JOE MAGSAYSAY

“Everything is a Blessing; One Door Closes another Door Opens!” –

This is taken from advice I have heard over and over again but have not paid any
importance to until Joe Magsaysay mentioned it to me during one of our conversations.
Adela Wassmer, wife of the late Leo Wassmer, president of Eli Lilly, and an aunt of
Joe’s wife, gave him this advice when he was feeling pretty low, after having left the
security of a full-time job at Wendy’s Hamburgers.

But before I get ahead of myself, let me go back to the very beginning.

I shall not go back to Joe’s days at Cubao Elementary School, but to his fourth year in
high school at Ateneo de Manila. When he lost his Dad, Joe lost his guiding light. Joe
went on to De La Salle and took up Commercial Arts. He took part-time jobs on the side
to make both ends meet. His uncle JessMag, took care of his tuition and even made
Joe live in his house in Sandejas street, near De La Salle

He tried his hand at first cousin Jun Magsaysay’s Cable Company and later moved to
Wendy’s as a part-time employee. The job was tough: he was studying and took the
work shift from 7 p. m. to closing hours. He cleaned tables and comfort rooms. He was
later made cashier of the same Wendy’s Shop.

Titoy Pardo, president and CEO of Wendy’s, noticed him and offered him permanent
employment. The bad news was that Joe had to give up his schooling. It was a choice
of helping out his Mom financially or giving up school. He told himself he would
eventually go back to school and finish the course. This never happened. Fate had
different plans for him.

He was made to attend a Management Trainee Course, and before he knew it he was
managing five stores. With his professional career going great, his plans to continue his
studies “took the back-burner.” Still, it bothered him that he did not have a college
diploma. By then, he had found the love of his life, the lady who now is his wife INEZ.

Things were going relatively well, but soon his brother-in-law Ricky Montellibano and
friends of his from De La Salle, Danny Bermejo and Jorge Weineke, invited him to join
their group in a new business venture.

Why not come up with a product similar to “FLAVORED POP CORN”? The suggestion
came from Danny, Jorge, and Ricky, who were already together setting up this new
concept of Flavored French Fries which they called POTATO CORNER. The partners
felt that since Joe had experience in operations he would be the right man to tap.
They had the product; they more or less identified the first outlets. All they needed was
MONEY! They figured P150, 000 was needed to get the business going. And for offices,
they used Joe’s garage and his Mom’s old oven as the filing cabinet.

Up to this stage, potatoes being deep fried needed a lot of space. They found a way of
deep frying potatoes in small stalls.

Joe’s share was P37, 500, but he couldn’t raise the funds. Ricky came loaned him the
money, and in six months Joe was able to pay it back.

Joe was putting in whatever free time he had with his partners to popularize Potato
Corner and make it grow.

As luck would have it, Titoy Pardo, Wendy’s “Supremo,” called him into his office and
asked him if he was involved with Potato Corner. Joe readily admitted he was. It was
something to have a small business on the side, and for his boss, the owner of Wendy’s
and Seven Eleven, to take notice of it was, to Joe, a real compliment. But what he
thought was a compliment turned out to be the end of his career at Wendy’s. Titoy gave
him a choice -- Wendy’s or Potato Corner.

Potato Corner was very small, and Joe by now had a family to feed. If he were
somebody else he might have quit the venture and stay with a steady paying job.
Besides he had a great boss in Titoy Pardo, a man he deeply respects to this day. But
despite these considerable pluses, he opted to continue with Potato Corner. He had
made a commitment to his group, he couldn’t let them down.

He was an amateur in franchising, but nonetheless he plodded on.

A franchise door opened. The first Potato Corner outlet was a success (one month
payback), but they did not have enough money to expand to other locations offered to
them. Luckily enough, there were friends who wanted to put up their own branches of
Potato Corner, and this is where their franchise operations really got going.

Their first franchisees were Rene Domingo and Mike Ramos.

It was franchising, Joe’s “no problem” attitude, and his partners’ contributions and
passion plus his franchisees’ and other shareholders’ support that made Potato Corner
grow.

At this time a political door opened. After five years of running the company, Joe, who
has the political blood of the Magsaysay’s, stepped down and tried his hand at politics.
He called on his first cousin Jun, and the latter’s advice was, “go and try it and see if
you’ll like it.”
Joe lost, found out politics was not his “cup of tea,” but now, since he had given up
running Potato Corner, Joe couldn’t just return to the business. It wasn’t big enough to
cover his overhead.

As luck would have it, another door opened. RAMCAR called. They wanted him to work
at MR. DONUT. They noticed what Joe was able to do with Potato Corner and wanted
him to replicate that with Mr. Donut. They also gave him an opportunity to take a course
at AIM where he met two professors, Mr. Danny Antonio and Andy Ferreira. They taught
him a lot of business sense. Both gentlemen now sit on the Potato Corner board as
independent directors.

Things were going well for Joe at Mr. Donut. Unfortunately, his partner manager,
Danny, of Potato Corner, died. This meant he had to step back into Potato Corner
again, this time armed with a master’s degree

Upon his return, they went into a major re-engineering of the brand. This coincided with
the economic crisis of the late 1990s.

Today Joe is Potato Corner’s CEO. He attributes his company’s success to very
supportive and constructive members of the board, loyal employees, hard-working
franchisees and partners, and yes, a “no problem” attitude.

They are now operating not only in Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. They are also
overseas, with 26 outlets in five countries! I can foresee that it will eventually be in every
corner of the globe!

Joe Magsaysay – Potato Corner

The young Magsaysay left school to bust tables, wash plates, and work on the cash
register at a fast food chain. In a few years, he became a manager, handling five stores.

With his background and skills in store management, Magsaysay’s friends asked him to
handle Potato Corner, of which he was a co-founder. They pooled their money together
and started the food cart business in 1992, offering franchises left and right. Today,
Potato Corner has more than 550 stalls in the Philippines and around the world.