Instead of getting discouraged, best friends Rose Tolentino and Chari Trinidad-Mendoza of RCT5 Inc. have managed to sift through the initial chaos and confusion in early 2020 to come up with an online company that now manufactures and distributes such diverse brands as as OMO! White, Oh Crop! and Rosie Posie. The duo is also behind the growing digital media company Alike Media.
With every crisis comes opportunities. Despite the death and devastation in its wake, the COVID-19 pandemic has unwittingly provided countless silver linings that allowed businesses and the people they employ to thrive. As the indoors provided safety and solace during the pandemic’s height, the digital universe and its more visible twin, which is online selling, grew, allowing people and industries to earn much-needed revenues while providing vital services to customers.
This was the path taken by businesswomen and best friends Rose Tolentino and Chari Trinidad-Mendoza of RCT5 Inc. “The pandemic was the great equalizer. It gave new opportunities to those whose eyes are constantly in search of new ways to do business,” said Rose, the company’s CEO. While many slowed down, the duo went the opposite direction and launched not just one but multiple brands, from personal care products to food.
“Twenty-twenty was the year everything changed for everyone. We also saw the consumer landscape changing overnight. To adapt was imperative for survival,” Rose added. “Instead of getting discouraged, we were motivated to look for new opportunities. So, we really did our best, and have been continuing to do so. We felt that it would be an injustice to God not to do well. That motivation further pushed us,” Chari, the company’s chief creative and operating officer, chimed in.
OMO! White, the company’s first successful brand, ascended new heights when it closed a partnership with Ever Bilena Cosmestics, Inc., one of the country’s biggest cosmetics companies. What was once a Korean-inspired product line is now manufactured in Korea. “The line offers the best of Korean technology with the Filipino skin in mind,” Chari said. OMO! White is now carried by nearly all leading beauty supply and department store chains nationwide.
Building a team that runs 100 percent online, the duo found that the system works to the advantage of their millennial team. No longer bound by regular office hours meant that their members now have the flexibility to work, network and sell way into the evening and even during weekends. “You know creativity can spring at 3 a.m. I guess you can call it structured flow,” says Rose.
Apart from OMO! White, the company is also on top of Oh Crop!, Rosie Posie and Alike.
Oh Crop! is an adlai brand that seeks to provide real and accessible alternatives to the growing health-conscious consumer market. Packed with nutrients and high in fiber, it is positioned as a healtheir alternative to the Filipino staple, which is white rice. Partnering with celebrity restaurateur Marvin Agustin to market its product, the company has a steady supply of adlai, thanks to its vast tracts of company-owned as well as contracted land planted to the crop.
It also pioneered in the first adlai-financing system with UBX and multiple LGUs to further encourage sustainable livelihood for partner-farmers. Oh Crop! is currently available at The Marketplace under the Robinsons Retail Group.
Halal-certified with a core philosophy anchored on “beauty is kindness,” Rosie Posie is a four-step skincare kit made specifically for the Filipino women. A brand promoting gentle and natural ingredients that aims to take care of your skin, while you take care of Mother Earth, the brand is readily available to women based in the Visayas and Mindanao. Among its chief outlets are Rose Pharmacy branches in Cebu, Iloilo and Bacolod.
Finally, to cap off their diverse business ventures, the two ladies also own and manage Alike Media, a digital media company founded even before the pandemic. And because of the disruptions the pandemic caused, it has also found its footing starting in 2020. Currently, it has expanded to become an “omni-channel” that has both digital and print media, placing it as one of the top 10 digital media companies in the country today.
