California event set to open doors for Filipino entrepreneurs

The Manila Times

California event set to open doors for Filipino entrepreneurs  Gerry Palon, president of the Coalition of Filipino American Chambers of Commerce (COFACC), shares a groundbreaking event in California, which can open doors for Philippine manufacturers, franchisors, retailers, and logistics providers looking to expand into the US market. Executive Vice President Ellen Samson enticed Filipino entrepreneurs to join the International Asian American Business Expo (IAABE) 2025 for valuable insights on international trade, business networking, and how the IAABE 2025 can be a gateway to global success.  Subscribe to The Manila Times Channel - https://tmt.ph/YTSubscribe   Visit our website at https://www.manilatimes.net   Subscribe to Business Franchise Guru: https://www.youtube.com/@BusinessFranchiseGuru   Follow us:  Facebook - https://tmt.ph/facebook  Instagram - https://tmt.ph/instagram  Twitter - https://tmt.ph/twitter  DailyMotion - https://tmt.ph/dailymotion    Subscribe to our Digital Edition - https://tmt.ph/digital  Sign up to our newsletters: https://tmt.ph/newsletters  Check out our Podcasts:  Spotify - https://tmt.ph/spotify  Apple Podcasts - https://tmt.ph/applepodcasts  Amazon Music - https://tmt.ph/amazonmusic  Deezer: https://tmt.ph/deezer  Stitcher: https://tmt.ph/stitcher Tune In: https://tmt.ph/tunein   #TheManilaTimes  #philippines #entrepreneur

Transcript

00:00Good morning to all of you who are listening out there and watching this Business Mentor

00:29Blog. We're on our 54th episode and today, alam niyo, but today we have somebody who is so busy

00:36and he's driving all the way in 110 in Los Angeles and no other than, you know, I don't

00:43want to take him out of his eyesight and thanks to Ellen Samson, our good friend, who is a woman

00:50behind. Really, literally a woman behind. She's the one holding the camera. But again, let me

00:58introduce to you the founding and original president of the COFAC, okay, and who is none

01:05other than Jerry Palion. You know that he used to work in the Philippines in Kenny Rogers and did

01:13you know that he's a graduate of UST. So Jerry, good evening to you and safe driving while you're

01:19talking. Yeah, thank you so much Butch. Good evening to all of you, my fellow countrymen.

01:27I'm sorry, we're caught in heavy traffic here. I hope we can park first before... we will be late

01:37in our appointment. Nonetheless, thank you very much Butch for giving us this opportunity

01:45to relay to our countrymen in the Philippines about our upcoming event in August.

01:57Not only as a partner, but she's our executive vice president, Ellen Samson.

02:04I'll just show the...

02:08Yeah, the traffic is getting wider. But Jerry, before you... tell us about COFAC. This was

02:17founded in May 2018, I believe. What is COFAC for our viewers in the Philippines right now?

02:26Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, thank you, Butch. COFAC, it's called the Coalition of Filipino-American

02:35Chambers of Commerce. We started with only four chambers. This is already existing in Southern

02:43California. We found the need to have a united front because there are many different small,

02:52small chambers in different cities all over the U.S. They've been operating. Some of them

03:01are operating since 1950s, 60s. It's been a long time in the industry. But they operate not really

03:10the way a chamber of commerce should be doing. Most likely, mostly cultural and social

03:18organizations are trying to present themselves as a chamber of commerce.

03:23So when Ellen and I entered, we saw the vision. We have to form a united front so we can be a

03:34strong advocate and a strong voice of the Filipino-American community in the state

03:42and federal government of the U.S. For the Filipinos to know, because we Filipinos here in the U.S.,

03:51we are silent minority. We have been keeping our income above industry and we're contributing to

04:08the tax money of the U.S. government and yet we don't have a voice. We want to make COFAC as the

04:18strong advocate to represent the Filipino-American interest, the business interest in the United

04:25States. So from four chambers in 2018, we grew them, especially during the pandemic because

04:34COVID-19. Right now, we had our 48th chamber joining us last, the first week of the month,

04:43January. Yeah, 48 and we are right now with the trend. Based on our trend, we're averaging about

04:5410 chambers a year. So we're an ambitious target but we're looking at 60 chambers at the end of

05:032025. And these chambers are meeting annually. We just completed our summit in Long Beach,

05:15California last week.

