.*laughs*
We did a bit of research and from what we got it seems that you are responsible for the stationery line. Could you describe the process from the designing of the stationery to the production and when it eventually lands on the store?
Well at the beginning of the year, I give them their assignments. [The expected amount of] how many pads of this size do they [need] to design, how many notebooks; so [at the end of the day] they have this whole long list of designs [to complete]. And so Peggy and Tina mostly, do the designs, sometimes Robert. [This is the usual arrangement] when we are already producing the calendars for next year, so we make with four designs for the wall calendars, twelve designs for the planner and when we have enough we give them to the printer. And then after that, they deliver [it to us, because] we don’t do the printing ourselves. After that, we just bring them to the stores.
What do you think is your main philosophy as a business, and how do you try to reflect that with the products that you sell?
Well the main philosophy is God is the partner in our business. So we try to do everything, so that God will be glorified and pleased. [Part of our effort is that] we pay our taxes; we pay our employees with right wages. [In short,] we follow the law.
You keep going how you’re company wants to help the Filipinos, given that are you planning on starting to branch out internationally or do you want to keep it here?
*laughs really hard* [That’s kind of at the far end of our plan] cause we can’t even go to the province. Before we opened a branch in Cebu and it was so hard [to manage] because we travel as a family, and when we go abroad it’s always [all of us], so it’s very expensive. We had to close down the ones in Cebu cause it was difficult to watch and to manage [with our situation.]
So it’s not even something that is to stay in the Philippines, it stays here in Manila.
Well we have [a branch] in Pampanga and in Clark but that’s it, [since] it is far. It’s like Monday’s [that’s the only time] that we are able to go to the store, [everyone goes] there’s my Mom, my dad and my sisters. Only Robert is not there.
Going back to the environmental aspect, with the growing corporate advocacy towards the green movement, how do you see Papemelroti maintaining its unique earth-friendly image?
Well, the personality of the company comes from the personality of the family. It doesn’t have to go with trends, we actually [never really tried] to follow trends. Like when some company would say, ok we have to know what the color of the year is, we never do that. We just make what we like to make. And we believe that, [by making] what we want in our house [or] what we like, a lot of people will [eventually] like what we like.
We really don’t like to follow anything or prove anything. To me, it’s good that more and more people are aware but [we don’t really plan to brag that] you know we were the first. Nothing, it’s okay. [Right now,] we are more concerned with livelihood projects. So we are always thinking of ways to help [because] there are so many poor people in our country. When we are made aware of that, we want to help. Recently we were given this award, [since] we helped Kidney Friends, this is an association helping poor people who are having dialysis often. They don’t really have [an access] to livelihood because they stay in the hospital. So the friend of ours, [whom I recall] is the President [of the association] came up to us and said “Could you come up with a product [for them to do?] We had to think of a product that they could do in the hospital and what we came up with [were] these flowers. *pointing to a stash of stuffed plastic bags*
They paste fabric on paper and then we give them a stamp of a flower or a heart and then they just cut it, [it’s something] that they can do in the hospital. I think there are 30 [patients] making it, [but] you know we can’t keep buying and buying everything they make. So now we’re developing bookmarks, cards, paper dolls; the same technique but in another direction. That is what we like to do, we are now serving [livelihood projects] to [inmates of] Quezon City Jail. [And then] when we go there, we were thinking “What kind of livelihood can we help them with?” We’re thinking of paper beads but right now we are helping [with the] paintings. [We can say that] we’re still on the thinking stage. And like mothers of street children, we taught them how to make jewelries. There are so many products that can be made, that’s what we’re focusing on now.
Papemelroti started out and remains a family business. It’s very much involved in social responsibility. I guess what I want to know is, to you personally, as part of founders the of Papemelroti. What is it to you?
What is it to me? I believe that God put me here. So I have to do my best, to do what he wants me to do. Usually, it’s really a step-by-step process it’s not just pure vision [that] you have to do this, no, it’s step-by-step and he guided us. With our business, it’s wonderful that all my sisters are united. Because it’s very hard if one wants to help with the livelihood, and the other one wants money. But in our family, we’re all together. We want to serve the poor.
It’s all [just] one thing, but the main thing [is that] my life should be in consonance with what God wants me to do and to be. I want to give him glory and I want to be able to say you know when I die, “you know God, I did my best and I hope you can call me a good and faithful servant.” And I believe that’s what my sisters and my brother wants [as well].
