This is the first time in so many years that my family and I will not celebrate Christmas. Actually, our religious beliefs forbade us to even spend a single cent on hamon and keso de bola in this day; but at least, we, like other ordinary Filipino families, make it special by cooking special dishes. Now, even cooking something as special as spaghetti, we find very hard to do.
The reason? I decided to wager my savings in the rotisserie chicken business. Yes, and I admit, I am losing my patience.
When I first thought on this, I had two brilliant options—continue what I do best, which is strategic marketing, or continue doing consultancy and build another business, either a water refilling station or something as common as a rotisserie chicken business. We chose the rotisserie chicken business since, based on my financial estimation, the chances of making more money there is higher than a refilling station.
I jumped on it, not as blind as a mouse, but as wide-eyed as an owl. We found a nice place, paid the usual rent and remodeled it. I thought that it would only involve a small amount of money. Yet, it took three weeks and more than 70,000 pesos before it was completed. And when the time came for us to operate, I was left with a very small money to spend for my family.
Now, I am waiting if people would buy my Manok King roast chickens. So far, I bought 71 chickens already and sold some already since I started last December 21. Many who have tried it say its delicious and we have repeat customers. Yet, the costs is equal to the profit and it will only be a matter of time before I call it quits.
Lessons learned:
1. Don’t do something that deviates from your expertise. The food business is not as easy as you think. It’s pretty complicated and if you don’t have the patience nor a deeper pocket, don’t go there.
2. Simple things are actually complicated ones. It depends on one’s perspective. Others may find some things simple while others, not so simple.
3. If you don’t want your favorite polo smeared by soy sauce, don’t go in the rotisserie business.
4. Lastly, stick with political analysis and marketing. Or, probably, wait a little while longer. As they say, it takes a long time for people to know you and what you sell. :-)
Merry Christmas my dearest friends. :-)
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You might not have the means to cook your special spaghetti, Pat, but, thatsalotofchicken you’ll be having for ‘noche buena’.
MERRY CHRISTMAS, Pat!
merry xmas too Bert. May God bless you and your family, make you safe from harm and imbue you and your family with peace and prosperity.
Pat,
Nasaan ba ‘yan manok mong iyan at makabili nga.
Dean
nasa makati dean, one is at the corner of washington and delarosa streets while the other one is in n. garcia street (formerly Reposo) in Makati. we are closed today since I gave my staff a Christmas break.
May God bless you and your family this coming year. May the Holy Spirit bring upon you wonderful blessings and peace.
Broasted chicken, barbecue chicken, fried chicken, rottiserrie chicken. They are all the same. Some are finger licking. Some are just tough to chew.
Business is an art. Not a science. It is a talent. Like dancing, writing
a Blog article. Commenting to a Blog article. Or any other kinds of
talent. Dont jump to a business. Because, your neighbor has that kind
of business. Business requires: sweat, common sense, timing and of course some luck. Being in the right place, at the right time.
Good Luck, anyway!
yes, Hyden Toro and I’m learning it the hard way. But, like I read in the Bible today, God loves the longsuffering ones. God will guide me thru.
Merry Christmas. May God bless you and your family and imbue you with the Spirit of peace and prosperity.
Happy New Year!
Location, location, location. If you don’t have the right location move somewhere else but don’t quit right away.
Merry Christmas to everyone.
Our little hole-in-the-wall bakery celebrates its 19th month of operation this December. And the wife is today preparing for the second holiday repast for all our employees. And we invested a lot more than a chicken business requires.
So, is it making money? I have not really as yet crunched the numbers to find out.
But then our business goal has been simply that it does not lose money as to bring about its early demise.
And we invested still more on passion. And on this score, we have had huge successes.
We out-price all the bakeries in the neighborhood because we did not factor in rent in our pricing, being the bldg owners. So we are only too happy to receive unsolicited praises from our “ordinary folks” consumers for our affordable pricing.
For the meantime, these are profits enough to encourage us to go on.
And we are happy to declare this makes the holidays fulfilling.
And so we share our blessings to all.
Yes, continue sharing your blessings with others. Right now, I am just doing this business to enable six young boys to work. God really works in mysterious ways. And He astounds even former Atheists like me.
May God bless your bakery business and peace be unto you and your family.
Pat,
1) awesome news that you’re starting a business.
