FIVE YEARS of AutoPH: Born out of love for anything with wheels
It has apparently been five years since me and my bestfriend thought of the idea of creating a YouTube channel dedicated to things with wheels. We were in our fourth year of trying to complete our Architecture degree at that time.
I totally lost track and forgot that April 1, 2023, 42 days ago from the date I’m publishing this, marked the fifth year of AutoPH’s existence. That day, I was enjoying myself walking around the busy shopping streets of Seoul, South Korea during a trip for the 2023 Seoul Mobility Show with Hyundai Motor Philippines, something I thought I would never experience.
As a young boy, I loved cars. My grandparents would brag to their friends that I could memorize and tell a car model just from seeing its features and design elements. I had car magazine collections from our country’s top publishers, and eventually would watch car reviews on the internet during my spare time. Who knew that decades later, I would be working in an industry that involves them.
From talking to car dealership agents and managers, to now talking to people from car and motorcycle brands themselves, there were many challenges to go through to reach this point. Some thought starting a new motoring publication from scratch is impossible, much more for someone at my age (I’m turning 26 soon). Of course, we had to learn how to properly write and produce car reviews and industry-related news, especially with our completely unrelated college degrees.
Worse, some people who supposedly should be the most supportive in my chosen path are sceptical and continue to attempt to stop me from doing this. Some people who have greatly contributed to AutoPH’s existence we unfortunately had to cut-off as well. Eventually we try to make it all work out.
In all honesty, the COVID-19 pandemic seems to have been a blessing in disguise for us as many people, with nothing better to do, stayed online, watching YouTube and TikTok videos, scrolling through Facebook and Instagram, and looking at various websites, all of which were being used by us. This gave us the growth we needed and brought us to where we are now.
From filming display units in car dealerships, to now borrowing weekly various test drive units from different brands available in our market, we’ve definitely gone a long way. The challenge now is to keep it going as growth slows down for us, especially with less people staying online to see our content.
We did it for five years, we’ll do it for more. I am so excited for what else we have to offer in the future. I would like to thank all our brand partners, subscribers and readers, as well as everyone for the opportunity to be doing this.