Do you see passing on the responsibilities of operating the business to your children. You think it would be something of a family heirloom of sorts, this entire business?
I think so. My eldest niece, she’s 20 [originally] wants to be a scientist, you know NASA. But before she got into college, she [suddenly] decided to take become an artist. [Now] she’s taking up Fine Arts in UP and so now she’s open to working here. [Usually] her classmates would say “Ohhh, it’s so great [that] you have this business already. You don’t have to [undergo] job hunt.” So she’s appreciating already the business, so that’s one.
And then my son, who is 15 [years old], his Lola [would say] “Josh you should take up business because you’re good in Math so you will run the Papemelroti” because he really wants to take up Fine Arts but [now] he’s considering it. [Little] things like that, but I know God will take care of it just like how he took care of our business. My Mom did not force us to work in Papemelroti, like my sister Meldy she wanted to work in Makati, [she wanted to dress up] because here we don’t really need to dress up. She wanted to wear high heels and suits because she likes dressing up. But she couldn’t get a job, she kept applying but she [just] couldn’t get a job.
[So she decided] I’ll work in Papemelroti first and then one day there was a women at the store [who she overheard talking] with her daughter and she said, “you know this figurine changed your father’s life.” And the figurine was something that my sister Peggy made, it said there “work for the Lord, the pay isn’t much but the retirement plan is out of this world.” So Meldy said, “My gosh it’s one figurine, if that can change a life of a person. We have so many figurines here!” [She somehow realized, maybe] God really wants me to work here. So when she decided to work here with us, that’s when the companies started calling. So obviously it was the Lord’s [will] that she work here. Right now she’s very happy [being] here, cause she can bring her kids, she fetch the kids. Basta important sa amin ay family.
How involved are the kids nowadays?
When its summer, they sometimes come in and work. Not the same as when we were kids [though], when we were paid and we pay. But the kids now, no, we can’t pay them ng konti, *Laughs* because they want iPods not like us before, we were happy [just by] going to the Sari-sari store. 60s when I was working I was just paid like P1 a day, stuff like that, its money naman, and we would go to the sari-sari and spend it there. And then we would even buy things from our store, we just couldn’t get things [and not pay for them]. So if there are things that we like, we would buy them. So my Mom was kind of [practical] she taught us the value of money, the value of work.
The business is a good example for women and men who don’t have capital. Because my mom started the business without capital, except of course my father was working. But the thing is, at the start of the business, she only puts her stuff toys in the windows. People would have to ring the doorbell [if they want to buy] because she couldn’t afford a sales girls, so people would ring the doorbell and when they go in, there’s nothing in the store everything is only in the window.
It was a very very humble beginning.
Yeah. She would make the things herself, and then when somebody rings the doorbell she would either go down or a helper, sometimes it would be me. [There was] this one time when a customer came in and was masungit, when [my Mom] would come home from buying something [she would find] me in the toilet, crying. When the business started, I was eleven [and still young, that’s why]. And then I made a newsletter [saying] KorBen opening day and in the newsletter I said that Daddy almost fell from the ladder because he was [doing] exhibitions while setting up the signage. It’s really a family affair, [where] everybody [participates]. I remember fixing the display, because when you’re young you have all these ideas and you know what’d I do? I put an empty frame [on the shelf] and my Mom didn’t like it. The empty frame for me is like drama, but she didn’t like it so she removed the frame. But it didn’t look nice anymore because the display was made for that frame, so they put it back. *laughs really hard*
It’s pretty impressive because there’s a piece of advice going around telling the people who want to start a business which is “Never start a business with a friend.” Considering the fact that Papemelroti is a FAMILY business, based on your experience would you say the same thing or would you actually encourage families to get in the business?
You know it really depends on the relationship, if you are like [a close family even before]. Of course we get into arguments sometimes, there’s [even] sometimes crying. But the way we were brought up is [to always tell ourselves] don’t give up, communicate until you both understand each other or you agree to disagree. So you have to communicate, in anything; in a marriage, you don’t give up. You can start a business with a friend, but you have to work through the problems by communicating, and trying to understand where the other one is coming from. As long as you’re willing to do that [everything is gonna be possible] because you’ll never ever have no problems, there will always be challenges. You have to be willing to work through it, kasi sometimes naman you quit because of the problems. Sayang naman, because sometimes you can get closer pa.
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