Social development with a smile

I’ll never forget the story about a group of climbers who hiked for most of the day up a mountain, scrambling over rocks, fording streams and hauling themselves and their gear over slippery slopes. They didn’t encounter a single soul on their way up.

Just when they thought they would collapse from fatigue, they came upon a clearing and right in the center they found—a sari-sari store. Needless to say, after refreshing themselves with bottled water, soda and snacks, the climbers eventually reached the summit.

This story may be apocryphal, but it simply illustrates how ubiquitous the sari-sari (simply, “different things” or “variety”) store has become in the Philippines and, so I’m told, in much of the developing world.

Whether it be around the corner (or around every corner), in a barrio that time forgot, or atop a mountain, the sari-sari store has come to symbolize micro-enterprises in the service of the consuming public. Customers not only avail of goods and services (such as cell phone loads) from the sari-sari store, they also use the premises, or the benches in front of it, as a gathering place to trade gossip or small talk. The store owner thus becomes the community’s source of information on everybody else’s whereabouts and doings. And for families in a crisis or temporary slump, the credit line (“lista”) extended by the store owner becomes a crucial means of survival.

There are about 800,000 such small retail outlets or neighborhood stores around the country, making up 30-40 percent of total retail sales in the Philippines. And most—perhaps even all—of them are owned, managed and supervised by women.

Which is why the “Hapinoy” is most probably a woman. “Hapinoy,” coined from a combination of the words “happy” and “Pinoy” is a program and social enterprise that focuses on sari-sari stores and endeavors to tap into the entrepreneurial power and potential for social change inherent in these neighborhood outlets.

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FOR the moment, the “handsome face” (if he may say so himself) of “Hapinoy” is Bam Aquino, cousin of P-Noy and nephew of Ninoy, to whom Bam bears a most striking resemblance. (“It’s in the genes, or maybe in the glasses,” he jokes.)

Bam is president of Microventures Inc., which he founded in 2006 with Ateneo college classmate Mark Ruiz who had left his post in multinational consumer goods company Unilever in search of more “meaningful” employment. Combining their strengths—Bam in social movements and community organizing and Mark in marketing and logistics—it didn’t take long for them to set their sights on the thousands of sari-sari stores one encounters around the country.

These neighborhood retail outlets, says Bam, serve the “bottom of the pyramid,” the poorest sectors of society, who ironically pay the highest prices for consumer goods and services. This isn’t just because many of the stores are located in hard-to-reach areas where transportation is scarce and expensive and thus goods cost more to reach them; but also because the operations of a stand-alone store are inefficient, with the operator enjoying low bargaining power or capacity to buy in bulk, forcing her to pass on the added costs to customers.

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And yet, says Bam, the combined sales of sari-sari stores could match that of the ginormous SM nationwide network, with potential for both economic and “political” power.

“Political power” doesn’t mean tapping store owners during elections, Bam stresses. It does mean, though, tapping the power of these neighborhood outlets to raise the economic status of their families and neighbors (mainly through cheaper goods and bigger profits), and to empower these small entrepreneurs by upgrading their skills, freeing them from constant worry and anxiety, and resulting, so claim some “Hapinoys,” in happier sex lives.

The “Hapinoy Program” starts with the infusion of capital, sourced from a microfinance institution partner, to help a sari-sari store owner take advantage of such services as bulk buying; expanding coverage even to non-traditional goods like cell phones and remittance services; and training that incorporates values formation, personal enrichment and enterprise skills, including customer services. In addition, field personnel visit the member stores and help diagnose and cure problems in the efficient running of the stores.

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All of the “Hapinoy Community Stores” are owned by women micro-entrepreneurs called the “Nanays,” the Filipino word for “mother,” since they mother not just their children (maybe even their husbands) but also their communities. The Nanays pass on the benefits of their Hapinoy membership to their customers in terms of lower prices for basic goods and a wider variety of items.

Right now, says Bam, they are looking into marketing the products of cooperatives or local producers to their member stores, both to cut down costs and establish a mutually beneficial relationship. The Hapinoy network has also been tapped to serve as test retailers for products or services to be introduced into the larger market.

There are currently 150 Hapinoy stores, found in Cavite, Laguna,  Bicol and parts of Northern Luzon, although Bam says their goal is to expand outside Luzon and enlarge their membership to at least 150,000 stores. Already, the “Hapinoy Program” has been recognized by the United Nations’ “Project Inspire,” a women-empowerment award that came with a $25,000 cash reward. The World Economic Forum also gave it the Asia Social Entrepreneurship Award.

But Bam values most of all the changes he sees in the Hapinoy “Nanays” who, since they joined the movement, “look healthier, are better dressed and now put on makeup.” It is, he says, “social development with a smile.”