Sean: What are your top investments during the pandemic?

Marvin: Your top investments, pandemic, no pandemic, good economy, bad economy, should always be the same. That should not change because your skill set for it should be the same. good economy or bad economy. So what works for you when things are good should also be the ones that will work for you when things are bad. Because that’s where you’re used to.

Sean: It was great, right? The one Marvin said, which is, same. What you're investing in, your top investments, pre-pandemic should be the same during the pandemic.

Marvin: Yes. Because it didn’t change, I’m still into stocks. It’s just that, your style, JC is right, it’s about pivoting.

Are you familiar with Josiah Go? I think he's one of the best marketing minds in the country. He said the same, if you lose everything, you also start with what you’re great at. Because it doesn't make sense to start something from zero, whereas, with the one you’re doing right now, the only thing that’s gone is the money. But your experience and skills are still there, unless your business is disrupted by the technology. Like if your business is an answering machine, something like that. Totally you have to really pivot off of that. That’s it. That’s my answer to it. I hope it was something.   

JC: To add to what Marv said about pivoting, because the question was about your investment during the pandemic and how do you adjust. Somehow, I’m thinking that’s the mindset. We tried to pivot our business in different aspects based on the different strengths that we had. Like what Marvin said, you focus on your strengths.

And then we realized that we have to pivot but still within the core of your strengths. So we tried to assess, and it's still the same. We didn't change our market.

So it’s still about pivoting to your strengths and if you’re going to invest in something, it should still be something that you know. It’s not about you, starting from scratch just because facemask is a trend that you’re going to invest in there. It doesn’t work that way.

So I still looked at the strength of our main core competency, which is food and all of that. And we focused there. So you’re not just going to invest because it’s the trend. That’s also what I learned during this pandemic.

Marvin: I was talking to Bo Sachez, I asked what his biggest mistake was in business. It’s also like that. He started businesses that he didn’t like and he was not good at. So he had failed businesses before. He opened up a fishball business, food cart business then he realized that it was not something he likes to do. So you will ultimately go back to what you like doing the most. I think that’s how, it will always go back to what you like doing, what you’re good at, and what makes you also happy.

But it’s true that you can also do things that do not make you happy, but in the second year, third year, and you’re still not happy, then why are you still doing it? Right? For me, I’d rather earn less, doing something that I like, than earn more, doing something that I don’t like.

JC: Also in times of, during a pandemic, you know, what type of investments will you deviate to or pivot? For me, that's something that you are known for. So at the end of the day, it was not hard for us to penetrate corporate accounts because we know them. It's just a different product. So if it's about investing in the pandemic and things, it’s like, you stick to your core if you're a business owner, and then you just try to see what are the different, new opportunities there. Because, definitely, there's another way to look at things. There's another market who will need your product. And there's something that you can offer that nobody else has.

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