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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