Potato Corner eyes more stores in PHL, abroad
POTATO CORNER is looking to open more stores in the Philippines and internationally this year.
“For international, we are opening 60 stores for outside the Philippines... all around. We have more than a hundred stores in Indonesia, already. We have 40 stores in the US... 30 plus stores in Thailand, already, so we’re growing internationally,” Jose P. Magsaysay, Jr. , president and chief executive officer of Potato Corner told BusinessWorld
in an interview March 5.
For the Philippines, Mr. Magsaysay said the company is targeting to open a “maybe, hundred more stores.”
At present, the food cart giant has 1,100 stores across the Philippines, while there are 200 stores outside the country.
Potato Corner’s expansion has been mostly due to franchising. Around 70% of its stores are franchised, while 30% are owned by the company.
Mr. Magsaysay said that the company maintained its franchising fee for Potato Corner, especially now that most of their new franchisees were the customers before.
“Not too far. Alam mo [You know what], that’s one thing we did. We’re always protecting our franchisees in terms of their payback, their return on investment, so we never increased the franchise fee. Kung ano ’yung franchise fee namin
[Whatever is our franchise fee] 15 years ago, ’yun pa rin ang
[that is still the] franchise fee ng [of] Potato Corner until today,” he said.
“A lot of our new franchisees now were our customers when they were, bata pa sila [still young]... Sila na ngayon ang mga partners namin [They are now are our partners]... Ngayon, may edad na sila, pwede na silang mag-invest [Now that they are in the right age to invest], Potato Corner ’yung choice nila kasi [is their choice because] it’s something they love,” he noted.
Mr. Magsaysay noted that for Potato Corner, the company does not require the interested franchisee to have the capital immediately. As long as the chosen site for the franchise can earn and return the investment, then the company is very much open to franchising it.
“Kunwari sinabi, may site dito, pero wala akong kapital, pero pag tinignan ko yung site mo, it’s something that I cannot say no to, mag-partner tayo… bigyan kita ng franchise, tsaka mo na ako bayaran. [For example, someone says I have a site but I don’t have capital. But when I check the site, it’s something that I cannot say no to. We can partner. I can give you the franchise and you can pay me afterwards],” he said.
Potato Corner started in 1992 with the concept formulated by Mr. Magsaysay and his three other partners, namely Jorge Wineke, Danny Bernejo, and Ricky Montelibano. The concept is selling flavored french fries the way popcorn is sold.
With their investment of P35,000 each, the single kiosk in SM Megamall grew to what is known to be the “World’s Best Flavored Fries.” Not only is it only in the Philippines, but also in more than 100 countries including Indonesia, United States, Thailand, and Panama.