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PANCAKE
House Inc. has further sweetened the competition in the
food and restaurant business by spending nearly a
quarter of a billion pesos to put up more stores.
According to the publicly-listed firm’s business
development and planning office, the company that owns
stores under the Pancake House, Dencio’s, Teriyaki Boy
and Singkit brands would be spending such amount for an
additional 25 stores this year.
The
amount doesn’t include spending allotment for the
company’s marketing programs, consolidation of three
commissaries and electronic commerce development.
These
are the main features of the management plans for the
year that the company reported during its annual
stockholders’ meeting on Thursday.
Shares
of Pancake House Wednesday closed at 6.50 apiece.
The
company said it already opened five of its targeted
seven branches of Pancake House—the flagship brand—this
year. Three of these are company-owned while the rest
are franchisees.
These
stores would bring the number of Pancake House stores to
72 from 65.
The
company said it also has confirmed the opening of its
franchisee-owned store under the Dencio’s Grill brand,
while its joint-venture store at the Trinoma Mall in
Quezon City has been operating.
A
company-owned Dencio’s Grill restaurant would be opening
in the northern Philippine
province of
Isabela
by July, the office of Pancake House executive Cecille
D. Macaalay said.
Of the
existing 25 Dencio’s Grill stores, it plans to open 10
more this year.
Pancake
House also plans to open eight more Teriyaki Boy
branches, bringing the total number of stores under its
Japanese restaurant brand to 34 from its current 26.
The
listed firm also plans to open four more stores under
its Chinese food delivery brand Singkit, which it
revived last year through 88 Just Asian Inc., a new
company it owns 80 percent of and the rest by Singkit
Deliveries Inc.
“The
expansion plan is on target,” said a person from the
office of Macaalay, director for corporate planning.
The
person who doesn’t want to be named but is familiar with
the company’s operations added that the spending for
store expansion doesn’t include the full consolidation
of the commissaries for Pancake House, Dencio’s Grill
and Teriyaki Boy.
She
added that the full consolidation of the commissaries at
the company’s headquarters in
Makati City from Pasig
City would only be realized by June 2008.
“There
would be some costs in the transfer of equipment and its
synergy with the whole production system,” she said
adding the numbers are still being finalized.
Pancake
House, an 83-percent Filipino-owned corporation, has
three main business units, namely restaurant operations,
commissary and franchising—respectively contributing 66
percent, 27 percent and 7 percent to its gross income.
In its
first quarter financial report, the company said that
“restaurants in the fast-food segment are in stiffer
competition compared to those in the casual dining
segments.” Its restaurants are eyeing the AB market.
Pancake House said this segment accounts for 5 percent
of 80-million population. |
