Henry Hudson

He was born in a remote village in southern China on December 25, 1923 to an impoverished family. His original birth name Sy Chi Sieng literally meant "to attain ultimate success." As a child, the young Sy a courageous boy who always aimed to succeed in anything he did. His father left the family, when he was still a toddler, for a country that was then a US territorial protectorate. His father was a trader seeking for good opportunities in a place where economic progress was bright and promising. Back then, the Philippines was the country that had this special distinction. Inspired by his father, he also wanted to become a businessman. He had nothing else in mind but to do business as a child. Hence, he later followed his dad and migrated to the Philippines at the tender age of twelve. It was in the year 1936 when he left his home village Ang-khue of the Dieng-oh municipality in the county of Jinjiang, now a city, which lies near Xiamen in Fujian province. When he arrived in Manila to join his father, he did not expect what he encountered back then. "I cried when I first saw him." he recalls. "Dad was dirt-poor." The two were reunited in a cramped space of only 30 square meters in floor area in a dirty street in the district of Quiapo, central Manila. He saw his father again in poor health conditions which moved him a lot. His father was a proprietor of a tiny grocery store on Echague Street, - now Carlos Palanca Sr. St. - just behind the city's notorious Chinatown. Since then, the young Sy only had one goal in life: The will to strive for excellence and to overcome the harsh environment of poverty through the discipline of hard work and frugality. He has learned the value of honesty and patience in the business. This father's hard life as a small shopkeeper was eased when his son assisted him. He went everyday to the Divisoriaflea market, the city's crowded wholesale retail bargaining drawer, at the Chinese chay-chi-kaw area to buy heaps of goods and then carry them on his back all by himself to resell them in the convenience store. The store was their very own ha-ya tiamor better known as a sari-sari store to Filipinos. Father and son both worked from early morning up to late in the evening everyday and just slept at the small counter floor, which they cleared late at night, when the store was closed. Certainly, these humble beginnings have already started a benchmark of future complexities that will be multiplied in the years to come.

The Birth of SM

Everything was going well during their stay in the country and Sy was enrolled at the Anglo-Chinese School in Quiapo entering Grade One at the age of twelve. It was a tough time for the young illiterate to catch up and learn English. Throughout history, his business life was always marked by risk and luck. During World War II, the unforgettable tragedy happened in the Philippines. The local economy collapsed during the Japanese occupation, businesses closed and the country's industries were all destroyed after the Battle for Manila. In 1946, when the shop was plundered into ashes and rubbles, his father simply went back to China without having any second thoughts. But he never gave up and decided to stay. He began returning into business by peddling cheap American shoes. In order to rebuild his business, he of course needed a financial loan for some capital. In 1949, he received his first credit line from the China Bank and was lent with one million Philippine pesos, approved by financial tycoon Mr. Yap Tian Siang. To improve his entrepreneurial skills in the buy and sell trade, he later enrolled at the Far Eastern University in 1950 and took up a degree in Associate in Arts in Commercial Studies. He also considered the change of his legal name into Henry Sy after obtaining Philippine citzenship. But his college attendance was unfortunately cut two years later due to the pressures and lack of focusing on his business. He later marries a Chinese immigrant who became a Filipino citizen under the legal name of Felicidad with whom he erected six offspring to the world. Both converted into Catholicism under the strong influence of the conservative Filipino society. Henry Sy witnessed the rebirth and reconstruction of the Philippine economy and took the opportunity by setting up a shoestore in the same district, this time along Carriedo Street. He opened the first Shoemart store along Carriedo St. in Avenida Rizal, downtown Manila in this label, he conceptualized a new chain of shoe stores, each characterized by a distinctive merchandising layout that has never before been attempted in the country. The shoe store soon became very popular until one store later expanded into three outlets. It did not take him too long to reach the top as a shoe retailer but he soon noticed that his business was mainly just a small scale cottage industry and his supply and opportunities were very limited. Because of this dissatisfaction, he decided to create something new and better. He added an electronic appliances division in each of his stores but he was still not satisfied. At this point of his life, he already began his journey towards climbing up his own mountain, the Mount Everest of the retailing business.