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Tag: Ayala Malls

  • Korea’s Born to Stand Out Opens First Southeast Asia Store in Makati

    Korea’s Born to Stand Out Opens First Southeast Asia Store in Makati

    South Korean luxury perfume label Born to Stand Out opened its first Southeast Asian boutique at Glorietta 4 in Makati City, entering the Philippine market through local distributor Scent & Beauté.

    Founded in Seoul by Jun Lim in 2022, the brand built its identity on high-concentration formulations and unconventional scent profiles, contrasting with the clean, minimalist branding common among East Asian beauty exports.

    Inside the Glorietta 4 Boutique

    The Makati boutique pairs bright crimson interiors with white ceramic-style flacons across the full catalog. Inventory spans four core collections: Dirty and Sticky, Dark and Drunk, Eau Intimité, and the flagship Extrait Extrême tier.

    Formulations in the Extrait Extrême series run between 55 and 62 per cent perfume oil concentration. The brand ages those blends for three months in traditional Korean earthenware jars known as onggi to round out volatile top notes before bottling. The store also stocks scented body lotions, washes, and home fragrances.

    The Play for Manila’s Niche Beauty Spend

    Distributor Scent & Beauté handles store operations, logistics, and retail management for the rollout. The company manages luxury and premium personal care portfolios across the Philippines and Singapore.

    Department store beauty counters in Metro Manila have long favored Western legacy houses, but independent Korean beauty and lifestyle brands are taking dedicated square footage in prime retail properties. Ayala Land continues to reconfigure Glorietta’s ground floors toward specialized retail and indie beauty concepts to capture younger foot traffic.

    What to Watch Next

    Niche fragrance carries high margin potential, yet price elasticity in Metro Manila will test whether consumers convert from entry-level K-beauty purchases into ultra-high-concentration extracts. Scent & Beauté has not disclosed expansion targets for additional locations across Metro Manila or second-tier Philippine retail hubs.

  • Metro Department Store is opening at Ayala Malls Feliz

    Metro Department Store is opening at Ayala Malls Feliz

    The 53rd Metro Department Store has opened its doors at the Ayala Malls Feliz in Pasig City. Covering a floor area of 21,200sqm, the store includes a 6600sqm supermarket. “Customers can look forward to an enjoyable and convenient shopping experience as we consistently strive to deliver world-class customer service as well as a wide assortment of premium quality merchandise at affordable prices,” said Frank S Gaisano, Metro Stores Retail Group chairman and CEO.

    The firm aims to open five more stores this year. An investment of P10 billion (US$191.9 million) has been allocated to store expansion over five years.

    Metro Stores Retail Group has shops in Metro Manila, Central Luzon and South Luzon, as well as in Central, Western, and Eastern Visayas through department store, supermarket, and hypermarket formats.

    For the first nine months of 2018, the group’s net income fell by 17 per cent to P454.93 million (US$8.7 million).

  • Ayala Malls the 30th offering Uber service

    Ayala Malls the 30th offering Uber service

    Ayala Malls has teamed up with ride-sharing service Uber to improve access to its newest mall, and may expand the service to the rest of its empire.

    Ayala 30th Uber

    Initially, Ayala Malls the 30th is teaming with carpool service UberHop, which offers fixed-rate ride shares for people heading in the same direction during rush hour.

    Ayala 30th Uber 1

    For a flat rate, people going to and coming from Ayala Malls the 30th in Ortigas will be linked to the business hubs of Makati City and Bonifacio Global City on weekdays.

    “The beauty of this is that it brings six to eight people together who would have otherwise taken their own cars from Makati and back, so that’s about six fewer cars on the road during rush hour,” says Uber Philippines communications head Cat Avelino.

    The test program may eventually lead to UberHop and other services being used by more Ayala malls.

    “Definitely we hope this will be the first of many more partnerships with Ayala. Ayala has more than 40 malls in Metro Manila and around the Philippines, so we’re definitely open to extending the benefit people get from ride-sharing,” says Avelino.

    The partnership ties in to Ayala’s Easy Ride project, which aims to give customers convenient access to various modes of public transport to and from its malls.

    “The real value-add of Uber is that it can direct where the drop-off and pick-up points are, and that really helps with the flow, the customer experience and our traffic,” says Ayala Malls the 30th GM Mariana Zobel de Ayala.