The Philippines Coffee scene is sky rocketing right now, and we're happy to see so many becoming part of Loyverse POS' online entrepreneur ecosystem. We Spoke with Raymon from Bretz Cafe in the Metro of Manila and heard how his café ambitions have led him to becoming more responsible for his community. Text and full video interview below!

Please describe your business, explaining about your local community, why you started, and your plans to achieve success.

Bretz Café is the first of its kind, Sydney-vibe small hole-in-the-wall type of cafe in Makati, the central business district area of the Philippines. Tucked less than 30 minutes from the busy hustle and bustle environment sits this local family-owned venture. A few blocks away from a secondary school, government university, and along one of the major thoroughfares, Bretz is making its mark in the local scene.

It is housed by a small space which used to be an Internet shop, the domicile has been transformed to what is now known as a cosy but affordable food and beverage shop that caters for students, professionals, and locals alike.

Bretz opened in July 2016 and is committed to bring a different kind of vibe in the area. Usually the choices for the community are cafeterias offering local dishes, local/international fastfood chains, global cafe brands, etc., which is catered to higher social classes. Now comes Bretz, with its initial objective to shake up the area, which is actually a pun, as our pioneer offering are FREAKSHAKES, which was popularized by a local cafe in Canberra, Australia.

Knowing its responsibility to give back to the community due to its support since its opening, Bretz has been a part of various non-profit activity such as feeding a hundred street children for Christmas. These social givings will continue with unwavering support from local groups and organizations.

How did you find Loyverse POS and why would you recommend Loyverse POS to other similar retailers?

As with any startup businesses, the challenge is to have a reliable sales tracker/POS for cafe that is easy to use and implement across people with different technology exposure. Several apps have been tested - mostly offering its trial version with very limited capabilities until subscription is paid. Due to the nature of business, these subscriptions are not feasible. Not until Loyverse was discovered - a free POS system with full functionality. This enabled Bretz to do parallel testing with its current manual process and Loyverse POS. In less than three days, the staff has been familiar as to how easy it is to use and amazed with the e-receipt functionality - definitely a first-of-its-kind offering in the community.

Given the designation as the Online Promotions and Social Media Manager role which is based overseas, Loyverse POS is a vital tool to track which products are in-demand, which time of the day is busiest based on the receipt tracks, and which day is the strongest/weakest to determine the next course of action for promotions.

In hindsight, do you have any advice for similar retailers?

To fellow retailers, do not forget to give back. Giving back to the locals will encourage them to support local businesses and grow the economy in the community by creating new jobs and increasing the value of properties due to live and accessible trading.

Please watch a full interview with Raymon below to grasp more depth in his journey adding to a Philippines coffee industry that is now making an influence on street corner's everywhere.