A Magic Carpet Ride To Success

I was educated at the Karachi Grammar school and then at Mumbais Cathedral School. I enrolled at Bangalore University to play cricket. But cricket wasnt a viable career option in those days, so I had to give that up.

I started by selling chikan work salwar kameezes. In the early 60s, I embarked on quite a hair-brained scheme I collected hair from temples and saloons and exported it to Korea, where it was turned into wigs! I was also working with my father in the family business of wool grading, which he had set up after we moved to India during Partition.

 

In 1965, I decided to strike out on my own because of professional differences with my father. By this time I had firsthand training in raw wool grading, and knew many wool graders and merchants. I wanted to add value to the raw product use the wool to make carpets and dhurries. Id always loved dhurries and realised that nobody had tapped the potential of this market. There were no restrictions at the time on exporting or travelling abroad, so I decided to export to almost all of Europe, the US, Scandinavian countries and parts of Asia. I was the first Indian to manufacture and export carpets and dhurries.

I drew on the little that I had saved from my hair exporting business and persuaded the banks to give me loans. My staff of five helped with sales and production. The business was set up from the family home in Peddar Road in 1965, but it took four years to get going. I spent a lot of time studying the market, and picking the countries to target.

Putting together research and common sense, I concluded that traditional craftspersons could not be displaced and made to perform in a new environment. Nor was mechanisation the answer. So in 1969, I went to the traditional weaving belt of Badohi, near Varanasi, and bought a few acres of land at very cheap.

After selecting some designs, I had them woven into rugs by the artisans. This is how I still operate I employ not designers, but editors. None of our designs are original, we only modify and edit traditional ones. Initially, they looked horrendous to my untutored eyes; but I found that they were highly appreciated abroad. So I spent four years in Europe building contacts. That investment paid off, and orders from abroad started coming in. In 1974-74, I set up subsidiary plants in Jaipur and Jodhpur.

We hit the big time in 1979, when our sales crossed the one million mark. The rugs and dhurries business was booming and we had lots of orders from Europe and Asia. There were no huge single orders, but I had contracts with a lot of showrooms abroad.

I think what made the difference was making silk upholstery around 1980 it opened up the US market for us. I set up a state-of-the-art silk factory outside Bangalore. And even in those recessionary times, the demand for my products increased. The advertising campaign we ran in the mid-80s helped: Have you ever been touched by silk? It showed the world that we were not simply about dhurries.

Fifteen years ago, I set up the first showroom outside Mumbai in Delhi, in 1982. Since then, we have grown to a total of 9 showrooms in India, one in New York, one in Paris and 80 retail outlets.

The going wasnt always smooth. In 1974 and again in 1985, my Mumbai showroom (which doubled as a warehouse) was hit by the floods. In 1985, it was submerged under six feet of water. Everything was destroyed the dhurries and all my records. We had to redo the showroom, and worked round the clock. The banks refused to honour my cheques. But my business was doing well abroad, so I fell back on that and stepped up production.

I live and work by some simple rules. I know my capability, so I never overtrade. Quality over everything has always been my motto. We make an array of products cushions, quilts, totebags, dhurries, towels, even jewellery bags. We try to provide the best customer service in the industry. For us money is only a reflection on quality: if you offer excellent quality, you get good money for it. So I was careful to plough all profits back into the business.

My advice to budding entrepreneurs would be to follow the same principles. Finally never pass judgements without taking a good, hard look at the facts.

(As told to Geetika Gosain)