How Vizco’s became a Baguio institution

BAGUIO CITY, Philippines — Today, Vizco’s is well-known for its strawberry shortcake with its
abundance of fresh fruits.

But when Jackie Vizcocho-Dizon first opened shop along Baguio’s Session Road in 2004, she was unsure if the restaurant and cake shop would take off.

Fresh from studying culinary arts in Metro Manila, Dizon combined her newly acquired cooking and baking skills with her business acumen to break through a market composed of Baguio locals on most days.

The opening of the SCTEX (Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway) and TPLEX (Tarlac-Pangasinan- La Union Expressway), which cut travel time between Metro Manila and Baguio considerably, were still years away so tourist peak seasons were only during the holidays: Christmas and Holy Week.

In the early 2000s, locals had their long-established favorites along Session Road including Star Cafe, Sizzling Plate, and 456 Restaurant. It was a mammoth task for the first-time entrepreneur.

The concept was a Western-themed restaurant with a menu of affordable meals and the strawberry shortcake as the centerpiece.

“I wanted Vizco’s to be known for a product that is uniquely from Baguio.”

“It took three years before we gained a steady clientele and five years before we recovered our investment,” Dizon said.

Pivot points

There have been many turning points in the restaurant’s 20 years. In October 2009, Typhoon Pepeng (international name Parma) brought volumes of rain to the region and cut it off from the rest of Luzon for an extended amount of time. Vizco’s and other businesses were dealt with twin blows of reduced tourist arrivals and higher prices of raw ingredients.

“Many of our employees were badly affected, so we not only had to keep the store closed but also assist them,” Dizon recalled.

In 2011, when the adjacent store space became available, Dizon decided to expand the space to launch Ocha, offering various Asian cuisines: Thai, Vietnamese, Japanese, Malaysian, and Korean. The COVID-19 pandemic forced it to close, but the homemade ice cream that started there remains.

“We closed for a month at the start of the pandemic,” said Dizon. When the situation in Baguio allowed, Vizco’s received orders from locals from as far as La Trinidad, Benguet, for deliveries and takeaway of their meals and desserts.

“Since people couldn’t go out, food became their link to the outside world. It was impossible to
travel and go to another city, so ‘pasabuy’ became all the rage! This created an opportunity for independent resellers to take pre-orders from their area, come up to Baguio and pick up the orders themselves, and deliver to their customers,” she said.

Overcoming distance, cake resellers satisfied cravings for Vizco’s cakes in Metro Manila, Rizal, Bulacan, Pampanga, Laguna, and Batangas as well as Bataan, La Union, Pangasinan, Tarlac, and the Bicol region. Some resellers would buy more than 100 cakes each time.

How did they maintain the quality of the cakes over long drives?

“There were different ways, like placing four barbeque sticks strategically in the middle of the cake so that they would remain intact. Some resellers also covered the windows of their SUVs or vans with insulation to shield the cakes from direct sunlight and set their air conditioning on full blast. They also improvised shelves in the vehicle and stacked the boxes to maximize the number of orders they could take per trip,” Dizon said.

Keeping them fresh

Beyond the wildly popular strawberry shortcake, Vizco’s has expanded to other baked treats that prominently feature strawberries: pie, cheesecake, macaron, and tres leches. Since the key ingredient in many of their bestselling cakes is subject to price and supply fluctuation, they have found a way to practically assure consistent supply of strawberries all year round by fostering strong relationships with farmers as well as traders.

“The price of strawberries tend to go up, especially during tourist or holiday season, and also during the extreme rainy season when the plantations are usually damaged, resulting in scarce or no yield,” Dizon said. In such cases, they strive to have at least half their usual cake volume so that they never run out of them. They set an average cost so their prices do not fluctuate with the changes in market rates.

Vizco’s has benefitted from observing consumer habits, for example, that even for special occasions, customers do not need full-sized cakes. That is why they made solo cakes, which are moderately priced. “We make brisk sales on them,” Dizon said.

Further expansion

From the first restaurant in the heart of Baguio, Vizco’s now has a total of four shops in the city. There are now Vizco’s cake shops in Urdaneta, Pangasinan; Clark in Pampanga; and Metro Manila.

All of the cakes are delivered from the commissary in Baguio. According to Dizon, since many ingredients are more affordable in the Cordilleras, this works out better. In addition, this helps them ensure consistency in the quality.

Vizco’s is also looking to open restaurants outside of Baguio.

“It’s not easy to put up a new business, and it is very challenging to remain in business, with all the existing and new concepts coming up,” Dizon acnowledged. She attributed their success to the loyal service team and customers, and personally, to a strong support system composed of family and friends.

“I have learned that patience, perseverance, openness to criticism, striving for excellence, and hard work are essential to build and remain in business,” she said. – Rappler.com