110 branches of NBS are ready for school

MANILA, Philippines - No back-to-school shopping is complete without a trip to National Book Store. With public schools beginning their school year on Monday and private schools in the second week of June, hundreds of thousands of students of all levels are completing their lists of supplies — and National Book Store is ready with its 110 branches nationwide, from General Santos City in the south to Tuguegarao in the north.

That the country’s favorite bookstore has grown so big from its humble beginnings in Escolta with its lone tindera during the Second World War to what it is today, giving employment to 5,000 people, can be attributed to NBS founder Nanay Socorro Ramos, the energetic 86-year-old woman who has guided its growth. Now the company’s general manager, she has left the daily operations to her children — Ben Ramos, Alfred Ramos, and Cecilia Ramos-Licauco.

“When we had our first store, we would get requests like, ‘Magbukas naman kayo dito sa Makati, ang layo ng Maynila. Ang mga customers ang nagre-request, they determine the locations of the stores. One time, I was being interviewed on dzRH by Tiya Dely. Di pa natatapos ang interview namin may mga tumatawag na, ‘Tiya Dely sabihin mo naman kay Mrs. Ramos magbukas dito sa Gen San,’ at sa iba pang lokasyon.”

The farthest branch in the north that she has visited is NBS Vigan, a visit that Nanay thoroughly enjoyed for its sights. “Maganda ang Vigan! Even if the drive is long, the scenery you pass through is beautiful, nagsimba pa kami sa Manaoag.”

National Book Store, according to Nanay, is still run like a family business. Every week, Nanay and her children preside over a lunch meeting with their 12 area managers, each of whom oversees multiple branches and most of whom grew up in the company, some of them second-generation employees, some of them starting at NBS’s second branch in Avenida.

“We have a meeting at one of my children’s houses and we talk about the problems and how to solve them,” says Nanay. As she toured us at the warehouse of NBS in Mandaluyong, employees who were stocking the “corrals” of each branch for delivery or loading up products in the many red NBS trucks would momentarily stop what they were doing and greet her affectionately.

Nanay says that the older employees, those she grew up with in the business, sometimes even ask for personal advice, the same way letter senders to her column in the STAR, “Ask Nanay,” veer from the business theme and turn to her for just about anything. “Yung mga matatanda na kasama ko noon pa ka-pamilya ko na, minsan pinapagalitan pa ako,” says Nanay with a laugh. 

This is the busiest season for NBS, when the stores change their layouts to accommodate their ever-expanding school supplies. Notebooks are stacked several feet high, folders and pad papers are taken from the shelves and put out front for easy access by shoppers.

Cecilia Ramos-Licauco, vice president for purchasing, has seen the trends and attitudes shift several times over the years, mainly driven by the students themselves. “Many years ago, everybody was into spiraled notebooks, then students began taking out the spiral and stitching the notebook with different colors of yarn, looking like an art and crafts project. So three years ago the manufacturers took their cue and began doing it for them, and now we have notebooks stitched with yarn.” 

Whereas basic supplies were adequate to consumers before, shoppers are now demanding for more sophisticated products, and National Book Store and its partner vendors have responded. Notebooks for grade-school children, for instance, now come color-coded and with contemporary designs; for high-school and college, they have become more handier and with tabs to mark the different subjects; from the white, gooey Elmer’s glues, they now come in shades of neon; simple highlighters now come in many colors and in one flower-shaped marker.

“We’re continuously looking for and developing products with our suppliers,” says Cecilia. “Students’ tastes change, and their needs as well. Like now we’re selling some seeds and garden tools for grade-school children because some schools ask them to do their own herb gardens and there is interest in the environment. We always think of something that’s in line with National Book Store’s ’s philosophy — that it should be educational.”

Home Offices

To keep abreast of worldwide trends, Cecilia attends stationery, office and school-supply fairs in the US, Germany, Hong Kong and China, for products that are both applicable and affordable in the Philippines.

The fastest growing section for NBS is computer accessories, such as memory sticks, recordable CDs, holders and sorters for CDs. The arts and crafts section, now with its many choices for scrapbooking materials, has been steadily growing in the past years, too.

“We try to balance the expensive products and affordable ones. Like for the Moleskin notebook, we choose the locations in which to distribute it, including Rockwell, Glorietta and TriNoma. We carry such things in specific branches where we think there is a market. For the general public we have the affordable products and at different price points. That’s what National Book Store is — we are servicing the general public.”

