It was in 1993 when two families, the Hernandezes and the Escalonas, set up the first Fruit Magic cart in SM Megamall in Mandaluyong City. After enjoying steady success, by 1997 revenues began to dip and the owner decided to sell out. Two years later, Alan Escalona, now Fruit Magic CEO, acquired the company and set out to turn it around.

16 years and more than 35 branches later, Fruit Magic has become the leader in the juicing industry in the Philippines and is currently enjoying its popularity as the leading source of the freshest fruit juices in the country. And now, riding the trend of establishments offering lounge areas, they’ve launched their newest concept, the Fruit Magic Lounge.

Conceptualization started in January of 2009. In May of the same year they opened the first Fruit Magic Lounge at the ground floor of Victoria Towers in Quezon City. According to company Brand Manager Martin Escalona, Fruit Magic wanted to graduate from their popular cart and kiosk set up and venture into a more challenging concept. “We wanted a place that [would] really enhance our food since our shakes are bestsellers. The lounge can showcase how our food can be great. We also wanted to promote a relaxing place where they can enjoy meetings, Wi-Fi, and simply hang out instead of the usual café.”

With their luxurious purple sofas, leather ottomans, padded booths, a chill-out music playlist, and free wireless internet, it’s easy to mistake the lounge for your run-of-the-mill coffee shop. According to Escalona, “We wanted to make sure that we get all the components of a lounge: nice music, comfy seats, nice ambiance…we wanted a more lively, colorful place, very pleasing to the eyes and still [has] that café feel.” The result is a space where one can spend hours relaxing in a cozy chair, however instead of sipping a cup of espresso with a sugar-glazed donut, you can get a shot of wheatgrass or a strawberry kiwi shake with a tuna melt sandwich. They’ve managed to make lounging healthy.

Their number one customer remains to be the growing community of health-buffs. “They partner their work-outs with our drinks,” says Escalona, and have been there since they began. But despite the launch of this new concept, Fruit Magic still goes back to its original set up: their carts and kiosks. “It’s still the bread and butter of the company,” says Escalona. And that’s exactly how it all began 16 years ago.

His is a story we’ve heard, seen, and read many times before: born in the province and raised in the slums, abandoned by his mother, raised by his blue-collared father, walked to school, realized he could run, did so without shoes, was seen by a talent scout, earned a scholarship, ran in a marathon, created a marathon, and became a millionaire. It’s a story we know all too well. But this one is different: he wears an afro.

Tall, lanky, and with skin brown from spending afternoons under the sun, Rio dela Cruz, 27, is a child of the streets. A native of Bato, Camarines Sur and the youngest of 14 children, dela Cruz was barely a year old when his mother left the family leaving all parental and nurturing duties to Rio’s father and grandfather. This led to his first foray into entrepreneurship: harvesting kopra at an uncle’s farm for two Pesos a day. With mounting problems on how to sustain their large family, it seemed like the obvious thing to do was simply run away from it all. While Rio didn’t exactly do that, he did however, learn to run. “Ever since I was a child, my basic game was running,” he recalls.

It was upon taking the train to Manila in 1985 that the young Rio saw the world beyond the rickety corners of their shanty, and the vast expanding space before him. With an allowance of one Peso a day, dela Cruz began attending public school, enduring the daily three-kilometer walk. However his ideal mode of transportation was running. “During my elementary days, I would always observe my friends. They were engaged in running,” says dela Cruz. “I thought to myself: ‘I think I can do that.’ Then later on my PE teacher invited my two classmates to try out for the team.” As luck would have it, the other guy didn’t make the cut so Rio took it upon himself to approach the coach. “Sabi ko (I said), ‘Can I try out? Then I removed my shoes and began to run. I was first, and that was the start.”

With advice from his coach the following year, dela Cruz shifted from being a sprinter to a long distance runner. “Back then,” he recalls, “I was running barefoot every time since I couldn’t afford to buy running shoes.” Thanks to a generous neighbor, he received his first pair of running shoes. And although they were a few sizes too small, he managed to make it work for him by cutting the front end open, exposing his toes. All the while the lanky kid with the afro was beating more senior athletes with years of running experience under their belt. Soon, the coach of the University of the Philippines (UP) took notice and offered dela Cruz a slot on the varsity track team.

College proved to be a turning point in his career. After being named Rookie of the Year and winning two silver medals in 2001 in his freshman year, dela Cruz began breaking and establishing records, winning more medals, and soon joined the National Team in his second year in college. In 2004, popular sporting brand Nike noticed the running kid with an afro and signed him up to become an endorser. “Two months before my graduation, UP hired me as a coach for the track team.” It was also during this time that dela Cruz began to teach running one-on-one. His clients, company presidents and CEOs, actors and socialites, made him the running coach to the country’s running elite. And Rio became Coach Rio.

