For many Filipinos, Christmas is one of the most-awaited event of the year. So awaited, in fact, that Christmas season is at least four months long—covering the months of September, October, November, and December, dubbed as the “Ber months” following the last syllable of their names.
This long, slow simmer of excitement, finds its way to almost every aspect of Filipino life. Malls, for example, begin putting up Christmas decorations by September and children begin carolling as early as November. On the other hand, one could easily recall horrendous traffic as Christmas day approaches. Truly, Filipinos can’t go without their beloved holidays.
Despite the current crisis, the Christmas spirit will endure, just like it had before, and new ways are being innovated to celebrate this festive season. As days pass, new opportunities and challenges are constantly discovered. For online food entrepreneurs in the Philippines, there is always an opportunity for service. To help you prepare for this year’s holiday season, it’s time to make ready.
Stock Up
In Filipino culture, food is almost always the centerpiece of good times. No table is complete without sets of favorite cravings. Whether simple or elegant, everyone is eager for Christmas dinner.
The holidays are one of the biggest draws of the year for businesses, and according to some sources as much as 30% of the annual profit earned just during the holiday season. Naturally, this also means that you can expect a ton of orders.
First thing’s first: Be prepared. Stock up on necessary ingredients, especially the ones that you use the most. If you run out of supplies in the middle of a food rush, you might have to leave the kitchen to buy groceries or stop working for the moment. Either way, you lose productivity due to not enough preparation.
Also remember that ingredients are not the only things you need to stock up on. You also need to make sure that your utensils are in usable shape—you don’t want anything breaking down in the middle of the day! Clean and well-maintained equipment is part and parcel of being effective in the kitchen.
Plan Ahead
Getting stocked up is just one part of being prepared. There is an adage called Murphy’s Law, which says, “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong”. And in a stressful place like a busy kitchen, there are a lot of things that can go wrong. But you can lessen the chances of something bad happening by planning ahead for it.
In a notebook (or you can also type it out on a spreadsheet on a computer), you can start by writing down all the likely best-case and worst-case scenarios that you can think of. Beside them, indicate what you will need to do in case the bad scenario happens, and include any alternative actions that you can take. Orient your coworkers and employees (if any) to these scenarios so they also know what to do if it does happen.
A scenario could be something simple: for example, two of your five employees call in sick. A planned response will be to immediately ask around and trace where your employees have been to make sure that no one else is infected. Automatically disinfecting the kitchen is also a reasonable action.
In case, however, those two employees can’t make it to work for any other reason, you will also have to adjust work around—you can’t really expect three employees to make the work of five. This adjustment will help give you some control on the expectations from your customers and rearrange work of your remaining employees.
Use Technology
At a time when most of the businesses are already online, don’t forget to attend to the digital world. By being smart with technology, you can wisely put out ads in platforms where others haven’t seen yet to propel your online food business forward and increase your sales. Use keywords related to the holidays in your advertisement posts so that more people will be able to find it.
Having an online food business is not easy, especially when everything is transacted digitally. However, there are many avenues for you to properly sell your products such as in TippyMart, the Philippines first online food market and bazaar. With this platform, you will definitely reach a wider audience and be able to keep your online food business up and running.
Customer Value Over Discounts
A common mistake that entrepreneurs make the holiday season is fast approaching is rampantly giving away discounts to encourage more customers to buy. This is not the case however, as buyers don’t just go blindly with discounts because of the reduced price. Instead, customers want to see the value of what you’re offering. How will this product benefit them?
Discounts are useful to attract attention, but remember that buyers still buy because of a number of reasons. With the increased production of your product, always remember to deliver the same quality. Highlight the different benefits, features and advantages of your products.
Plan for After the Holidays
Business operations of the holiday rush don’t exactly end with Christmas or the New Year. Just as the public is picking back up to its normal pace, it will be time to slow down from the rush and get back to your normal rhythm.
It may be difficult to adjust to operations after a hectic holiday of doing business, so before the holidays even start, begin planning out what you will do once things shift over to the new year. As mentioned before, having a plan will save you a headache trying to come up with a strategy on the dot. Wrap up your finances for the year end and the holidays to keep track of your revenues and expenses. Third is to account for remaining inventory to be able to allocate the funds and resources for the items you need. Lastly, once everything is back to the way it was, take a short rest, you deserve it!