10 Things to Know about Mark Sampelo, Co-Founder of Lone star Palengke

Written By Nico Belasco

Mark Sampelo is a passionate community builder and co-founder of Lone Star Palengke vendor fair in the Dallas-Fort Worh area in Texas who finds joy in amplifying the Filipino American presence in his area. With all of the hats that he has worn, Mark has made it his mission to bring kababayan spirit to Texas, in order to connect with one another and celebrate their rich culture. We’ve put together a few fun facts about Mark and all of his efforts to strengthen the Filipino community in Texas. Let’s get to know this driven leader, who’s a force to be reckoned with.

1. He moved to the United States when he was very young, like many young immigrants.

Mark was born in the Philippines to two loving parents, who worked as OFWs (Overseas Filipino Workers) who met in Saudi Arabia. For the first five years of his life, Mark grew up in Cavite and Sariaya, Quezon with his Lolo, Lola, and his mom’s siblings. A year after his parents immigrated, Mark was flown to the US with family to join his mom and dad. His first question, fresh off the plane, was “Is there Jollibee here?”. 

Transitioning to the United States was tough for Mark. For the first year, he did not talk, despite his ability to understand and speak English. Because of this, he was placed in ESOL (English as a secondary language). Within time, he started getting comfortable and everyone around him was shocked to find that he knew how to communicate with them all along. 

2. He was one of 3 Filipinos in his high school.

Growing up as a Filipino in America, Mark had a lot of cultural differences from his friends. He was one of three Filipinos in a predominantly white high school that had a ratio of about 25% of the school consisting of minorities. Mark was a cultural chameleon, taking part in chess, track, football, basketball, and an honor student. With all of the hats that he wore, there were many moments where he was looked at differently for his cultural background and tendencies. Despite this, Mark took pride in his roots. He loved bringing his adobo and dinuguan to school for lunch. 

Mark overlooked the differences that he and his friends had and found joy in focusing on the ways that they were connected. In an interesting way, this helped him understand himself better.
“I learned that we probably won’t agree on everything, but there is something that we could connect to. I found out that there is a word for that, and it’s rooted in our heritage. It’s Kapwa,” he shared.

3. He broke the mold and chose his own path in college.

As with many Filipinos going into college, Mark was pointed in a direction that made sense to his parents. After graduating high school, he wasn’t entirely sure what he wanted to do in college. When his best friend mentioned that he was taking up Biomedical Engineering, Mark decided to go down that path as well. It was the perfect fit for him as it touched on the fields of medical and engineering, both of which were fields his parents were involved in. However, after a year he realized it wasn’t for him. 

Mark was determined to switch majors. Initially, he wanted to be an architect, but his parents did not support it because it would cost too much. He then sought out to pursue business instead. Mark put his foot down and knew had to make the decision for himself. So, he did. 

4. He was the president of FSA (Filipino Student Association).

In his senior year of college, he became the president of FSA, Filipino Student Association. Mark had to overcome personal battles with stage fright and anxiety, but in the end he was able to power through. Mark brought so many students closer to their roots. 

Throughout his time as a leader, he organized cultural parties and events. He shifted the culture of the association and came up with fun ways to educate members of the rich history that our ancestors held through cultural time, storytelling, cultural dance displays, and more. The hustle and bustle of organizing everything for the association brought Mark closer to being Filipino and taking pride in where he came from. “It solidified in me the values that I have. When I enter spaces, I want to leave them better than when I first stepped in. Because if you are just going in and consuming, how are you making a difference?” recalled Mark.

5. He founded UniPro Texas with his friends 

About one year after graduating from college, Mark set off another exciting venture: starting UniPro Texas. It all started when Mark was scrolling through Facebook one day and came across a post by one of his friends. It read, “If you are wanting to be more involved in the community, like and comment on this.” Twelve people engaged on the post. They were then placed in a group chat and started getting the ball rolling. 

Three months in, Mark became co-president with Rea Sampilo. Together, they started implementing programs and being the change that they wanted to see in college. Their team consisted of people from all walks of life. They had a scientist, a reporter for NBC, masters in performance studies, entrepreneurs, marketing professionals, all coming together to create something beautiful. They held many workshops that focused on different aspects of the diaspora and what it truly meant to be Filipino American. In addition to this, Mark, Rea, and their powerful team organized events like leadership retreats and 5-course meal events and gatherings that gave members of the community safe spaces to bridge the intergenerational gap and connect with one another over their shared love of being Filipino. 

