Reese Fernandez-Ruiz (born 1985) is a Filipino social entrepreneur and President and Founding Partner of Rags2Riches, a sustainable fashion enterprise established in 2007.
[1] The company aims to empower Philippine-based artisans, fashion and home products that follow environmental ethics principles, and alleviate poverty in Payatas, Quezon City and other communities around Metro Manila.
[6] Through her college organization, Fernandez-Ruiz volunteered to teach math, science, and reading skills in Payatas, a community in Quezon City, Philippines and home to one of the largest dump sites in the country.
Fernandez-Ruiz co-founded Rags2Riches after seeing rug-weavers (mostly women) in Payatas receive little profit for rugs they crafted from cloth and scrap foraged from the Quezon City dump site, due to middlemen controlling their supplies and sales.
[8] Rags2Riches created links with factories and warehouses to provide the artisans with fabric scrap materials and opportunity to sell their products directly to customers.