05:18So basically Jerry, what I see now is you're trying to put everybody together

05:25instead of this splinter group. One of the things I noticed is that you have trainings for

05:33locals or local Filipinos in different... to upgrade their chamber training. You have board

05:40training, members training, right? Yes, yes, yes. We have an academy now, Boots. We just launched

05:49our leadership development academy. That has two components. One is the basic chamber management.

05:59So you cannot have an advanced course if you're not done with the 10-week course of the basic

06:05chamber. From A to Z of running a chamber is trained. It's taken up in the training program.

06:15But it's 10 weeks. It's self-paced among the chamber leaders. So they are just submitting

06:26assignments, homeworks. At the end of the term, at the end of 10 weeks, they have an exam.

06:32So you're trying to professionalize managing the chamber, right? There are times when we call it

06:46ningas kugon in the Philippines. So this is something you professionalize and hopefully

06:52really you are gaining weight. But let's talk about the activities. One of the activities that

06:57you are doing is Asia Meets America. This is the second year, correct, Jerry?

07:05Yes, the second year that we are doing. We were very encouraged with the outcome,

07:11the successful outcome of our first one in August, last August 2024 at the Cerritos

07:20Center for Performing Arts. We didn't expect that we will have a big turnout.

07:28It's such a small space. We managed to bring in almost a thousand guests,

07:37walk-in guests for a period of four hours or five hours, I believe, I remember.

07:43Now with this upcoming August, what we are really promoting is a stronger partnership

07:50with the other chambers. The Asian organizations that didn't participate with us last year,

07:57a lot of them inquired, how can we participate. So we were encouraged,

08:06inspired by that kind of outcome. Now this year, we are three times the size

08:16of our guests, about 1,500 or 2,000. Almost 2,000 is our goal for this year. We will hold it at the

08:26Delta Hotel by Marriott in Anaheim. It's in Garden Grove as well.

08:32So who are the target participants that you would want to recommend,

08:38especially here in the Philippines. We would like to invite a lot of entrepreneurs.

08:45But who are the entrepreneurs that you are looking at?

08:49Well, our target market here are the Philamps that would like to invest in franchise. That's number

08:58one. The affordable franchise fees or investment wherein it's easy for the family to decide if

09:12they want to run it by themselves or they want the relatives in the Philippines to run it for them,

09:19for self-sustainability initiative. Because we are trying to help the Philamps here,

09:29instead of sending money, they should invest in the business for self-sustaining of their

09:34families in the Philippines. Teach them how to fish.

09:37Teach them how to fish. I agree. I agree. But there are also entrepreneurs who are looking at

09:44enticing Filipino-Americans to get their business from the Philippines to there, to the U.S.

09:51That's another marketing program or event is the exporters in the Philippines who would like to

10:04bring in their products to the U.S. and tap into the big U.S. market.

10:10Because this market in the U.S. is the most difficult overseas market to penetrate.

10:18We have a lot of competitors here. Vietnamese, they're already very, very well distributed.

10:26Koreans, Thailand, even Indonesia.

10:31They already impressed that they want to join.

10:34We are already leading other Asian nationalities. So we would love to help the Filipinos in the

10:45Philippines to bring in their products and services and their franchise concepts.

10:52Correct.

10:53So Jerry, probably I can also interview the Executive Vice President of Covaxin, Ellen.

11:02Ellen, to give us some ideas about your experience in the U.S.

11:08And you were just here, by the way, recently, Ellen. You gave a talk about dementia, Ellen.

11:17Uh-huh. Oh, yeah. Yeah. About IABE, those who are actually manufacturing there and they have

11:29products, if they want to bring it and introduce here, kausap na namin, andun ang FDA, andun ang

11:38U.S. Commercial Service. Yes, Department of Commerce.

