Gemima

Loan description:

Gemima Bediot is 31 years old and married with three young children. She manages a small general convenience store in the area of Media Once, Toledo City in Cebu. Her greatest difficulty is balancing family and business. She cannot afford not to work, so the ideal solution seems to be running her business from home. However, small general convenience or 'sari-sari' stores are quite common and she does face competition. Nevertheless, Gemima has managed to attract and maintain a regular set of customers by always having a variety of household goods such as canned foods, snacks, soft drinks, household cleaning products and even kitchen supplies. She has sought a new loan from the microfinance organisation Lamac Multi Purpose Cooperative to buy new stock. it is a short term loan to be repaid over just three months. One of the problems she faces is that because she has so much variety she can only stock a relatively small number of products of each because of the limited size of her shop and also limited capital she possesses. Therefore, she regularly replenishes her stock. Loans are used as working capital. Her aim is to improve her business facilities so that she offer more to customers and earn enough to ensure her children receive a good education.