GREAT Women Now A Brand of Local Women’s Products

A new brand of specialty products made by local community women will soon be available in leading concept stores, mall outlets and labels of renowned Philippine designers.

GREAT Women brand is a new and distinct brand of up-scale food products, lifestyle goods and homeopathic care products manufactured by women microentrepreneurs

throughout the country. The brand was derived from the GREAT Women Project,

a governance and capacity development project of the Philippine Commission on Women (PCW) that aims to promote and support a gender-responsive enabling environment for women’s economic empowerment, particularly those in microenterprises.

PCW forged partnership with the Enabling Communities with Hope and Opportunities Sustainable Initiatives (ECHOSI) Foundation, a non-profit organization that promotes products of local enterprise groups; and converged with national and local governments

to support product development and widen market opportunities for women.

Various women’s products from project sites of Ifugao, Metro Naga, Quezon, Bohol, Iloilo, Leyte, PALMA+PB Alliance in North Cotabato and Davao del Sur were selected to be part of the brand. Previously, women food products needed improvements with regard to taste, texture, nutritional components, design and packaging, label, production processes involved and overall marketability while non-food products on functionality, relevance to fashion trends, form and overall quality.

Through the design clinics supported by the GREAT Women Project, women microentrepreneurs received technical advice and mentoring on value-adding for products, developing new product collection, managing the microenterprise, strengthening production capacities, proper packaging and labeling, and assistance with food and nutrition requirements and technologies.

With GREAT Women brand products breaking through new markets, it is expected that employment and income opportunities will be heightened for women microentrepreneurs and their communities.

GREAT Women products will initially be sold exclusively to all ECHOStore retail stores, Tesoro’s outlets and shops in March 2013. A product catalog may soon be downloaded for PCW’s website, www.pcw.gov.ph.

Pull Quote:

GREAT Women brand goes beyond upscaling products and linking them to wider markets. The brand will generate a higher demand for women microentrepreneurs’ products. When launched, GREAT Women brand products are seen to indirectly create employment and income opportunities for women and their communities, who form the brand’s supply chain. Women additionally benefit by being able to sell products at fair trade prices.