Last night on News on Q, Winnie Monsod said that the price index has gone up 15 times since 1979. But the income of most Filipinos has not kept pace.
Companies are pouncing on this reality by coming out with smaller cuts of their products to sweep in every peso that Juan dela Cruz has in his pocket.
To illustrate, Coke has its Sakto which is now retailed at P5. Ponds now comes in P5 sachet. Milo, Joy's dishwashing liquid Ultra, Rexona's Deo-lotion, Sun Valley's cooking oil, Surf's Bigatin, to name a few, all have their P5 variant. Even Selecta has its own P5.00 Pinoy Sorbetes popsicle. Other's like Marlboro cannot go lower so they have their 8 peso sachet pack (5 sticks). Bear Brand's Swak is retailed at P10. Still, there is that effort to reduce the price. The 5 and 10 centavo coins and sometimes the 25 centavo are now being shunned even by the poorest of the poor as they don't pick it up as change.
Another case in point. For a long time, Procter & Gamble's Tide stuck to it's P10.50 retail price for its sachet and advertised that it was twice better than it's cheaper competitor (isa higit sa dalawa) but it soon lost ground. Wings was 1st to come out with a P5.00 sachet and was brisk selling until Unilever's Surf came out with its 5 peso heavier Bigatin. Tide is now coming out with it's own P5.00 sachet but it has not completely covered lost ground even with Vic Sotto on board.
In the telco's, Sun revolutionized the industry and more than doubled its subscriber base to more than 10 million now in less than 2 years with its P25 Call & Text Unlimited and Combo 10 products. Their minimum load is now P5.00. Smart is now forced to have unlimited call and text for P25.00 via their Red Mobile brand, the same product which made Sun popular among students and the masses. Globe is catching up with massive advertisement and TM's P5.00 load with 3 minutes worth of call.
Big is out. Small is in.
It is in crisis and calamities where opportunities exist. What this means for all of us is that only those who can adapt quickly to the situation can survive and even make good like the multinationals.
The P5.00 coin is now the immediate disposable income of the masses. Gone are the sardines. In comes the cheaper noodles. The poor has only P5.00 to spare but their class make up more than 90 percent of the country's consumer purchasing power and it's a multi-billion peso business!
The P5.00 coin! Isn't it amazing!
Let's just all hope that the next president will not introduce the 1 peso retail phenomenon!
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