Japanese ice cream shop to open 2 more stores

AFTER opening his first branch in Davao City at SM City Davao last week, the owner of the Japanese ice cream shop announced that two more stores will be opened soon, one at SM Lanang Premiere and another one at Centrio Mall in Cagayan de Oro City.

Nowie Potenciano, owner of Mochiko Potenciano, said their first store in Mindanao was opened just last week to introduce an ice cream delicacy that is new to the country.

Potenciano said they decided to open stores in Mindanao upon receiving many requests from both Davao and Cagayan de Oro markets, which had tasted their product.

The soon-to-be opened branch at SM Lanang Premiere will be much bigger than that of their branch in SM City in Ecoland, according to Potenciano.

"This one (SM City branch) is a counter while at SM Premiere Lanang will be an in-line store," he said.

The company invested around P600,000 for the branches at the two SM malls in the city.

The Davao branch, Potenciano said, is supplied with mochis straight from Metro Manila.

Mochi is a traditional dessert from Japan, but it is different from commercialized ice cream available in the market since it is made from premium fresh milk.

Mochi, an ice cream wrapped with sticky rice, comes with 16 different flavors with its top-sellers as Oreo and Milk and Cookie Dough.

He said the sticky rice coating helps sustain the ice cream frozen, which takes about 45 minutes before it melts.

Given the longer period before the ice cream melts, Potenciano said customer can conveniently bring orders to home.

"We develop the products entirely by ourselves," he said.

Mochi is also famous in Shanghai, Singapore, and Bangkok aside from Japan.

"We saw it in Japan and we thought we should bring it here," Potenciano said.

Right now, Mochiko has eight branches nationwide and present in key areas Makati City, Metro Manila, Taguig City, Quezon City, Muntinlupa City, Tagaytay and Cebu City. Mochiko will also open its second branch in Cebu next week.

Potenciano said they introduced mochi in the Philippines in September 2010 in Tagaytay City and the forim has since expanded to other areas in the country.

"We're happy with the response (of the Dabawenyos) so far," he said.
Asked if they accept franchise, Potenciano said they want to make their stores stable first, making sure that the premium quality of the products is maintained.

He said Dabawemyos can also expect more flavors of mochis in the coming months.