The American Woman Who Help Malaysian Single-mom and Malaysian Tradition

Its just 2 days back I went to a seminar for E-commerce where I met with a lot of small E-commerce players. One of the many Malaysian agenda is to help small entrepreneurs in E-commerce space where I have a lot of interest too. The E-commerce space is a branch of industry such as Retail and Tourism-- at least it started from there.

Going at this type of forum, it is an eye-opener where we will get the input of not only small players but as big as Wallmart and Lazada. They started from something small then grow to un-imaginary growth-- all powered up as the Internet of Things (IoT) start to revolutionised the world.

But that is not what I want to share here, we know how big is Wallmart and Lazada. They are ahead of their competitors now, what about the small players?

Have you ever heard about why Apple is a successful brand? That they sell the company's value?

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Well at least in Steve Job's era they did that. Let me just briefly break down Apple's value

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Now that is the reason people buy Apple product. It is a physiological marketing which is genius.

I haven't been straight to the point am I?

Okay coming back to my experience in meeting with E-commerce players. One person in particular that shared her story is Amy Blair the owner of Batik Boutique. For all of you who do not know, this is Batik :

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DISCLAIMER: BATIK IS ORIGINALLY FROM JAVA INDONESIA, MASS MIGRATION FROM INDONESIA FORMED A MALAY LAND, MALAY ETHIC IS FROM NUSANTARA DESCENDANTS SO INHERITANCE OF TRADITION IS INEVITABLE

Batik is actually a cloth that is traditionally made using a manual wax-resist dyeing technique. The word batik is thought to be derived from the word ‘ambatik’ which means a cloth with little dots with the suffix ‘tik’ meaning little dot, drop, point or to make dots. At the same time, batik may also originate from the Javanese word ‘tritik’ describing a resist process for dying where the patterns are reserved on the textiles by tying and sewing areas prior to dying – similar to tie-dye techniques. So Source

Traditional batik making is characterized by the wax-resist dying technique in which melted wax is applied to the fabric using a canting, a utensil that has a metal cup to hold the melted wax with a tiny spout at the far side to drip the hot wax

Source Handmade process of Batik

Ok now here is the American Amy Blair

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What about her?

Amy Blair shared her story on the startup of her Batik Boutique Journey. She lived in Malaysia for 11 years now, at the early time when she and her family started their life in Malaysia, nearby her house is a PPR Flat (low-cost-subsidized-government-flat) that mostly resides by a family that lives near the poverty line).

This is PPR Flat Source'

Amy makes friend with people in the area where she met this single-mom where she called 'kakak' (that is how you address an older female). Making friend with this Kakak make Amy feels obligated to empower the woman's who resides there. Things does not happen overnight. Amy got this idea of using Malaysian Batik and sell it online leveraging on people like the 'Kakak' to help her and ultimately help people on the PPR.

What is moving when Amy presented her Batik Boutique journey is that she did not think of it as a 'fast-cash' kind of opportunity. Her ambition is to help these Malaysian, empowers them and giving them a fair wage. Amy now has a lot of employees that come from that PPR housing area. Amy said:

• Her employees earned more than 40% of minimum wage
• She does not believe in cheap price process. Imagine the labor cost of a product that cost a Dollar
• She is trying to breach international market for Malaysian Batik to be recognised -- now, that is wonderful for an expat to do

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As a Malaysian, I am truly honored by this story. I wish I have the heart to her and to do more for my country and fellow Malaysian. Back to the sharing of Apple's core values, this one is the same as why people believe in a brand, the people behind it and the values.

I hope Amy the best in here future endeavors!

Jen.

Take care Steemians!

Jen.

P/S: I blogged about other stuff too!

• Jen's Netflix Review - Orange Is The New Black ALL SEASON (1-5)
• Jen's Movie Review- Ready Player One
• Jen's Travelogue - Cappadocia, The Land of The Beautiful Horses [Part 2]