THEY say one must think hard if you plan to do business with friends because you can end up losing one or worse, both.
However, these four inspiring couples have bravely defied the odds. For them, friendship and business can mix well with the right dynamics and a dead-aim meaningful goal.
Meet Architects Rene and Sylvia Rieta; Joey and Joy Mempin; Richard and Monique Villanueva; and Vic and Fe Rosario.
“The eight of us found each other in Gawad Kalinga, or what we fondly call GK. The four husbands played different roles in the nation-building movement, either as full-time employees or staunch volunteers. The four wives naturally gravitated towards each other as our spouses had shared advocacy. Over time, the work transitioned into camaraderie, and naturally evolved into a deep bond of friendship, as we discovered our shared values on family, work, and our life’s purpose,” says Monique.
In 2009, the daughters of GK founder Tony Meloto, Anna Meloto-Wilk with husband Dylan Wilk, and Camille Meloto-Rodriguez, invited the group to be the Davao distributor of Human Nature, which at that time was a virtually unknown Filipino brand of natural personal care products. The idea was to boldly transform how Filipinos do business, where profit is defined not only as an excess of revenues over expenses but also measured by how an enterprise changes the lives of the people it touches - its employees, customers, suppliers, and owners.
“In other words, we were going to use the GK template, but in a commercial setting. Given our backgrounds, it did not take much time and convincing for us to say yes to pioneer the GK social enterprise in Davao City. Fourteen years later, we are one of the biggest and most successful Human Nature branches in the country,” Monique proudly shares.
Social synergy
According to Monique, “the upsides of friends doing business together are:
Many shoulders carry the burden. It is a heartwarming relief to know that you are not alone in overcoming the day-to-day or extraordinary challenges of the business. A burden shared with people you love and care for lightens the load.
Synergy. As many as there are friends in the business, so are the available resources, talents, and collective experiences that contribute to the success of a business.
We can go bar hopping, take a road trip, or do a beach outing, and still call it a “business meeting”.
There is a potential to grow both the personal and business relationship. Done right, navigating through a business together strengthens friendships. Strong friendships become a well of positive energy that can be channeled into new and exciting endeavors, such as a second or third business. In short, there is a cycle of productivity in business partnerships among friends.
Shared passion. All eight of us found each other in the mission of nation-building. By ourselves, the task would have been so daunting that we would not know where to begin. But together, knowing that we have each other’s backs, we find the boldness and fearlessness to dream and do big things for our country.”
odging pitfalls
Monique continues that “over the course of fourteen years, they have managed to avoid a couple of pitfalls in their business by constantly reminding themselves to:
Argue but do not quarrel. We have lost count of the number of times we have had differences of opinion in our doing business. But we train ourselves to not take these differences to a personal level. And when it cannot be helped, at least one of us finds a reason to gather, in a “strictly no shop talk” get-together. And that is when we realize that our friendship is older than and must outlive our business.
Create boundaries and respect them. By virtue of the skill, experience, and resources that we bring to the table, we all recognize each other’s areas of expertise. We intentionally do not encroach on our respective “territories” to avoid conflict.
Pray. One of the blessings of the pandemic to our friendship is that we found ourselves virtually coming together every weeknight at 8:30 pm to pray – for our planet, for our nation, for our families, for each other.”
Cheers to friendship
And given their proof of concept that friends can get into business together, the group has just incorporated themselves, this time as The 8:30 Group, Inc., to open Wine World, Davao City’s first wine bar with a 24/7 airconditioned walk-in wine cellar.
“Just like Human Nature, we established Wine World as we were finding ways to sustain our annual “Noche Buena Mo, Sagot Mo”, or NBMSM, a Christmas Project which was born in the early months of the pandemic. After two successful years, we anticipated that donor fatigue would eventually take over the donation-driven project. So, beginning this year, a part of Wine World’s income will go to continuing NBMSM,” explains Monique.
“Why are we still the best of friends after all our years in business? The answer that comes to mind is that money was never the primary motivating factor for us, which we feel is the downfall of many business endeavors among friends. All eight of us have our so-called day jobs where we are individually blessed, and our businesses are the avenues for paying forward, for sharing what we have so generously been given, and for making a difference. In today’s lingo, Human Nature and Wine World are our side hustles with a heart,” she reflects.
For friends who are thinking of going into business together, Monique has this valuable advice: “After finding and agreeing on the common passion that you can translate into an enterprise, always remember that it is friendship first, business second,” Monique stresses.
Well, we’ll drink to that. Cheers to these friends with biz-nefits!