11:42Department of Commerce, andun yung mga proseso para madala mo dito.

11:46May mga workshops for that. And then andun yung mga makakatulong sa kanila,

11:51and possible distributors ng kanilang mga produkto. Jerry and I had a meeting last week with them

11:59and andun ang mga distributors, logistics company, FDA.

12:04Even cold storage.

12:06Even cold storage.

12:08Oh yeah. Kailangan yun. Cold storage or storage facilities.

12:21Yung mga interested exporters, for example, they can take a look because we have also

12:29a part of the program or the event agenda. On the third day, we will have a tour,

12:36a tour of the port facilities in Los Angeles and Long Beach. So makikita nila how

12:45well organized yung logistics dito sa U.S. and they can be really confident na yung products nila

12:53will be handled properly by experienced, mga malalaking companies ang logistics.

13:01At the same time also it's a bit of everything, even real estate.

13:20There's a certain portion there on how to retire in the Philippines or if you want to retire in

13:26Vietnam. It's going to be big kasi it has a lot of everything but it's more of Asian

13:34businesses meeting American businesses. At the same time, ito yung cross-cultural and cross-border

13:41trade that we can... So we would love sana na may mga Pilipino. Kasi siyempre

13:47ang main organizer nito is COFAC. We are a voice. We are a voice here.

13:54Pagkatapos ko, konti lang ang Pilipino. So that's why if you guys, those people who will be

13:59interested, we'll be helping you in facilitating the invitations. Thank you that merong isang boots.

14:09It's true po Jan that you guys are our partner in bringing these businessmen. Ang hingay ng Jerry.

14:26Anyway, I won't prolong you because you guys are driving and you're heading to a meeting.

14:32But basically Ellen, where can they get in touch for our viewers to,

14:36really if they're really serious, they want to participate in the Asia Meets America,

14:42meron ba ang Facebook page ang COFAC na nandyan?

14:46Yes.

14:46Ilalabas na namin boots next week. Kasi hindi lang namin mailabas earlier because we have a prior

14:52event.

14:52Yeah. We have the big event, the strategic planning of COFAC. We finished it.

14:57But by Monday or Tuesday, you can see it already. But I'll also send to you so you could

15:05actually include in this video the newest advertisement of patalastas about IAB, which

15:13we showed last Saturday to our Asian friends who attended the leadership awards gala ng COFAC.

15:24We had that, which I will send to you and you can actually share with them.

15:29But you know Ellen, with the social media, people are asking, wala ba sa TikTok yan,

15:34yung COFAC na ating event. Andami, maraming nagtatalon.

15:42That's actually, may nauna lang kasing, but it's there. You will see it by next week.

15:49May mga video reels na kami. Hindi lang madami because the event that we had last weekend was

15:56really, really big.

15:57We just don't want na magpatong.

16:00Magpatong. Kasi baka mamaya may ganito, ganyan. But definitely next week, you'll see it. It's

16:05already done. We have already sent also some materials for Vietnam and other countries

16:13na nakatranslate na. So yung Philippines, English naman yan. Madali namin ipadala sa inyo yan.

16:20Yeah. The sooner that we can get serious inquiries, we can already help them start

16:28advertising their company seal. So we can get possible B2B meetings. When they arrive,

16:37at least may arrange natin yung meeting with those interested buyers.

16:42We know, Ellen, we're being supported by our Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry,

16:49Las Piñas, Quezon City, and we're also drumming other chambers. So we're all in full support for

16:57Asia meets America. So we want to bring the one voice. So Jerry, I will not prolong you. I know

17:08you're driving through the challenging streets. We can have another interview again, no? Yes.

17:18As a follow up to this. Yeah, correct. Give us an update and then we will send it to our members.

17:24Okay, Jerry and Ellen, thank you very much for the opportunity. And again, more power and keep

17:31safe to you all you guys. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, bye-bye.

18:01Bye-bye.

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