Prince Hypermart teaches, inspires 2,000 micropreneurs in annual advocacy festival

TRUE to Prince Hypermart’s (formerly Prince Warehouse Club) vision of serving the underserved communities, the Sari-Sari Store (SSS) Festival is the annual advocacy event of the company. This festival is Prince Hypermart’s way of giving back to their loyal customers, and thanking them for the years of continued loyalty and support. This year, Prince Hypermart celebrates 10 years of the Sari-Sari Store Festival with the theme: “TEN”dahang Karnabal: 10th Annual Sari-Sari Store Festival 2015.

The event also aims to grow the local economy by imparting the needed skills and lessons to the Sari-Sari owners on ways to grow their businesses, and further improve their entrepreneurial skills. It brings together sari-sari store owners from all over the province of Cebu through speaking engagements, helpful discussions, and valuable skills training for the attendees.

According to Rina Go, supply chain director of Prince Retail Group of Companies, the event is also educational to the sari-sari store owners because “they have a chance to learn in improving their own businesses.” Topics of discussion include entrepreneurship, micro-finance, merchandising, inventory, accounting, and best practices in a running a successful sari-sari store business. It also includes an exhibition of the country’s top consumer brandsshowcasing their best product offerings and giving away exclusive deals to the Sari Sari Store owners.

“Sari-sari store business is relevant to the local economy because it directly helps Filipinos at the grassroots level in getting themselves out of poverty,” added Go. Prince Hypermart is present in towns around the Visayas and Mindanao region and Go is quite glad to note that “we have heard many stories from our customers how their income from their sari-sari stores help send their kids to school or help them pay for food and electricity.” Go further highlights the positive effect of their stores in the provinces; she observes that the town “becomes more vibrant with more food shops, more bakeries, more small ready-to-wear (RTW) shops, and other small business that prop out near our stores.”

Bringing together more than 2,000 sari-sari store owners from all over Cebu Province, this year’s vintage carnival theme is reminiscent of local peryahans that are staple entertainment during town fiestas which will be a relatable concept to these attendees. Go attributes the decade-long success of the SSS Festival to being customer-focused because “the Festival has always been about the customer because it gives back to them and it’s a celebration of their loyalty.” Go also added, the SSS Festival will not only be fun “but also educational for them to have a chance to learn in improving their own businesses.”

The celebration is expected to be bigger, grander, and more fun-filled through an exciting program filled with games, prizes, and surprises. This whole day event will be happening on August 15 at the Amnezia Superclub, Ouano Ave., North Reclamation Area, Mandaue City.

The main highlights of this event areDepartment of Interior and Local Government (DILG) Secretary Mar Roxasas the Keynote Speaker who will deliver an inspiring message to the attendees, and Paul Jake Castillo as the celebrity guest set to entertain the crowd and make it unforgettable. Chinkee Tan, popular wealth management speaker and TV Personality, and Best-selling author of “Till Debt Do Us Part” and “For Richer and For Poorer”, will give a motivational talk.

This event is made possible by the event partners and sponsors who are committed to the same vision of Prince Hypermart. Co-presenting this event isNestle represented by its brands Magic Sarap, Nestea, Milo, Nescafe and Bear Brand. Platinum sponsor for the event is International Pharmaceuticals, Inc. represented by its brands Bioderm, Casino Ethyl Alcohol Femme, Efficascent Oil, Omega Pro, and Winner Dishwashing Liquid.

Gold Sponsors are Unilever;Virginia; Purefoods; Procter&Gamble’s Safeguard, Head & Shoulders, and Ariel. Silver Sponsors are Monde Nissin’s Lucky Me; CEED Marketing’s Snowtime;Eleven 22 Sales Inc.’s Green Cross, Del, Zonrox, and Kopiko;Wellmade Manufacturing Corp.’s Bareta Detergent, Speed Babad, and Winrox; Zest-O; Selecta and Mead Johnson’s Lactum.

Bronze sponsors include Coca-Cola, Perfetti Van Melle/ BasicEssentials Marketing represented by its brand Mentos, Colgate-Palmolive, Universal Robina Corporation, Permex, Prifood, Emperador Distillers, Pepsi, and Johnson & Johnson. Esteemed Media partners are Sunstar Superbalita and The Freeman’s Banat. Other exhibitors include Wet Gold Sales and Philusa. Attendees will be dazzled by displays of  interactive and creative booths from each of the sponsors.

This annual fun-filled gathering is exclusive to members of the Royalty Program, Prince Hypermart’s membership rewards and points program. The membership base is growing with 75,457 members in Cebu province alone and a total of 245,166 members all over the Visayas and Mindanao—mostly sari-sari store owners. Go says that what distinguishes Prince’s loyalty program are the rebates to earn direct discounts on purchases, exclusive monthly deals to get higher resell profits, and Royalty Program exclusive deals and access to life and health insurance.

Prince Hypermart is one of the leading retail and wholesale chains in the Visayas and Mindanao region, with 24 stores to date. Since its founding in April 1990, the retail chain currently has seven branches in Cebu found in the North Reclamation Area, Old MCWD building in M.C. Briones, Danao City, Minglanilla, Dalaguete, Argao, and Daanbantayan.

The leading retail chain also has branches outside of Cebu in other parts of the Visayas and Mindanao. Prince is present in the provinces of Negros Oriental, Negros Occidental, Leyte, Samar and Northern Mindanao.For more information on Prince and the Sari-Sari Store Festival.