A LOT has been written about the real-estate boom, especially in the form of sophisticated urban vertical developments that have come quite unprecedented in the Philippines.
Luxury condominiums have sprouted across Metro Manila’s cities almost one after another, creating the new urban landscape we see today.
Now, in the wake of all this development, and as these properties are being delivered and turned over, a new boom is starting. To complement all of these high-end homes, a new market has been established.
And it is now starting to emerge. The surge in real estate from the past couple of years has resulted in the formation of a second wave that comes to us in the form of a huge demand for high-end home furnishings. And while luxury real estate may have more or less plateaued in recent times, the fruit of all the building and construction is now giving birth to this new emerging market.
In recent times, we’ve seen an influx of top-end, globally competitive brands for home furnishings making a clamor to enter the Philippine market. Seeking to be the essential finishing elements to all of these new homes, brands like Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, and Kohler have arrived and are now trying to capture the local market.
These international brands are racing to establish themselves locally by opening their respective flagship stores. In fact, Kohler just opened its first official showroom in the country at Designo Atelier along Acropolis, Libis. Designo Atelier is a Design Center that seeks to house the world’s top luxury brands in home furnishings, as stated by Rosmarie Ong, executive vice president and COO of the Wilcon Corp. It was at this launch when I was able to listen to Kohler’s Kitchen and Bath president for Asia Pacific, Larry Yuen, as he spoke about his views on the Philippine market, as well as a few insights on Kohler’s decision to expand their operations in the Philippines.
“We are very confident with the Philippines,” Yuen said. “The demand for high-end bathroom fixtures is up, and people in the Philippines embrace products in this category. Our job now in Kohler is to launch exciting products and make them available to our market in the Philippines to keep up with and satisfy the growing demand.”
The luxury furniture industry emerging in the wake of the upswing in the real-estate industry can be taken as a positive indicator that the growth achieved can be sustained. As the real-estate sector winds down, a different but complementing sector, is picking up the pace, in this case luxury furniture.
Booms, as we all know, reach their end at one point or another with just as much pomp and circumstance as they started with. The boom in the real-estate industry in the Philippines has started to show small and subtle signs of slowing down, but with this new development, an all-out crash in the economy just might be averted.
Perhaps, the most important aspect in the shifting roles between growing industries is that of watching out for the ones that can build a strong second wave. This second wave by the luxury furniture industry following the real-estate boom is a good thing for us and our economy. But as the market opens up, and as it attracts more and more international players to come to our shores, it also serves as a wake-up call. As the competition in the Philippines goes international, it now becomes our duty to protect and safeguard our local industries getting eaten up.
Philippine-made furniture, which has proven its mettle time and time again, stand to gain just as much from the second wave as all the others.
It should be a no brainer that our Philippine furniture industry should be the first beneficiary of the boom ushered in by the Philippine real-estate industry. Our local furniture makers and designers, with their many international awards and acclaim, have been exporting their creations to Europe, the US and the Middle East, where demand is high and steady. 2014’s newly opened hotels, resorts, restaurants, condominiums, and commercial buildings all pose as contract opportunities for local furniture makers to provide all, if not most, of their furnishing needs.
The capability to produce well-designed furniture of considerable quality is no longer a question for the Philippines, as evidenced by our strong exports. The challenge now lies in getting the domestic market to see this capability and respond to it in positive ways.
With the increased demand for beautifully designed, durable, and high quality furnishings, the local furniture industry, most especially in the emerging luxury market as opened by the real-estate industry boom, deserves the spotlight in this great second wave.