2) use those marketing and political analysis skills to your business’ advantage ;) change that footer and add, is an entrepreneur. Pat is the owner of the best [chicken business] located at [ ].
happy christmas!
cheers,
Cocoy
manok king, cocoy. it is in makati, at n garcia street and there’s another one at the corner of washington and dela rosa streets. btw, i love your posts ah, especially that one you wrote about Villar.
continue on my man!
Ahh,
perhaps the old business plan neglected to build in the time it takes to become set in the shopping patterns of the local market, which can be anywhere from six months to three years, depending on the condition of the situation. So stick with it a while, eh?
I appreciated the reality of your blog. It is different than what most of us do, opine on things that don’t involve us directly. Life is more like selling chickens, I think . . . not always clean or easy . . .
Best wishes,
Joe
yep, joe, politics is like selling chickens. You need to put soy sauce for them to taste good. And paprika too.
May God continually bless you and your family my friend and strengthen you to continue writing and fighting for the Cause which many see as hard and tortuous.
May God bless our Nation and bring it to its former glory.
I see another sparkle of hope for our country if our new Pinoy rebel Patricio Mangubat and (balik-retiree?) Amadeo are now venturesome entrepreneurs. I always thought what can turn our country around are not so much the grand aspirations of upright politicians as the vigorous entrepreneurship of the business class, driven by a great sense of country.
If this sort of “wagering” is a trend at all, how could it be sustained? Or what kind of programs, for instance, governmental or otherwise, could help Pat “stick with it a while” to weather the initial business squall?
Anyway you have a merry Christmas and may your coming business year be bountiful and fulfilling.
Happy holidays too to FV and all our partners of every stripe.
hi pat! merry christmas! i’m also interested to set up my own roasted chicken business. what data or information should i need to know before jumping into this type of food business? what preparations should i make (attend seminar or workshop?)in order to lower the risk of failure? your inputs will surely provide more insights to those who are planning to become entrepreneurs.
thanks!
erwin
hi erwin,
you need a very good business plan. I have one. You need to know the demographics of your market. You need to know how much will you actually spend in the business. And of course, you also need to know what products will the market “warm up” to. I did all that.
I think the reason why I am apprehensive is, my wife is not an entrepreneur. Entrepreneurs are leaders, not followers. Also, she mixed our personal funds with the business funds, a no-no. That’s why I am finding it real hard to fund these personal financial requirements.
thanks pat! i got the demographics of the area already for my market. working on my budget to fund the business, too. i will try my best to have separate accounts — personal and business.
by the way, i’m looking for a powdered marinade. any supplier that you might recommend? thanks!
There are more success factors, but insufficient working capital for at least 12 months is a key reason for demise/success of new start-ups. You want it to be so, but the odds are against a restaurant-type getting full-exposure and high traffic volume in only 3 months, so chances are that the restaurant-type is operating at loss for those 3 months (and maybe 6 months even). The business plan month-by-month projections should show very slow sales the first months (while rent- and other fixed costs are, well, fixed and draining the cash). Without enough working capital, a business can’t operate past months 5-6 when the big bucks is “destined” for month eight forward.
Good luck on the venture, Erwin.
thanks! i will keep that in mind and prepare my budget well — good for 12 months.
Hang in there Patricio. One thing I learned from this recession is perseverance and thrift. We have a oil business that got really affected by this recession since we just started up in 2007. We tightened our belt this year and recently got a shot in the arm in the form of a major investment towards the fourth quarter. But the lessons learned such as thriftiness will stay with us as we venture into the start of this decade. We also treat our employees really well since we know we will need them more when the economy recovers. They say it as going to be a U shaped recovery but slowly the world is starting to recover and Dec 2008 is like lightyears away. Happy New Year to everyone, readers and writers alike, in Filipino Voices.
Hi Rosa,
Thanks. I am actually exercising extreme patience with this. I asked around and they told me that selling half of the 71 chickens in just four days is not bad. And seriously, I am really saving what money I am left with in the bank, which is under 10,000.00. And its in current accounts. Have to do something by next week to address the situation.
my brother was in the lechon manok business for years and earned quite well. Unfortunately, he died 10 years ago. I would never go ito the food business even if I grew up in it. It was just too stressful. I didn’t have much of fun growing up.