06/03/2025
Starting March 2025, all 60+ tours will be offered for FREE on YouTube and the izi.TRAVEL app.
Starting March 2025, all 60+ tours in Filipino will be offered for FREE on YouTube and the izi.TRAVEL app.
(Disclaimer: This is a long post.)
While last year’s stats showed a 500% increase in downloads, they also showed one striking fact: that a lot of these downloads came from people living overseas.
While the stats showed us that we were able to showcase the diversity of our country, these also showed us that we were defeating the purpose of making these tours accessible to more Filipinos no matter how affordable the tours were already priced, which was a one-time fee of PHP 49 to 99 (less than USD 2).
In reality, the issue was less about pricing and more about accessibility.
To make any purchase on a smartphone, we need to register our card or any other payment method. How can we expect accessibility when a survey* showed that in the first quarter of 2024, a little over 13.9 million credit cards were used in a population of over 119 million? That’s a mere 12% of the population**.
Even with good intentions, little did we know that we were only reaching 12% within our country.
So to address this accessibility issue, we will be offering all our 60+ tours in Filipino for FREE. Please bear with us as we slowly, but very surely, reproduce each tour in the local language.
Here’s to more places, communities, and stories that we will all discover together!
Your Friend on Foot,
Raizel of Anthro on Foot
NOTES:
*Credit card 101: How does it work, and which one is for you? https://shorturl.at/EioRt
**We are definitely reaching fewer people. The 12% figure is only based on the number of credit cards used which does not take into account the actual number of people owning several credit cards. Not to mention that other online payment options are used, such as debit cards and mobile wallets, such as GCash. And while a report^ shows that there were over 90 million GCash users in 2023, we highly doubt that a majority of these users would load up their GCash just to link it up with their phone’s App/Play Store.
^Philippine e-wallet GCash eyes evolution into all-in-one financial app https://shorturl.at/SjqxR
TRANSITION SHOUTOUT:
On behalf of Anthro on Foot, I would also like to take this opportunity to thank our earliest supporters who lent their time and support in helping us refine our project and amplify our vision.
Thank you to our hardworking team: Aika Henson-Albano, Aly Pineda, Chloe Sazon, Hannah Contillo, Macy Pabustan, Renrich Albano, and Robertine Gozun.
Thank you for sharing your time and resources with us: DIWA Learning Services, Inc., Eighty Eight Hotel Koronadal, Heritage Philippines, Holy Trinity College of General Santos City, HotBox, LBS Bakeshop Sto. Rosario Angeles City, Office of the Vice Mayor of Vintar – Hon. Maribel Albano, M.D., PinkPunk Creations, and Q Citipark Hotel GenSan. A special shoutout to our very first sponsor, Heritage Philippines!
Thank you for featuring us: ABS-CBN, Amazing Earth Ph for GMA Network, ANC Conversations, ANC Headstart, Art 2 Art with Lisa Macuja Elizalde, CLTV36, CNN Philippines, Cosmopolitan Philippines, Filipina on the Rise, INQUIRER.net, Philippine Star, PhilSTAR Life, Radio Pilipinas Dos, Smile Magazine for Cebu Pacific, Southeast Asian Archaeology, spot.ph, Tatler Philippines, Teleradyo Serbisyo, The Global Filipino Magazine, UNESCO-Philippine National Commission, and University of the Philippines.
Thank you for recognizing the potential of our project: the US Department of State under its Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative (YSEALI) Program, and the World Heritage Institute of Training and Research for the Asia and the Pacific Region under the auspices of UNESCO.
Thank you for the endless confidence and support: my daughter, parents, siblings, sister-in-law, nephews and nieces, grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins, extended families, friends, and newfound friends and communities whom I had the honor of meeting through this project.
Ultimately, my biggest gratitude to God, in whatever form people believe You to be. Thank You for the gift of surrendering to You ❤️
FIND OUR WORK ON:
izi.TRAVEL app: https://izi.travel/en/9373-anthro-foot-c/en
Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/anthroonfootph
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com//podcasts
Again, thank you for joining us on this walking journey. Let's keep on walking ❤️
