Influencer Pat Cortez, 26, knows how to break glass ceilings. When it comes to success, age is just a number.

At 23, the young entrepreneur and co-founder of Overlay Designs proved that age isn’t a hindrance to success.

Cortez and her older sister collaborated to build a company called Overlay Designs – a store that sells trendy accessories such as bags and belts for women. 

“I wanted to create my own brand,” she told republicasia. 

“It was me and my sister’s idea back in 2020. She’s an industrial designer. I came from advertising. So when we built Overlay it was just natural for us,” she added. 

Just like most business starters, they too experimented on various products before they came up with their signature items. However, these first releases weren’t at all related to bags and belts. 

“Our first product actually was like a chair that’s spray painted kasi mahilig kami magpaint and graphic design everything. It did not kick off at all,” she said.  

“And then our next product was like a tactical belt industrial vibes, it did not kick off again,” she continued. 

Not giving up just yet, Cortez believed in her vision so much that she knew her ideas to be manifest in her reality. 

“There has to be Overlay in the world, it has to be. So eventually the hero product was the Rafael bag, which is a bag with a belt strap. It really kicked off the first month,” she said. 

The venture took off and aced the industry with flying colors. From the initial production plan of just five to 10 bags per month, they produced about 20 to 30 pieces every month after the demand for the designs bursted online. Since 2020, Overlay has sold over 200 plus bags. 

The signature design

Looking back three years after the company’s founding, it isn’t shocking why the signature Rafael Bag became famous. Its sleek and posh design fits every girl’s fashion moments. 

It comes with different colors to match different wardrobe styles. The price of the Rafael Bag ranges from P5800 – P8800. Their bags comes in pricey because besides the material made from full grain leather, they are handcrafted so it takes time to create one bag. 

There is no stopping Cortez despite OD’s initial success. The entrepreneur said there are more feats to be achieved as far as her career is concerned. 

“So I have big dreams that I’m still working on, I’m still praying for na sana maging ganon,” she said. I want Overlay to have more collections, more products, maybe apparel, and then maybe be known to the international level. 

Life as a content creator 

Like most influencers who found a side career during the pandemic years, Cortez channeled her boredom into productivity by producing content focused on make-up and beauty. 

She delved into it in 2018 but took it seriously only in 2020 after she saw brands reaching out to her for partnerships. 

Cortez said she was clueless about the basics of vlogging like filming yourself, personal branding, and coming up with your niche content. 

Eventually, she got the drift.

“The two years were like play time for me, like joke joke time lang,” she said

“I think influencer thing was a bit to new and I was still scared that the people would judge me and you know syempre weird naman talaga yung influencer world parang you always have to be on the camera and talking to people and presenting yourself to the public,” she added. 

Good thing, she had a background that made things easy for her. She formerly worked in the production doing mostly advertising, creative direction and branding for various brand campaigns. 

“My main [content] is make-up so I create beauty content. I don’t really do reviews. It’s more like Let’s do colorful eye make-up. Let’s do a black smokey liner and then I just play around with it, she said. 

As with her business mindset, Cortez believes there’s a lot more to achieve in terms of producing content that matters. 

“I feel like until now hindi parin ako pumapalo. Parang I think influencers, personalities should know na you don’t have to have a peak. Parang hindi ka kailangan may sikat era ka or parang you have to be on top always. You just have to be consistent and continually growing,” she said.

She currently has 25,200 followers on Tiktok.