7th Filipino Franchise Show

It's my first time to attend the Filipino Franchise Expo. In general, the show was pretty small. The exhibit area only occupied a third of the World Trade Center. It's a combination of food and non-food industries ranging from medium to corporate enterprises. There were about 80 exhibitors to explore for possible business opportunities. In our case, we are particularly interested in the food category. Among the increasingly popular Food Cart segment, the dominant trends are Siomai and Noodles. It seemed that dimsum already found its way to the Filipinos heart and stomach. I saw a lot of companies offering this particular franchise. Apart from that, Noodle Cart is fast becoming a second popular business opportunity. A typical cart houses a concept of stir-fried noodles with your choice of toppings and sauce. Competition dwells mainly on the type of sauce and toppings used. One serving in a small paper cup costs around Php 25 - Php 39. The franchise package ranges from Php125,000 - Php 250,000. Habba Habba, the noodle kiosk from the company that operates Goto King is what I found most interesting. It's noodles with a Pinoy twist. They use habhab noodles, a specialty of Lucban, Quezon. The noodles can be consumed boiled and fried or as-is (ala-crispy noodle type), with seafood sauce and a variety of toppings. Unlike other carts which offer a number of choices for the sauce, Habba Habba uses one type of sauce only. This makes the operation simpler. Taste wise, it's acceptable. The others (Hongkong Noodle House, Fried Noodles etc.), I found too salty and short in character. I think the Habhab Noodles is also a unique selling proposition in itself.

Coffee, Pizza, Rice Bento Box, donut, ice cream and other snack items comprised the whole food franchise repertoire. Your budget, interest and passion are the things that will dictate which franchise is worth exploring.