Andrew Tan turns hobby to business in putting up sports apparel maker Jersey Haven
FROM a family who loves to watch basketball and collecting jerseys, Andrew Tan is thankful to turn his hobby into one of the go-to sports apparel creators. Mr. Tan’s passion for basketball started as a young kid being brought to the PBA games by his father when Asia’s pioneering pro league was still being played at the Cuneta Astrodome.
“My brother and I started this as a hobby. We were basketball enthusiasts. We started watching the PBA when it was still being played at the Cuneta Astrodome. We were influenced by our dad to watch basketball and we started to love it. Then we fell in love collecting basketball jerseys. We came to the point that we want to convert our hobby to business, so there we came up with Jersey Haven,” Mr. Tan told BusinessWorld in an interview.
No other race is more passionate in basketball than the Filipinos. Basketball has been in our bloodline, from playing the game from the streets, backyards, schools and everywhere, to watching the game all the way to collecting our favorite jerseys.
Collecting basketball jerseys is one way of showing our admiration to the players we used to love and we want ourselves to be attached to them. Such passion is shared by Mr. Tan himself, who was able to collect more than a thousand jerseys altogether — from the NBA, the PBA and other local leagues.
“Before, I have a collection of replica jerseys, then shift from replica to swing man to authentic. Basically for the NBA jerseys, right now I have hundreds. For locals, I have around 800 more or less,” he added.
That feverish passion of collecting jerseys motivated Mr. Tan in putting a business that is close to his heart. He recalled how, nearly 15 years ago, as a freshman college, Jersey Haven started.
For Mr. Tan, having a business that is close to his heart isn’t just a business at all and gives him advantages.
“At least, we don’t feel the stress,” said Mr. Tan.
“We started this as a sideline, when we were first year college. We didn’t expect it to last from 2003 until now. We officially started 2008 when we prepared all the business papers.”
Like in any other businesses, there were struggles along the way, but Mr. Tan and his family was able to endure it.
“We started at a time when there was no social media. It was difficult for marketing. Now, you could simply post it on Facebook and the next thing you know, people started to contact you. Even the sites we were posting before, they’re no longer here,” he added.
The business started to grow and now on its 16th year, Jersey Haven has able to produce a line of brands not just for PBA teams but for those apparel makers, which want to include sports line in their business.
“Right now, we have partners from different leagues — both commercial leagues and hobbyists leagues,” added Mr. Tan.
“We’re more of helping the brands to come up with their lines, for example World Balance. We’re tasked to produce their sponsored teams, so basically, what we want to offer them, since materials are made of imported fabrics, like the known sports brands, the point is we want to brand to level their products by serving them with our high quality materials,” said Mr. Tan.
“For World Balance, we started with their UST team three years ago, then Barako Bull, then recently, for Barangay Ginebra for two years now,” added Mr. Tan.
There’s a sense of fulfillment for Mr. Tan each time he sees the jerseys of the teams they created become winners. He feels they became part of it.
Barangay Ginebra captured the Governors’ Cup title last year in a thrilling finish made possible by import Justin Brownlee’s buzzer-beating trey.
“It only happened last season, with Ginebra. There’s a special feeling you get to outfit the most popular team in the Philippines and then they will win the championship. You know that shot of Justin Brownlee will be repeated many times because it’s part of the history and you can tell to everyone that you were the ones who created their uniform, with a sense of pride,” added Mr. Tan.
From the retro line all the way to the current ones, Jersey Haven has catered to different audience. Mr. Tan was able to make his mark on different markets, serving purpose to those people who were looking to be attached to their well-loved players past and present and partnering with apparel makers and leagues that need his services.
Because of the retro line, Jersey Haven, at one time, got involved catering to the needs of the PBA.
“We’ve secured license before for the PBA Retro Jersey. We started to partner with PBA before we licensed it. We distributed data manufacturing first. Since the PBA is not into retail, we decided to license the PBA Retro line so they don’t have to worry about anything in retail or inventories, stuff like that. We were the ones in charge of manufacture, research. They came in two lines — high end and low end. Authentic and replica. It’s more of a generic line, free sizes, low cost budget for the ‘common masa.’ Then, we came up with authentic line. That’s more for the collectors market. The authentic line has sizes,” said Mr. Tan.
Creating jerseys, particularly the retro line, is more sophisticated as you need to create it the way it was designed from different genre. More importantly, the retro jersey was also a way to foster bond between family members and friends who grew up from different generations.
“We’ve researched the product. For example, the patches. Before, they were hand made. So basically, we traced it. The resources were limited. So we tried to come up with the nearest pictures of the design we want to produce. From there, we will trace it to look it appear more like hand made. If we do it on modern patching, it won’t make realistic. It won’t make retro. So we designed it that way. It will look more nostalgic. It also gives us the chance to bring back the golden era of the PBA. Having the retro jersey and new ones combined will give people from different era to bond, for example a father and son tandem can have their bonding of sorts purchasing jerseys from different generations,” he added.
“Our target market for the retro jerseys were OFWs. Young professionals now, probably came in the era of (Alvin) Patrimonio, Bal David, Olsen Racela up to the time of the rookie year of Jimmy Alapag. The 40 and above, they would purchase (Robert) Jaworski, Atoy Co, Ricky Brown, and Samboy Lim.”
The retro line is just part and parcel of Jersey Haven’s creation.
“For UAAP, we’re doing for UST. We also created the La Salle-Ateneo reunion game, the sleeved ones they’ve used. When the sleeved jersey was becoming a trend, they’ve tasked us to come up with a sleeved jersey,” said Mr. Tan. “When the NBA Legends came here to play against the PBA Legends, we were the ones who made the jerseys.
“We also did PBA Legends uniforms besides this. If they have provincial or international games, sometimes they will task us to do their uniforms.”
But in anything you do — be it business, family, friends, and society — Mr. Tan knows they have a mission to fulfill.
“Our direction now is since we have this high-quality materials, we’d like to help all the starting brands, not just for sports, but also in the apparel line, we’d love to help them,” he added. “I believe as Christian, everything we have is not just because of your hardwork. It’s God’s blessing. It would be better if you help them. The market is big and you cannot monopolize everyone. It’s better to help everyone. At least we’re all happy. What’s the point of being the top when you’re stepping on somebody’s business? It’s better to help those who are still trying to get their way on top, then together we’ll go right to the top. It’s a blessing we have to share.”
One of the essential elements why Jersey Haven is still going strong is the tight-knit relationship of Mr. Tan with his staff, whom he calls as his family.
“Even in my staff in the sewing area, I always tell them to just do our job properly and in that way, the clients will continue to come in. There were times we have to struggle. You have to find ways where you can provide jobs for your workers. What’s the next step? They have families to feed. They have bills to pay. We treat each other like a family. I don’t treat them as my employee and I’m the boss. We just have different roles to fulfill. In that way, we can work together more comfortably. We also work like a basketball team with different roles,” he added.
Such importance is very crucial, especially during down time where planning and plating is very crucial to ensure that his workers will have something to do.
“Peak season comes in before Holy Week all the way to December. Usually, the month of January and February are our relax month. Usually by these months, the school season is about to end and the companies are still rearranging the annual budget. But we plant the seed during these months where we give quotations. Planning stage and plating stage,” he added.