Q1: You have expanded from a shirt brand to a tourism brand. Please tell us what was the insight that led to this transformation? I first got the idea to go into the business of selling souvenir shirts from my travels – shirts were and continue to be the preferred souvenir as they’re light and practical. But many of the […]
Search Results for: Business Model
Q1: What made you decide to open a wholesale operation in Zamboanga? We felt there was an untapped potential and there was a big opportunity for the BIG BOX model in Zamboanga. Our primary target market were the sari-sari store owners wherein we feel they can be better served than simply offering them credit terms and low prices. We moved […]
I recently attended a kid’s fashion show at SMX Aura, a welcome break from my business conference routine. I learned that from 3,000 entries, 50 kids were shortlisted and trained to walk the runway. They were all so cute. I suddenly entertained the idea of wanting to be a grandfather. In the meantime, my family will have to make-do with […]
As a student of lifelong learning, I always search for ideas and knowledge as well as great minds and conversations to challenge my ways of thinking. I like seeing white spaces of opportunities for new methods, new frameworks and new possibilities. I was especially intellectually stimulated with a concept of a strategy book in the mid 2000s and was so […]
One of the persistent gaps in sales development is the assumption that sales excellence is primarily a matter of frameworks, models, and conceptual instruction. Frameworks are useful. They provide language, structure, and discipline for thinking about growth. But they are not, by themselves, proof of commercial capability. Sales leadership is ultimately validated in a different environment—one defined by market pressure, […]
The Philippines remains Asia’s Catholic heartland, yet the number of people attending Sunday Mass has plummeted from 64% in 1991 to just 38% today. I call this the “Barabbas Moment.“ In the biblical narrative, the crowd was given a choice between the radical, transformative Truth and the immediate, violent “fix” of the insurrectionist Barabbas. They chose the tactic over the transformation. Today, […]
In an earlier piece (From Sari-Sari Stores to Global Systems: Why Trust Matters, Inquirer.net, April 17, 2026), I argued that trust is the original infrastructure of commerce, and that organizations most likely to endure are those that treat it as a governance system rather than a values statement. But there is a dimension worth pressing further: if trust is the […]
We tend to explain today’s instability in geopolitical terms—conflict zones, trade routes, shifting alliances. But beneath all of that runs a deeper strain: trust. When trust breaks at the level of nations and institutions, the consequences don’t stay abstract. They show up in higher fuel costs, tighter margins, and consumers whose purchasing power steadily erodes. We are, in many ways, […]
ER Rollan, CEO of Growsari and a winner of the 5th Mansmith Innovation Awards, has been transforming the micro-retail landscape in the Philippines. By leveraging technology, he empowers small sari-sari stores, streamlines distribution, and creates a scalable digital ecosystem. In this interview, he shares the assumptions he challenged, the pains he sought to solve, and how he turned innovation into […]
(Photo source: Pixabay) I’m not the type who usually writes love letters. I measure things in KPIs and deadlines, not feelings. I notice inefficiency, not poetry. And yet, here I am, writing during a flight, not to a person, but to an airline. Singapore Airlines. You’ve taught me that superior customer experience (CX) isn’t just about getting from point A […]