While waiting for her daughter Maricon to finish her classes in school, Consuleo L. Tolentino thought about what product to sell to augment the family income.
“I thought about pickled papaya because it’s easy to prepare and does not need a big capital,” said Tolentino, a 56-year-old resident of barangay Talamban, Cebu City.
With P500 in capital, she started making and selling pickled papaya in 2000. Tolentino had no trouble selling her pickles to other parents and finding customers.
She said the income helped her family especially when her husband’s income fell short of their budget.
In 2006, Tolentino joined the Kapamilya Negosyo Na, a program of the University of San Carlos College of Commerce Alumni Association and ABS-CBN that gives training and cash aid to micro, small and medium enterprises.
She was one of the participants for the first season of the program. “When I joined I thought about making my product unique so I developed pickled chayote as my entry,” said Tolentino.
Her exposure in the program gave Tolentino more customers, encouraging her to add variations like pickled ampalaya (bitter gourd) and pickled onions.
“I met a lot of customers then but in 2007 I stopped selling until 2010 when I got a stall in the USC canteen,” she said.
Tolentino said she got so busy with the stall that she couldn’t find time to make her pickled food items.
Looking back, Tolentino said she would have made more customers had she continued selling.
“When I was no longer given the stall in the school, I decided to go back to making my pickles,” she said.
Tolentino then started to produce all her pickled variants and added another, pickled raddish, s. She said she now supplies the Center for International Education.
Tolentino said she aggressively markets her products at Banilad Town Center every Sunday.
She’s now also displaying at Parkmall in Mandaue City at the KNN booth, which drew orders from foreign customers.
An American ordered 50 bottles of pickled onions and some Koreans also like my pickled ampalaya,” Tolentino said.
Bbig bottles are sold for P100 while the smaller one is priced at P60 each.
Tolentino said she’s researching other food products to develop like pickled singkamas and pickled cucumber.
“For more information on new technologies and process in making pickles I’m also planning to go to DOST (Department of Science and Technology) and ask for their assistance so that I can further improve my products,” she said.
Tolentino uses natural vinegar from coconut nectar which turns dark if stored longer. She said she wants to preserve the color of her pickle mix so her customers won’t wonder why her products are darkly colored.
“They might think that it’s no longer safe to eat when in fact it’s only natural,” said Tolentino.
She said she also wants to register her pickled food items under the Bureau of Food and Drugs (BFAD).
“If I can process that, I know I can penetrate the retail chains because I’m confident about my product,” she said.