“At that time, I was already thinking of organizing races myself.” With a challenge from his then girlfriend that he couldn’t do it, the then 25-year-old dela Cruz took it upon himself to prove her wrong. Armed with nothing but his experience as a racer and a little over a hundred thousand Pesos of his own money, dela Cruz took to organizing his own race. It was a one-man team–from producing registration materials, designing flyers, looking for sponsors, creating the race route, applying for permits, delivering registration forms, and even creating jerseys. “I based it on experience. Since I always race, I already had an idea on what the basic needs of a runner are in an event.” And in August of 2007, the grounds of the University of the Philippines was swarmed by nearly two thousand runners participating in The Great UP Run. The result was an event worthy of its name. “That was where it all began,” dela Cruz says, “the notion that if Coach Rio organizes a race, it’s a quality event.”

Now, in only two years’ time this veteran of over twenty races in more than four countries, has managed to make himself and his full head of hair a brand that holds quality and world-class racing events popular amongst the country’s running community. To put it into perspective, his last race, the 2009 Timex Run held last November, drew in over 4000 participants and cost 5.7 million Pesos. “After that event, I felt challenged to do better. I really think I can do better,” says Rio.

And better, he did. In 2007, dela Cruz established Entraineur, an events and sports management company that handles corporate accounts. In 2008, he launched Finishline.ph together with business partner Vince Mendoza, an online sports management company that organizes races. And just last year, he launched Run Rio Incorporated which holds dela Cruz’s own running series called The RunRio Trilogy–a yearly triple combination of three major running events, and RunRio Sportswear–Rio’s own running apparel brand.

The success of dela Cruz in such short a time is nothing short of stunning. “I think what they like about me is my enthusiasm as a runner to create a good race,” he says, “And then, of course, the innovation I put in my races, because if you get stuck in the usual or traditional event, nothing will happen. My technique is to bring innovation in my races and create quality events. That’s the key to my success.”

Currently, dela Cruz is training for the Holy Grail of marathons, the Boston Marathon in April of this year for which he qualified, and the New York Marathon in November. But for this kid from the province, the ultimate dream is as big as his afro and as far as the kilometers he’s run: to find himself at the starting line in the city with the same name as his: the 2016 Rio Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The barefoot-running kid with an afro has become the running guru still with an afro. However, he now makes it a habit to slip on some shoes when he runs. When asked how many pairs he now has, “More than a hundred pairs,” he answers matter-of-factly. And how many of those did he buy himself? “Not one.”

PHOTO CREDITS
www.runrio.com

I did an interview once as a requirement for one of my journalism classes in college. While I’d ask the usual questions of “What are the difficulties in your line of work?”, “What’s your most memorable interview?” and other pageant  questions, all those would lead up to “Have you ever received any death threats?” And the most interesting answer I received was that someone actually sent him a death wreath. Interesting, creepy, and very The Godfather.

I never got to interview Marites Vitug. I did, however, get to read her stuff. Marites Vitug is to Philippine journalism as Pavlov is to classical conditioning and salivating dogs.

***

Marites Vitug, author of the controversial Shadow of Doubt: Probing the Supreme Court, has received death threats, reports ABS-CBN News.

The veteran journalist reportedly received two intimidating text messages days after the successful release of her book.

The first message about the pen being mightier that the sword had added text which read: “But the sword kills faster than the pen.”

The second message coming from the number 09091348825 read: “Kaya pala maraming napapatay na journalists dahil katulad mo. May katwiran pala si Ampatuan na pagpapatayin ang mga journalists. Sana nakasama ka dun, malay mo malapit na. (Your kind is one of the reasons why journalists are being killed. Ampatuan has valid reason to kill those journalists. I hope you were one of them. You’ll never know, it could be sooner.)”

Vitug told ABS-CBN News that the threats came after the publication of her book Shadow of Doubt, which dissects the inner workings of the Philippine judiciary.

In an email to SPOT.ph, Vitug disclosed: “I did not expect a death threat. I expected those who were offended by the book [to launch] a campaign to discredit me. I expected criticism. But I am not surprised by this threat because the culture of accountability has not yet seeped into a number of our government institutions. Public officials don’t do the right thing and expect to get away with it. When journalists dig up the truth and write about these public figures, they intimidate and scare us off. They shouldn’t be bothered at all if they have nothing to hide.”

Vitug stated that she doesn’t know the identity of the person or groups that sent the messages, but she is certain that her book was what prompted them.

In any case, Vitug has the support of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) and the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP).

In a statement released to ABS-CBN News, the NUJP praised Vitug for her courage in unveiling what is considered one of the “most mysterious” branches of government in the country: the Supreme Court. “[This] is the role journalism plays in any genuine democracy—that of stripping away the mystique that often surrounds the way government and its instrumentalities work so that the people may judge whether that government is true to its mandate to serve them,” said the NUJP.

Meanwhile, Vitug said that she is simply “keeping her cool but staying alert.” “(A journalist’s) best protection is to bring the threat out in the open,” she explained.

To date, Shadow of Doubt’s first printing editions have been sold out. Newsbreak is currently reprinting the book. This Friday, March 26, 3,000 copies of its newsprint edition will be out. Then, on Monday, March 29, they expect 2,000 copies of its hardcover edition to be delivered.

FROM: Spot.ph