NBS is also looking to expand its product offerings. Two years ago, it started selling basic school uniforms at very competitive prices (white polos, khaki pants and socks) so customers who were already in an NBS branch didn’t have to rush to the department stores to look for these.

“We really want to strengthen the office lines — the vaults, filing cabinets, fax machines, cash boxes, and things like that,” she says.

A sub-category to this line is the home office. Cecilia notes that a lot more people today are working from home, whether in full or part-time capacity. Just look at any house being built or fixed — an unused room is usually turned into an office or study. And when it comes to your home office — you want your supplies to be a little less office-y and a lot more homey and pretty even though they serve the same purpose as the plain ones. Cecilia says that soon NBS branches will carry printed staplers and punchers.    

“People don’t want their stuff to be boring when they’re using them at home,” she says. “We want to make sure we will be able to answer the needs of offices and home offices. In the bigger branches, we also have the basic office tables and chairs so that it can be a one-stop shopping experience for customers.”

Budget Still The No. 1 Consideration

What’s the biggest problem of parents with schoolchildren today?

“Budget,” says Ceilia. 

“Kasi tumaas lahat like transportation and food, including the uniforms and tuition fees,” says Nanay.

The recession has altered the attitude and shopping behavior of people today, adds Cecilia. “Their actions are very measured, they only buy what they need and want to get value for their money. They’re no longer shopping indiscriminately.”

One piece of good news is that paper products have remained at the same prices as last year’s because the price of paper did not go up. “The manufacturers are just charging the cost of the paper and since the demand did not go up they have to sell their products at the same price or less, which is good for the consumers.”

National Book Store has two house brands that cater to budget-conscious shoppers. Best Buy is a line of bestselling products with topnotch quality, while NBS Basics is still good quality but more affordable. In paper products Best Buy is slightly thicker and whiter, the pens last longer, the crayons of better quality; Basics is mostly pad paper and notebooks.

“Parents may be conscious of prices but they’re also smart enough to know that they should choose good quality at the lowest price as opposed to very cheap where the quality may not be that good,” she says. “Like pens that run out of ink after a short time, they’re not worth the savings you think you’re making.”

The budget, of course, is a very small consideration if the children are out shopping with their grandparents — or their great-grandparents. Just ask Nanay. When she takes her apo-sa-tuhod, who affectionately call her “Lola Lola,” to shop for toys it’s their mothers that protest.

“Like on Sundays dinadala ko sa Toy Kingdom, ang nagagalit ang parents nila, ‘Lola wag mo masyadong i-spoil yan.’ Binabawasan ang mga binibili ko,” says Nanay.  

Advice For Parents & Kids

School opening is the busiest time for National Book Store (second is Christmas when it brings out its Christmas trees and home décor). Nanay feels that in today’s tough times, the best advice she can give to students, whether in grade school or college, is to know “how lucky they are that they are in school when so many others can’t afford to go to school. Study well because education is important. When you grow up, you can get a good job. Read more, know more, earn more. Invest in your mind.”

Cecilia adds, “I think the kids don’t realize yet how important it is to learn. It’s two ways — the teachers have to make it interesting so that learning is fun because that’s the only way kids can learn. You can’t force it on them. That’s the challenge our teachers are facing. The students automatically open their minds if education is made interesting and relevant to them.”

Nanay knows it’s not easy for parents to balance their work, time for the home and children, but she says the burden of helping their kids do well in school falls on parents. “They should be patient enough to help them with their homework, trabaho nila iyan. When my children were small, the twin boys were attending Ateneo at Padre Faura. Pagdating nila ng 4 p.m. magmi-mirienda, maya-maya wala na, naglalaro na, andun sa bodega. Ipapahanap ko pa, tapos nagtatago sila kasi ayaw mag-homework. During their exams, I would make them review questions. Siyempre if you read Philippine history you’d know more or less what the teachers would ask.”

Apart from the required textbooks, both Nanay and daughter Cecilia advise that parents should set aside a budget for books that’ll enable kids to open their minds. For Nanay, it’s the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, a bestseller at NBS which sells about 30,000 copies a year, and the classics. For Cecilia it’s reference books about the world we live in to tweak their curiosity and give them knowledge.

“One time I gave a speech at Unilever and I was asked, ‘Mrs. Ramos, aren’t you afraid that one day nobody will be reading books anymore?’ I don’t think so. There is nothing like the smell of a book; you can take it anywhere you go, if you want to read in the bathroom or on the bus, rather than these new gadgets that need electricity.”

What about books for parents themselves? “Self-improvement books,” says Nanay, a true believer that at any age, one can still gain important knowledge about one’s self.