Affordability, service help firm grow

With Cebu’s retail industry growing robustly, a family of businessmen decided to invest in a retail chain that would offer quality, affordable products to the market.

In 2002, Fooda Saversmart Corp. opened the first Fooda Saversmart shop along Mango Avenue, Cebu City.

According to Raphael Ngochua, marketing manager of Fooda Saversmart Corp., Cebuanos have always been known as a critical market that puts emphasis on value-for-money purchases including groceries and basic commodities they would need at home.

concept

“We want to put emphasis on quality and affordability coupled with wide selections and quality customer service,” said Ngochua.

The concept proved effective as three years after opening the first shop, they eventually opened Fooda Saversmart in Guadalupe, Cebu City.

This was followed by the opening of their biggest outlet yet in Consolacion, a municipality in northern Cebu known to be one of the most populated areas in Metro Cebu.

“Our Consolacion outlet is called the Hypermart which we opened in 2007,” said Ngochua.

competitive

Despite the presence of many other retail chains from Manila and expansions by other local players, Ngochua said the business remained very competitive as they always managed to keep prices lower than what most other chains offer.

Aside from considering the convenience of customers in every store location, Ngochua said they would always look at the existing market, study the demographics to know what products the consumers would need and base their business decisions on these data.

4th outlet

In December of last year, they opened their fourth outlet in San Nicolas, Cebu City which is still a residential area.

Applying all their learnings in the past and combining new discoveries and trends of the competition, the family saw the need to expand more aggressively and decided to open a year after in barangay Kasambagan, Mabolo, Cebu City.

They opened the outlet last Saturday offering a newer look that’s tailor-fitted to their concept of the existing market in the area.

imported products

“While the shop looks more high-end, prices of the products remain true to our original concept of affordability,” said Ngochua.

The new shop is located behind City Park Hotel.

The floor area of the new branch is about 2,612 square meters or about half of their Fooda Hypermarket in Consolacion.

“Here we offer wider range of international or imported products because we think the market in the area would want that,” said Ngochua.

With the fast growing economy of Cebu, Ngochua family said they were optimistic that their business would still grow and that there was still a huge market for them to tap.

more jobs

“We are always looking at expansions in different areas in Cebu and we’d like to add at least one shop a year, hopefully that can be realized,” said Ngochua.

With five outlets now opened, the business has provided direct job opportunities to at least 900 people now.

“We hope to help provide more jobs for Cebuanos through our growth,” said Ngochua.