Which is perfectly characteristic—or a least a perfect characteristic—of someone in the business of selling unique, interesting, and absolutely fascinating bags in a brand-conscious or otherwise fad-crazy fashion market. Under the brand 8 Mile, in which she is partnered with her sister, Reena’s most distinctive bags are the zipper bags, which, literally, are multi-colored zippers arranged together to make a whole bag. Even the straps or handles can be made of zippers, some with the teeth facing outwards for variety.

The bags range from small vanity pouches to shoulder bags to messenger bags to even large tote bags, where the zips are used for piping for a unique variation on an already unique design. Her smallest bags are a take on the popular cellphone pouches, which she calls Ketai pouches, after the Japanese word for cellular phones. The colors of the bags define the look of each bag more than anything, and each combination is either developed by Reena herself or comes from a suggestion from people around her. "I can’t even draw," Reena admits. "But ever since I was a child, I loved to play with colors. Now, my ideas for colors come from different places. If, say, I see a signage and I realize that the color combination on it works well, I’ll put it on my bags. Or sometimes, I get my ideas from people who ask me to customize bags. My tita once had me make a travel bag with an interesting green and brown combination, so I named the color combination after her."

Reena’s background and even her dreams would seem the farthest thing from her businesses now, which aside from bags, are collaborations on lines of accessories, footwear, and clothing. "I started PT in college, because I wanted to be a doctor," she says. "And I still dream of continuing on to med school." Her business of zipper bags took off just last year, when Reena was still doing it part time because she was still studying. "I had to go on leave in school because I had to work on the bags full time," she explains. "In less than a year, I was supplying bags to 10 stores, and I realized it could be a real business for me. And, by that time, I also had people working under me, so all the more I felt driven, I felt I needed to make things work for them as well. I really had to make a decision to make my business push through."

Of course, having quite the unique bag concept, Reena has inevitably found her smaller zipper bags copied and even turned into school art projects after she was featured in a morning show over a year ago. "At first, I was taken aback," she says. "But then, I realized it doesn’t matter. The zipper bag isn’t a completely original idea of mine, I was actually inspired by a thesis project I saw, and I decided to innovate on them to make this line of products. I realize that even if people copy my bags, I’ll always be way ahead of them, because I always try to come out with newer, unique designs and products."

Another important part of her bag business is that Reena is open to customizing. She has an open ear to customers’ suggestions, and being the good businessman that she is, she is always eager to listen to their personal concerns of practicality and usability, which go a long way in improving her bags and her clients’ satisfaction. "People sometimes like a design I make in one bag, but it may be too big for them or too bulky," Reena explains. "They ask me if I can make it smaller or wider or like this or like that, and I make it for them. The customer’s suggestions are often very useful, and they can actually help me improve designs."

Practical and functional design are obviously key to Reena’s bag concept, especially in the new bag line she developed, apart from her zipper bags, under the brand RadDish, with a partner who happens to himself understand the need for practical design: an architect. A key product of RadDish is a gorgeous line of laptop bags, both for men and women. Understanding the need for elegant, fashionable, lighter laptop bags, especially for people who live out of their laptops, RadDish developed two gorgeous types of laptop bags: for women, a striped oversized shoulder-bag style with genuine leather base and handles in fashionable cherry red, pink and baby blue colors, and, for men, a sleek, messenger-bag style laptop case in more subtle but no less fashionable colors.

"We wanted to make laptop bags that didn’t look like the usual gray and black bags you usually see," Reena explains. "And the bags are spacious so that you can put your other personal items in it as well, so you won’t have to carry a separate handbag. It was important that the bags didn’t look like laptop bags also for safety, so thieves won’t take notice of it because it doesn’t look like it carries a laptop." The women’s laptop bag looks so chic and stylish that it has been mistaken for a Kate Spade bag, only the protective pocket inside the bag for the laptop revealed otherwise.

At the end of the day, perhaps the best parts about Reena’s bags are that they are extremely affordable and unique. Her own personal belief that fashion needs to stylish and functional but at the same time reasonably-priced and personal is ultimately what drives all her businesses. "I’m not brand conscious, and I much prefer unique items," Reena says. "Bags are part of a fashion statement. I mean, just because your bag costs a fortune, does that mean you’ll be forced to use only one bag forever and not be able to play around with style to suit your outfits and occasions?"

"Also, I always want to be the one people ask, ‘Oh, where did you get that blouse?’ rather than be the one asking where they got their stuff," she says. Reena speaks with a determinedness and passion for this uniqueness, and it spills over into her own creations. In her business, she understands that those qualities, before even business-savvy and marketing sense, are what make for timeless, outstanding products. "You just have to love what you do. Don’t think of the money first," she says. "Maganda talaga ang lalabas sa ‘yo."