Clark Freeport—Oscor Mart is slowly gaining a foothold in the Philippine convenience store sector currently being dominated by 7-Eleven, Family Mart, Alfa Mart and Ministop.
During the first “Balitaan” media forum of the Capampangan in Media, Inc. (CAMI) for 2021, Oscor Mart chairman and CEO Joseph Cruz Franco recounted how he was able to establish 60 stores in the country in just 2 years.
Franco said innovations in his stores in Zamboanga, Davao, Cebu, Palawan, Laoag City, Bataan, Pampanga and Ormoc City which posts a gross sale of P80,000 to P100,000 per day even during the pandemic.
Franco said while other companies are “sulking” during this pandemic, Oscor Mart continues to innovate.
He said he started with 4 companies that are into pharmaceuticals, rice retailing, bills payment, and food-to-go under the Franco Group of Companies. Franco said he is also into printing services, food supplements, and has set up Eco Global, an online business similar to Lazada and Amazon.
“We also have an app store for online shopping for groceries and we partnered with J & T Express for deliveries with most of our stores located near tricycle terminals. The tricycle operators and drivers’ association welcome the partnership because it adds up to their income,” said Franco.
The Oscor Mart app is used for online grocery shopping which is a way of buying food and other household necessities using the internet which has become the new normal in amid the Covid-19 pandemic. “It simply means shopping for groceries right in the comfort of your own home and then having them delivered at your doorstep.”
“We discovered that during the pandemic, the most saleable items are the essentials, but people are stuck in their homes. So, we developed an app for online shopping.”
But most importantly, “you have to locate your store where there is a huge volume of foot traffic,” Franco pointed out. The store should at least be 60 square meters.
The business executive said Oscor Mart was initially “known for [distributing] suka (vinegar), patis (fish sauce), toyo (soy sauce) delivered nationwide.”
Franco said In Pampanga, Oscor Mart has offices in the City of San Fernando near the Fernandino Hotel and two in adjacent Guagua town.
What is inside Oscor Mart? “We have groceries, pharmacy products like medicines, bills payment like a Bayad Center. But unlike the latter which costs about P400,000 to establish and most of the time goes offline, the Oscor Mart bills payment is never offline because our system is managed by a big company,” Franco said.
Soon, Franco said, debit and credit card terminals will be installed in his stores as well as ATM machines.
For its product supply and for its deliveries, Oscor Mart partnered with Suy Sing Commercial Corp. which deliver the products to Oscor Mart locations at wholesale price.
Franco also said Oscor Mart is “the strongest and most affordable in the Philippines.” He said Oscor Mart only gets a royalty fee of only 3 percent from the net profit of the franchisee.
From an initial investment of P1.5 million, Oscor Mart will only get P250,000 as franchise fee which can be settled on the 4th month of actual operation.
But the most important thing, Franco said, is that its return on investment or ROI is only less than a year.