02/05/2026
Nothing humbles a business coach faster than co-founding a festival with zero experience.
And yes, we revised it about a thousand times before it felt right.
That's me and my business partner on that stage. And I still can't fully believe we pulled it off.
Here's the honest truth about why we built this.
MSMEs are the backbone of our economy. Not in a motivational poster kind of way but in a real, structural, economic reality kind of way.
The majority of what keeps the Philippines moving is not the big corporations. It's the small business owners, the bazaar merchants, the student entrepreneurs, the home-based sellers who figure it out every single day with little to no support from anyone above them.
I know this world. I love bazaars. I love going to events like this, the energy, the community, the hustle you feel walking through a row of vendors who built something with their own hands.
So when the chance came to build Northbound, the question wasn't really should we. It was how do we make this actually matter.
We wanted merchants to go home with real sales and real brand awareness. We wanted customers to leave with a genuinely good experience, entertainment, activities, energy, something worth talking about.
We wanted both sides to win.
This first version had more revisions than I care to admit. But every single one came from the same place. A commitment to doing this right for the people who showed up.
I'm happy with how it turned out. Genuinely happy.
Business owners will always be the ones who show up for each other. That's what Northbound is built on.
If you were there as a merchant or as a customer, I hope we gave you something worth coming back for.
Round two is coming. Follow Northbound PH for the journey and follow this page if you believe the MSME community is worth betting on. 🙏
