Managing with seasonal income flow differences
Rice farmer, Iloilo Province, The Philippines, February 22nd 2009 Roger is the eldest of a family of seven. When he was 13 years old, he would watch his parents work hard in the fields as casual labour during the rice planting season to earn enough money to feed, clothe and educate him and his siblings. […]
Creativity goes hand in hand with entreprenuership
Furniture designer & artisan, Iloilo Province, February 24th 2009 Jesse is just 30 years old. A year ago, he sold his motorcycle to obtain the working capital to start his own handmade furniture design workshop, here on the main road. He pays 300 pesos a month to rent this highly visible location and lives onsite. […]
Using Ethnographic Research To Learn About Life at the BoP
The expected deliverable of the iBoP Asia grant project is that we create a new payment strategy or business model for purchasing a shared resource within a Bottom of the Pyramid (BoP) community. Recognizing that no member of our research team has grown up in a community considered to be at the BoP, we can’t […]
There can be no shortcuts at the BoP
This is not meant to be a complaint about any one organization so much as an observation made by happenstance while in the field. As written about earlier, my hostess in provincial Philippines is a micro entreprenuer running a small village shop which she started with the support of a loan meant to empower women […]
Review of the informal economy and its connection to the BoP
By seeking to understand how people manage their household expenses when living on irregular and unpredictable incomes, my naive assumptions at the start of this enterprise (the iBoP Project is only the first step, this broad area of business models designed for irregular income streams is very likely to evolve into a dusty dissertation somewhere) […]
Original abstract for research project
Whether its schemes like microfinance, loans to small business owners or even the opportunity to purchase a large consumer durable for the home using micropayments over time, organizations wishing to serve those at the bottom of the pyramid must design effective business models and payment programs that can meet the needs of their customers. The […]
Stories from Malawi: how to barter your phone for 4 goats
Photo credit: John Lumbe, Malawi, March 2009 John Lumbe reports on how the barter system works in his home region in Malawi: It has never been simple to determine the trade. It mostly goes with agreement of the parties entering the contract. Like the one I talked about in my blog post, happened in the […]
Inspired by pay as you go fresh water
Gines Patag, The Philippines, February 21st, 2009 Right after my recent post where I wondered if business models and payment plans for those who live on irregular and unpredictable incomes could be designed to be as adaptable and flexible as the informal economy, I came across this snippet today that gives much food for […]
Alejandro builds a house
Alejandro starts early in the morning, February 20th, 2009 Alejandro used to work as a security guard in a wellknown company in the city until his youngest daughter was weaned. Then his wife left for Abu Dhabi to work in domestic service and, in a way, so did Alejandro, choosing to stay home to look […]
Village shops: Malawi and The Phillippines
John Lumbe has begun sending in reports from Malawi after speaking with various small business owners. While I'll start getting them organized and published soon, here is something that caught my eye, even as I was going through my own photographs from my fieldwork in the Filipino barangay. Just look at both shops. photo credit: […]
