Our Franco Collection will always be special. To many, it may be just a leather bag collection by a homegrown brand. To us, it’s a story – a story of inspiration, collaboration, and most especially, a story behind a community.
When we planned on making an improved version of our laptop bags together with a messenger bag to better cater to the market’s needs (and suggestions, of course!), we didn’t have enough funds. As all of you know, we are a lean start up brand; we maximize and work with the resources we have. But with a clear and big vision for the collection we’ve planned, having limited resources didn’t stop us from turning our ideas into a reality.
The old version of our laptop bags, Joaquin Collection.
Our team, which was only composed of three during the past year, continued to research and find ways on how to bring our product ideas to life. It was not easy for us, but we had a motivating force; we had a bigger purpose behind the collection. It was our goal to showcase the quality that local brands can offer, the traditional leather craftmanship, and most importantly, the highly competent Filipino bag makers.
Luckily, we came across The Spark Project and a good friend of our #GirlBoss, Diana Ferrer, introduced her to how this project worked. And we must say, that was exactly the kind of spark that we needed. The Spark Project is a crowdfunding platform which enables businesses, especially start ups, to launch their business ideas. It was through this platform that we were able to launch our Franco Collection. We have released our Franco Collection last September 2018, and we still produce them up to today. Not only was their platform able to help us gather funds to start the production, they’ve helped us gather support and belief for our homegrown brand and story too.
If you think that The Spark Project journey ends after the crowdfunding period, you’re totally wrong. If anything, that is just the beginning of a journey that unfolds you to new opportunities, like-minded people, and a community that you’ll be in for a lifetime. We, at The School of Satchel, continue to embark on that journey and we couldn’t be more thankful.
Attending Spark Fest for the first time last March 25 was one of the most memorable experiences of being in The Spark Project journey. Our team was invited to take part in this year’s Spark Fest and we were able to gain so much insights on other types of businesses, the values they promote, the steps they took to succeed and more. It was also inspiring to hear entrepreneurs share the failures they encountered and how these helped them get to where they are now. On top of all that, we felt honored to have our Girl Boss share The School of Satchel’s story to the Spark Project Community. It was a day filled with exchange of ideas, learnings, and support among all businessmen, girl bosses, and changemakers.
The Spark Project is definitely more than just a platform. It’s an inspiration for creative individuals to pursue their business ideas, their passions. It’s a collaboration among people who come from different backgrounds but share the same purpose and advocacy. Most importantly, it’s a community that continues to grow, helping one individual after the other dream big enough to reach their goals.
To The School of Satchel, The Spark Project made us feel that our business ideas are not costly and hard to reach. It was a platform and avenue that made us realize that having a lean start up, being a local brand, and experiencing capital limitations are never hindrances to spark your dreams.
Your idea today, a reality tomorrow. Spark your ideas with The Spark Project.