an escape from reality

For educational purposes only

[jnnlynnette]

Blog #4

Failure in business does not make you a bad businessmen/businesswomen, there is always a room for improvement which is open to everyone.

I could still picture out in my mind how we started our class in entrepreneur and now, we are at the end of the semester. Oh, how time flies too fast. The moments that we found out about the pitching and everyone were scared, it was still fresh in my memory. I am so proud of my groupmates who happened to be my friends who were always dedicated to their work. We never thought that we could make it. At first, the Everleaf was just a requirement that we must do our best to have a good grade, but now, we learned to love that product. We learned about so many things. We learned that innovation is not an easy thing, it was a trial and error, but we still manage to make it through this far. The final pitching experience was a great challenge to me. Personally, I faced a lot of hindrances that time. Night before the final pitching, we experienced brownout in our community. That event wasted the time that I supposed to polish our BMC. In the morning, I was bombarded with my household chores and responsibilities as a child and I do not have a choice but to do it first before prioritizing my self. After that, I was finally able to start my part in BMC. I was supposed to travel from home at 11:30 AM because transportation is not that accessible in our vicinity at that period of time. However, as aforementioned, I had house responsibilities to fulfill. On 12:00 pm, went to the road to wait for busses to stop by, but sadly, I was able to ride at 12:36 pm. I really can't forget the time because I almost missed our final pitching and the final papers or the BMC was with me. Gladly, our Entrep adviser favored us and he decided to start at 1:20 so I was able to catch up. I thank the Almighty God for being with us that day and for the success of the Final Pitching of everleaf. Lastly, I would also like to thank the advisers of Entrepreneurial Mind course for pursuing the Lecture series. It opens up many opportunities for us students. It made me realize that innovation is not an easy thing and trial and error is part of the process, and we must not give up. Instead, heads up, and make those experiences, trials, and errors be one of our inspiration and motivation to aim higher and achieve the things we wanted.

It was a long journey, but we made it.

Photos were documentations from our first pitching experience, to midterm pitching, and final pitching.

Thank you, Sir Reymark for this wonderful opportunity for us to experience these activities.

Below is the video presentation of Everleaf.

The Final Product of Everleaf.

[jnnlynnette]

Blog #3

~journey after midterm pitching~

All of my groupmates were exhausted after midterms. We have research paper to revise , critique paper to present, reporting, meeting demonstration , etc. As college students, we felt like we have no time to rest, relax, and have time to ourselves. Despite of being tired, we still have energy left for our incoming final pitching.

After our midterm pitching, we decided to have specific sizes with our paper. We finalize whether we will make a crafting paper or packaging. After several meetings, we decided to make a crafting paper with 3 sizes, A4, B4, and A3. These crafting paper will be sold in bundle or per piece. Before proceeding with making our prototype for the second time, we conducted an interview to 10 students about our product, everleaf.

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Question #1: Are you going to avail the everleaf crafting paper?

As we can see on the results, 40% of them would avail depends on the price and quality, 30% committed to buy it it is available, 20% states it depends on the project they're working on, and 10% stated that there would be a possibility.

Question #2: How much do you think are the justifiable prices of everleaf crafting paper (per piece/sheet)?

The survey result for A3 is that 20% for ₱6.00, ₱5.00 to ₱9.00, and ₱5.00 to ₱10.00. For the size B4, 20% suggested ₱5.00, ₱7.00, ₱3.00 to ₱5.00. Lastly, for the size A4, 20% suggested ₱10.00 to ₱25.00, and ₱3.00.

Question #3: How much do you think are the justifiable prices of everleaf crafting paper (per bundle/pack)?

The survey shows that in the size A3, the justifiable price(per pack) is that 20% suggests ₱45.00, ₱55.00, and ₱100.00. For the size B4, 20% suggested ₱45.00, ₱50.00, and ₱95.00. Lastly, for the A4, 20% suggested ₱25.00, and ₱200.00.

Question #4: What do we need to improve and level up to be able to compete in the market?

The survey shows that 40% of the interviewees stated that we must improve our product quality and price, 30% suggest to improve our packaging and marketing strategies, 20% suggest to make it unique, and 10% stated that we need to improve the sustainability and durability of our product.

Interviewing those students made us realize that even though it is satisfactory for us sellers, the buyers perception are need to be catered. It is to improve and product and make our prices budget-friendly or student-friendly and at the same-time profit generating.

The respondents declined to video record their response but we were able to convince them with the photo documentation.

[jnnlynnette]

Blog #2

                I have always wanted to start a business. Seeing those students like me starting their business at a young age inspires me to do well. Even though I am a political science student wanting to proceed to law school, business crossed my mind from time to time. I know several people, schoolmates, and even friends who lived independently and does not rely on their parents in terms of financial status--- they inspire me. I do not want to bother my parents asking money for school anymore. Even though I know that it is their responsibility to send me to school, I still want to help them financially. Because of this, I always wanted to start a business, an online business. Online selling, such as pre-loved clothes or “Ukay” clothes. Aside from having no capital for business, what hinders me to pursue one of my dream is my introversion and anxiety. However, despite having those fear inside me, I still try to overcome it by participating in this activity which always involve other peoples’ opinion and perspective. We, the entrepreneurs, seek for validation from customers.

Experience

Just like the other activity that we had in our Entrepreneurship subject, I also felt fear in approaching strangers. However, the difference is I am not so scared unlike the first time. I learned to talk to strangers without my hands trembling. Though my hands were sweating, nonetheless, there is an improvement which I appreciate in myself. In our class, we were tasked to interview at least 25 people each group. Our group decided to assign three (3) interviewee per member.