6. He is a financial advisor during the day.

While passing on the torch to the next set of leaders of UniPro Texas, Mark worked in analytics for a startup company, dealing with data. “I would finish everything at 12PM. Then the rest of the day I would do Unipro stuff. During my time, I helped bring in about $60,000 in grants. Because of the relationships I helped cultivate,  Unipro Texas was able to get $200,000 in grants. I bring up the financial side because it goes into my next chapter. After I got laid off, I went soul searching,” he mentioned.

After about three months of struggling with unemployment, Mark connected with his friend who had invited him out for lunch to go over his financial plan. His friend mentioned to him that he should apply for his firm. Ultimately, Mark was welcomed into the firm and is now flying high as a financial advisor. Upon walking in on his first day, he found that he was the only Filipino out of more than 300 advisors, with 2 other asian counterparts. In his first year, Mark ended up being in the top 3%, serving over 120 families across the United States in places like California, Seattle, Chicago, New York, and so much more. While he is the only Filipino in the room a lot of the time, he finds motivation in raising our flag high and educating our people and others to be financially responsible. 

7. He started an initiative to document and collect Filipino memories.

Mark finds joy in working with Filipino American National Historical Society (FANHS) in Houston and connecting with trailblazers who do amazing things in their respective fields. 

He and Chelsea Battad, the current president of UniPro Texas, started interviewing and collecting photographs of fellow Filipinos so that they could start archiving and commemorating stories of leaders before they are gone. 

8. He is a co-founder of Lone Star Palengke.

Mark was one of the leaders in the recently concluded Lone Star Palengke, DFW’s Annual Filipino Market. The event aimed to promote small businesses, support local entertainers and celebrate the presence of Filipinos in Texas. 

Despite the heat, Filipinos traveled from far and wide to join in on the festivities. At the start of the planning phase for the big event, they received a bit of mixed emotions from people. However, they didn’t let that stop them. “We didn’t let their words affect our ability to make a difference. When they said we would only get ten vendors, by the time we got to the event we had over 120 vendors, non-profits, and performers. They said we’d be lucky to have 500 attendees, we had 7,000. We learned that anything worth doing is going to be difficult. There’s always going to be hurdles and people telling you no. But with faith, hard work and perseverance, it gave us a lot of hope. It affirmed the plans that we had.”

9. He was selected to represent the Dallas Network office for Northwestern Mutual’s 276th Class of Fastrack Academy.

The Fastrack Academy is an 84-year-old Northwestern Mutual tradition. Financial representatives that attend are selected based on meeting production qualifications and endorsement from their managing partner. Through the academy, attendees take part in an interactive forum that aims to foster professional growth. 

“Each class consists of 60 Leading Advisors under 5 years in the business from all over the US out of over 6,000+ Advisors in our Firm. We were flown into our HQ in Milwaukee to experience growth, deep introspection, and pursuit of our goals. Thank you Tait Cruse, Chris Cruz, and Bren Reynolds for this opportunity. I’m a first generation immigrant working to bring Financial literacy & wellness to my communities. I’m dedicated to bring multigenerational wealth to families and uplift our local minority businesses & community organizations,” mentioned Mark in an Instagram post. 

10. He plans on opening a Filipino Community Center in Dallas.

Mark and his team have plans to open a Filipino Community Center. Unfortunately, Dallas does not have a space for Filipinos to convene and support one another at this time. Mark has made it his mission to raise funds to change this. Their goal is to raise $2.2 million to lock in the land and their eventual goal is $22 million to build and create the space. 

“For us it’s continuing to uplift. There’s a lot of growing pains. We’re not perfect. But we welcome everyone in. All of this isn’t possible without everyone’s unique skill set. One thing I always say is that right now there isn’t a table for us to sit at in DFW. Before we run out of space, before private hedge funds and investors by out all the land, we need to make sure that any Filipino American or kaibigan of the community, whenever they’re here they know that we’re present and we have a place to call our own, before time runs out,” mentioned Mark. 

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Written By Nico Belasco

Photographer, Writer, Speaker, Podcast Host, Creative

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