Retailer remains unfazed by weak market spending

CEBU, Philippines – Cebuano retailer Robert Go expressed optimism that despite the evident slowdown in consumer spending brought about by the crisis, they are keeping their hopes up for brighter prospects to come up before the year ends.

“Our projection continues to be optimistic although we still do not see basic indication of possible upswing. With the upcoming elections, we look at possible increase in consumer spending and we look forward for the holidays in the end quarters. With the A(H1N1) issues a bit slowing down, we hope our tourists will flourish back again because this is one market that keeps our retail sector afloat,” said Go, who sits as president and chief executive officer of Prince Warehouse Club.

He said that as a retailer, his optimistic forecast is banked on the economic forces and the government sector.

Go said that although there is no indicator that the purchasing power of consumers will get better as the months progress, there is still enough reasons to stay optimistic as overseas Filipino workers' remittance continue to soar and provide consumers the capacity to spend for their daily needs.

He said that like other businessmen, he keeps expansion plans in his business intact as he views it as a way to further strengthen his market base and his business operation; however, for the time being, there are no immediate plans for Prince Warehouse to expand this year.

He said that if there will be expansions in the future, this will either be in the Northern or Southern part of the province as Metro Cebu has already been congested.

“The best way to go for us is to those areas where there are less retailers in line with your business. Because of existence of many retail players, Cebu is already near congestion,” said Go.

Go said that in their stocking and inventory, they considered the trend that is shifted on basic consumer goods like food and other essentials.

He said that because times are harder, consumers prioritize spending on essential and basic items rather than no essentials like furniture, accessories and clothes.

“There is always a need for us to eat so everybody has to shell out money on food so our supermarket items are not affected much with the slowdown on consumer spending,” said Go.

He shared that for basic supermarket items that they sell, they have worked with their suppliers so that they can do “bundling” and put extra items as well as discounts to easily move these products and avoid excess inventories.

“We change items that are hard to sell with products that will enable us to easily turn around our inventories. But we cannot do that for general merchandises which are out of fashion, have gotten scratched, and soiled so we cut down on prices and put them on sale,” shared Go.