First meeting after presentation of innovation. Designation of tasks for following activities.

            During the interview, with the help of my friends to approach students, I was able to interview 3 persons at once. I introduced myself to the interviewees by stating my name, program, and purpose and which course I am working with the interview. Also, I asked for forgiveness for stealing couple of minutes of their break time. However, they were so good that they said it is okay for they understand me because they were Entrep students as well. First, I gave them the background of our study, I shared to them the result of our first activity interview, and I shared to them the solution that my group come up with. After which, I started my interview.

Question: Would you buy our product if it is already available in the market? Why?

                Interviewee 1, 2, and 3, were random students spending time in College of Arts and Sciences-Main. The first interviewee stated that she would buy our product if it will be available to the market because it is another way of reducing logging. It is another way to same trees from cutting and to help the environment. Interviewee 2 stated that she would buy our product since it helps to lessen the leaves of garbage in Central Mindanao University. In other words, she answered “yes” to our question. Interviewee 3 stated that yes, she would buy our product since it recycles leaves and save trees.

Question: What characteristics/qualities of our product make it appealing to you as a customer?

                The first interviewee answered, thick, durable, and smudge-proof. She explained that she always write down her reviewers, class discussion, etc. so she seeks for a smudge-proof paper. The second interviewee answered smooth texture and durable. She explained that she look for a paper quality that even though it was made from leaves, it is not visible that it is made from leaves because of its smooth texture. The third interviewee answered smudge-proof ad should be useful. She stated that it should be useful in a sense that it is not easily torn which can be used anytime and should be smudge-proof because she likes to write.

Reflection/Learnings

                I am inspired to thrive to meet the expectations and qualities that the potential customers wanted. Even though we know that this innovation will not be easy, we still pursue this because it has many benefits. It aids one of the major problem identified on the first activity, which is the leaf garbage. This activity made my heart feel grateful with the students who are willing to participate in such interview.

Results of the Survey

Overall result of Question #1

Our group targeted 25 respondents and the result of the interviews was 100% yes. As we can see on the pie chart above, the students we interviewed are willing to buy our product if it is available in the market.

Overall result of Question #2

Majority of the interviewees with a total of 56% are willing to avail on our product because of its benefits to the environment. Another reason of them willing to avail on our product is because it has student friendly price or cheap, the quality of the paper, they support local, and it is convenient.

Documentation

I would like to extend my gratefulness to these beautiful ladies who wholeheartedly participated in the interview. Thank you so much ka-CMU! Padayon para sa kaugmaon!

Trust the process, do your best, and God will do the rest!

[jnnlynnette]

First Blog: Facing fear

Experience

I am a type of lady that is active in church, the one who participates in any activities such as camping, bible drills, song drills, etc. However, when I am at school, my confidence would turn 360 degree. I am afraid to approach other people, I am trembling every oral recitations, or reporting. I am noisy with the people I am comfortable with, but it's the opposite when I don't know anyone. Approaching someone, asking a favor if they could lend time for me with aleast 3 to 5 minutes is an enormous step for me getting out of my comfort zone. I was having trouble on approaching anyone, but thanks to my friends who pushed and encourage me to do it, face my fear and overcome it. It was a sunny morning when we went to College of Agriculture bench after our morning class to start our interview. We approach random students from College of Agriculture and College of Business Management. I also went to College of Engineering and College of Arts and Sciences to interview random students. It was a fun and enjoyable experience to be able to talk to my co-students and ask them about the problems they noticed in our school that needs attention from the administration or any student organization.

Reflection

It was Wednesday when my friends and I decided to conduct random interview with several students of CMU. Anywhere we look, every angle we turn our heads, we always see students doing their homeworks, hanging out with their friends, reviewing for their exams and quizzes, etc. However, despite of their business, there are some who lend several minutes to us to participate in our interview. My heart would really melt everytime I hear them say, "uy! pa interview ta kay mag inana sad raba ta puhon" and "pa interview ta aron mahuman nang task nilang Ate". I realized that in this world, there are still people who are willing to help you in times of needs. Asking favor for educational purposes to strangers is not an easy thing to do - - - it was really a big step for me. I do house to house everytime there is an outreach program of our youth in church but when in school, I am always shy to approach anyone. Additionally, I realized that in this world full of irresponsible people who does not dispose their garbage properly, there are still people who are concerned with the mother nature who wants to eliminate the consume of plastic bottles, cups, etc. in canteens, market, and other eatery in CMU. I am astonished by their love of nature and ecosystem, and their perseverance to maintain the greeny CMU.

Learnings

In this activity, I learned that there are numerous problems of CMU that was noticed by the students. The pie chart below is the result of the survey interview of our group which are the problems that needs attention by the administration and student organizations stated by the student.

There are total of 14 problems of CMU stated by the students during interview, which are the tambayan, transportation, internet connection, students schedule tracking, lack of potable water fountains, waste problems, insufficient educational tools, lack of healthy foods in canteens, student security, mental health, ventilation, illegal business in CMU, invisible road humps, and lack of printing stations. As for the commuters who have several hours interval of classes, they see "tambayan" as a problem because the benches are not enough to accommodate thousands of students. Waste problems is commonly mentioned in our interview because in CMU, they see garbages, plastic wrappers, and plastic bottles thrown everywhere by the irresponsible students. Also, they reasoned out the absence or lack of garbage bins.

Documentation

Regular meeting of the group.

Photos with the interviewees.

(other students refused to take photos and record videos during interview, hence, we utilized voice recording.)