The man behind Calata Corp’s success
SOME say that it must be his age and demeanor. Others say that it’s the spunk and bravado that only youth can bring. Whatever it is, no one can deny that something in Joseph Calata made his company become the biggest distributor of agrochemicals and other farming basics in the country.
The 32- year- old is president and CEO of the company that bears his family name, Calata Corp.
Two weeks after Calata Corp. was listed at the Philippine Stock Exchange ( PSE) on May 23, 2012, the stock generated unusual heavy interest and trades, driving its stock price up to dizzying heights. Calata said that his company started as a “mom and pop store” in Plaridel, Bulacan. It was owned and managed by his parents. Like most stores in the countryside, it was originally a sole proprietor business named J. Melvins, named after brothers Joseph and Melvin Calata. It was incorporated as Planters Choice Agro Products Inc. on July 23, 1999. It changed its name to Calata Corp. on
February 22, 2010.
The firm distributes agrochemicals, feeds, fertilizers, veterinary medicines and other agricultural products. It is also one of the emerging leaders in the agriculture industry with annual sales amounting to more than P2 billion in 2011.
Shortly after graduation at the age of 21, Calata was put in charge of the store, which sold all kinds of agrochemicals and feeds for hog and poultry. This was when he realized that his parents were using an old and outdated manual method for accounting and inventory. So he bought an accounting software and started inputting all their sales and inventory the hard way.
His mother and their customers resisted his new style of selling because at first it made things seem a bit more tedious and slow. Some of the old farmers who were buying would be impatient as he would input the sales into the records and issued a corresponding printed receipt of the transaction. He was able to convince his mother when he discovered that she paid twice for some supplies and this saved them some P100,000.
Calata employed another strategy to expand his family’s business more rapidly. He hired salesmen who took their business farther up north. This strategy became so effective that their company grew in such a short time.
Today, Calata Corp.’s business partners include some of the biggest names in the industry— San Miguel Corp., Syngenta, Bayer, Jardine, Dupont and Monsanto, among others. The company also distributes fertilizers from Swire, Viking and other companies; and seeds from East West Seed Co. and other veterinary products from San Miguel Corp.
Calata said that listing his company in the PSE had always been his goal. He said that he once told his father that he wanted to take the company public because he wanted to follow the footsteps of the country’s tycoons.
He chuckled when he remembered his visit to the PSE one day in 2006 to have his company listed.
“The head of the department asked me for various requirements I never thought I needed. So I told myself I will accomplish all these and go back to them in due time,” Calata recalled. And he did. Today, Calata is expanding his business by putting up his own retail stores nationwide. He already started his own brand, which he will sell through his stores. The company also has a number of big projects in the provinces of Isabela and Davao. He plans to put up subsidiaries that would complement their core business, even diversify when the right time comes.
As of now, Calata said that he is happy that he has achieved his childhood dream to become a billionaire businessman. Although selling feeds and fertilizers wasn’t exactly his original vehicle to success, it was just as well because he realized his dream and turned his parents’ business into a multibillion- peso enterprise.