Adela Rivadeniera, Owner of Three Sisters Home Made Banana Chips

Adela P. Rivadeniera, 45, joined CARD Bank in 2000, has taken out 11 loans to start and expand her family business, Three Sisters Home Made Banana Chips, which employs seven people. Undisclosed earnings.

Adela Rivadeniera considered herself lucky: with her husband’s steady income from the Marcopper mining company, they never had to worry about making ends meet. His salary even allowed her to quit her job at a local daycare so she could stay home full-time to look after their children. But when the company suddenly shut down after a mining disaster in 1996, they had to find a new way to support their family. The most practical solution, combining her interest in reading business magazines and her parents’ plantation, was to get into the banana chip business.

“We started with only 100 bananas,” she recalled. “We just used kitchen knives to slice the banana while watching television.”

She borrowed 2,000 pesos from CARD Bank to buy a frying pan and a basin. With each sale, she bought more bananas and chipped away at the loan. With her next loan of 5,000 pesos, she bought a second frying pan. After 11 loans, the Three Sisters Home Made Banana Chips is now staffed by seven people and sells four flavors to customers across the Philippines, even reaching some markets in the United States, the Middle East and other Asian countries.

“As the business expanded, we hired more people, prioritizing our neighbors to help them obtain extra income,” she said, noting that they buy their fruit and production supplies from local sources. “Part of the income generated from the business was used to support the studies of our children.”

The future looks even brighter as their grown children bring their engineering and marketing degrees to the family business. The next step is to buy another vehicle to make deliveries and advertise the business in Manila, a short-term cost that Rivadeniera calculates will pay for itself.

As a mentor for other entrepreneurs, Rivadeniera advises them to focus on product quality – measured by cleanliness and customer feedback – and responsible lending.

“I make sure to save a certain amount on a daily basis,” she said. “If I need to pay 7,000 pesos weekly, then I need to save 1,000 daily – and I would not spend that money even if I do not have capital for my business. The money I save must be intact.”

~ Adela P. Rivadeniera