Celebrating a bag

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THE Confetti Dumpling Bag comes in black, ivory, and periwinkle.

THE Confetti Dumpling Bag comes in black, ivory, and periwinkle.

THE Confetti Dumpling Bag comes in black, ivory, and periwinkle.

WITH Singaporean brand Beyond The Vines’ celebration of their 10th year, they’re leaning into one of their hero products: the Dumpling Bag.

For their 10th anniversary, the brand is releasing a limited edition of the Dumpling Bag, with a layer of soft mesh covering it. The soft mesh carries about a handful of confetti, made of recycled store collaterals. A plus, since a chunk of the bags is made of recycled nylon.

Daniel Chew, the brand’s co-founder (the other is his wife, Rebecca), talked about the new bag: “Our community, the fans of the brand, can carry this little celebration with them everywhere they go.”

The bag was created in 2019, and since then has been a traveler’s favorite. Lightweight, foldable, and expanding, it can fit lots more than its size betrays. It had gone viral during its release, with reviews of the bag and videos of it in use numbering in the thousands. The bag’s sales go further: in an interview with BusinessWorld at the opening of the refreshed store in Shangri-La Plaza, Mr. Chew said, “For the bag alone, we have sold close to about a million bags.”

He himself has one: when traveling, he uses it to lug multiple bottles of water. “Once I don’t need them, I can fold (the bag) and put it in my hand luggage.”

While they’re known for this one particular bag, they started with clothes. In fact, when they opened in the Philippines in 2019, they were riding on the tail end of 2015’s normcore minimalist fashions. However, in the refreshed store, we saw decidedly youthful fashions in the colorful, 2000s aesthetic Gen Z favors.

Mr. Chew says that they did the rebrand five years ago. “We were not particularly happy about the direction of the brand. We thought it didn’t truly represent us,” he said. “As adults, we forget to have fun.”

The brand has nine stores in the Philippines, and is increasing its number of stores in Tokyo and Shanghai. “I do think that in this trajectory, we want to grow deep in our market in the Philippines, more than we want to expand.”

Interested parties can find the Confetti Dumpling Bag at www.beyondthevines.ph , or at its locations in the Philippines: Shangri-La Plaza mall, SM Mall of Asia, Power Plant Mall, TriNoma, Uptown Mall, One Bonifacio High Street, SM Megamall Manila, Ayala Center Cebu, and The Block SM North EDSA. — Joseph L. Garcia