What's good for business? Franchising, protecting the environment & Internet

I think God’s going to come down and pull civilization over for speeding. — Steven Wright

Implementing the three R’s — reduce, recycle, reuse — will help you save money and help protect the environment! And, if we protect the environment we are reducing our stress by living in a healthy world. — Catherine and Byron Pulsifer

Is our government doing enough to protect the Philippines’ still beautiful tropical environment beyond fancy political speeches and media praise releases? Are our leaders ridding our streets of smoke-belching vehicles, cleaning our rivers, master-planning our tourism centers like Boracay, solving Metro Manila’s garbage problem and lessening pollution?

Do our entrepreneurs and big businesses realize that protecting the environment is not only a fashionable or moral duty, but is actually profitable in the long run in terms of energy efficiency, water conservation and recycling benefits? 

Congratulations to SM/BDO taipan Henry Sy Sr. and his family for successfully bringing Nobel Peace Prize winner and former US Vice President Al Gore to the Philippines for his June 8 speech on climate change. Will our government, business, church and other leaders wake up to the challenges of climate change? 

Among the many business, political and other VIPs at SMX Convention Center were President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, former First Lady Ming Ramos, Senator Loren Legarda, Senator Miguel Zubiri, tycoon Oscar Lopez, US Ambassador Harry Thomas Jr., British Ambassador Stephen Lillie, and NBN scandal whistleblower Jun Lozada accompanied by Association of Major Religious Superiors of the Philippines President Sister Mary John Manansan. 

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Actor John Lloyd Cruz told this writer at a recent lunch arranged by Gokongwei-owned Magic Flakes that he is doing very well financially with his flourishing showbiz career, but he thinks many of our countrymen are not yet enjoying the effects of Philippine economic growth. 

This is the big challenge for the new Noynoy Aquino administration — how to make the masses, the middle-class as well as small and medium-scale entrepreneurs benefit more from the economic growth claimed by government statistics. John Lloyd also shared a good suggestion to all of us riding vehicles, that instead of giving money to beggars, he suggests giving them foods like Magic Flakes to prevent money being wasted in vices or perhaps even pilfered by gangs. 

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Congratulations to Metrobank/PSBank/Toyota taipan George SK Ty and PLDT/Smart/TV5/Meralco boss Manuel “Manny” V. Pangilinan for having been conferred the Order of Lakandula awards by outgoing President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

Aside from Philip Morris Philippines, which sponsors the prestigious Philippine Art Awards under its dynamic CEO Cris J. Nelson (history graduate of Cambridge University), George Ty of Metrobank Group is possibly the Philippines’ top private sector patron of the visual arts and a philanthropist with many other civic causes under his Metrobank Foundation.

I urge MVP, who will become chairman and CEO of Meralco starting July 1, to meet with incoming President Noynoy Aquino to address the frustrating problem of high electric power costs. More than a prestigious award from the government, MVP will become the people’s hero if he can somehow find ways to work with President Noynoy to lower the electric power rates inflicted upon our businesses and hapless consumers.

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By the time this column is out, the grand winner of ABS-CBN 2’s Pilipinas Got Talent will have already been chosen. When this writer asked all 12 grand finalists how they are going to spend or invest the P2 million cash prize, most of them said they would use it to alleviate their family’s poverty; some said they would share money to repair their local church; and a few said they would share part of their winnings to charities.

The talented ventriloquist Ruther Urquia pledged that he’d donate half the prize money to charities through the Philippine STAR and that the balance will support his hope to become a pastor spiritually ministering to the poor. Win or lose, I hope Ruther Urquia and his fellow finalists achieve their dreams!

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PLDT retail business group head Dan C. Ibarra and PLDT MyDSL head Gary Dujali invited me to witness how PLDT myDSL chose the interesting bunch of Watchpad Crew Final 5 winners at M Café in Greenbelt. The talented and pretty Yassi Pressman is from a broken family but she overcomes this with positive attitude; eloquent leukemia cancer survivor George Schulze is still a year away from total cure but wants to inspire his fellow youth; other winners were talented Nikko Ramos, bubbly Blinky de Leon and beautiful Jackie Milner.

Dan Ibarra revealed that there are 30 million Friendster accounts in the Philippines, and 15 to 20 million Filipinos nationwide with access to the Internet through subscription, Internet cafes, schools, etc. He said there are 10 million Facebook accounts from the Philippines, that people on average spend at least two hours daily on FB.

The most popular Philippine online activities? Dan Ibarra said: “No. 1 is social networking like Friendster and Facebook, No. 2 is video like YouTube, and No. 3 is games, but this category is declining. We at PLDT MyDSL believe that more Internet access for people can help them in their businesses, professions and studies, plus, of course, it’s also fun. For Philippine economic progress, we need to help more people to gain access to the Internet. That’s our mission.”

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To the many professionals, students, housewives and overseas Filipino workers who ask this writer how to start their own business, one safe path is via franchising a reliable and honest franchise.

On July 14 to 18, I encourage all aspiring entrepreneurs and business people to join the “Franchise 2010: 18th Philippine International Franchise Conference and Expo” at SMX Convention Center beside SM Mall of Asia in Pasay City. Led by Wendy’s hamburger chain boss Elizabeth “Yvette” Pardo Orbeta, daughter of ex-President Erap Estrada’s former Finance Secretary Jose “Titoy” T. Pardo, this franchise conference and expo by the Philippine Franchise Association (PFA) offers everyone many local and foreign franchises.

PFA president Yvette Pardo Orbeta told this writer: “Based on Philippine statistics, the success rate of a business from a legitimate franchise is 80 to 90 percent, but in the US it’s even a higher success rate.”

When I complained to Orbeta about the proliferation of unreliable or dishonest franchises that try to dupe innocent professionals or people who want to do business without the headaches of starting totally from scratch, she advised: “I suggest people do research first on the franchise they are interested in and to talk to various franchisees. There are fake or dubious franchises, some as cheap as only P10,000 — be careful! We recommend that the public contact us, the Philippine Franchise Association, at 687-0365 to 67 to help them verify. We have our own website. For complaints, the public can also go to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI).”

Yvette Pardo Orbeta said, “The 155 members of the Philippine Franchise Association generated sales of P121 billion last year and had 300,000 employees. Philippine franchises today have over 1,000 brands and 115,000 outlets.”

Orbeta added, “Our local franchises are going overseas, too, like Ben Chan’s Bench has 48 outlets all over China, two in the US, and 12 in the Middle East. Jollibeee has 62 overseas outlets including 28 in the US and 16 in Vietnam. Red Ribbon has 38 overseas outlets. Max will soon open outlets in Australia and Canada, in addition to two existing outlets in Hawaii, six in Los Angeles and one in San Francisco. We hope our government can be like the governments of Singapore, South Korea and Malaysia, which promote their local franchises abroad, especially in trade fairs and via international promotions. Franchising is not only good for more businesses, it’s very good for economic progress, too.”

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