Indeed, life and commerce have significantly changed as businesses find new ways of operating amidst COVID 19.
Many MSMEs now accept new business concepts and have gotten past the so called old “brick and mortar” mindset to survive.
If there’s anything good that came with the pandemic, it is the realization by many of the benefits of digitization.
As an advocate for digital transformation, I have personally experienced the difficulty in convincing our entrepreneurs to adopt digital. Perversely, COVID-19 has effectively forced everyone to fast track digitization into their businesses.
While some local companies still struggle, one Cebu based company successfully translated its business online.
FRL Trading, a start-up selling agri-based products, diversified to producing washable face masks and running a grocery delivery service online last year.
Proprietor Felita Lubon said that although her company earns well producing corn coffee, turmeric and ginger tea, she saw the high demand for washable facemasks and decided to look for good needleworkers in the mountain barangays of Cebu.
“These needleworkers are happy that they earn income from their work and are able to support their family despite the lockdown in 2020,” Lubon said.
At the height of the COVID crisis, FRL Trading produced 6, 000 to 10,000 facemasks a day for local and international buyers.
In late April last year, Lubon noticed the huge volume of people who have been forced to stay home and were unable to do groceries as well as drivers who were suddenly rendered jobless.
This crisis gave Lubon the idea of establishing an online grocery delivery service that brings supermarket items to those compelled to stay home and give jobs to drivers who are out of work as well.
At the height of the pandemic, Lubon’s grocery delivery service received an average of 100,000 online orders a day.
FRL Trading is currently digitizing its agri-business as it is one of the SMEs in the country that has joined the online platform of UnionBank GlobalLinker.
The UnionBank GlobalLinker is an SME ecosystem built for the ever-growing digital lifestyle.
Felita Lubon is also a beneficiary of the Department of Trade and Industry’s (DTI) One Town, One Product (OTOP) program for entrepreneurs who engage in business within the value chain of OTOP products (raw material suppliers, processors, distributors, retailers, manufacturers).
Lubon is also a graduate of DTI’s Kapatid Mentor Micro Entrepreneurs (KMME) program which helps MSMEs scale up their businesses through mentoring on different functional areas of entrepreneurship, produce the right mindset and business know-how.
DTI also assists MSMEs in product development, design, packaging, standards compliance, marketability, production capability, brand development, among others.
In the coming months, DTI will hold most of its trainings via video conferencing to comply with the new normal restrictions.
For remote barangays where technology may not be accessible, DTI may hold seminars in gymnasiums, multipurpose buildings but with limited number of participants as to comply with the social distancing protocol.
Meanwhile, DTI is open to using other viable means to reach out to MSMEs in the countryside such as radio and comic strips written in the local dialect.
To know more and be part of DTI’s trainings and seminars, DTI encourages small business owners to contact any of the DTI Central Visayas Provincial Offices:
DTI Cebu Provincial Office:
Tel No.: (032) 255.6971
Email: r07.cebu@dti.gov.ph
FB: https://www.facebook.com/DTI.Cebu/
DTI Bohol Provincial Office:
Tel No.: (038) 501.8828
Email: r07.bohol@dti.gov.ph
FB: https://www.facebook.com/DTI.BoholProvince/
DTI Negros Oriental Provincial Office:
Tel.No. (035) 422.5509
Email: r07.negrosoriental@dti.gov.ph
FB: https://www.facebook.com/DTI7.NegrosOriental/
DTI Siquijor Provincial Office :
Tel No.: (035) 480.9065
Email: r07.siquijor@dti.gov.ph
FB: https://www.facebook.com/DTI7.Siquijor/
No comments:
Post a Comment