Chennai: TK Chandiran, MD, The Chennai Silks & Sri Kumaran Thanga Maligai elaborated his journey as an employee in the Indian Postal department to building a multi-crore retail brand at the 3rd edition of Medianews4u Straight Talk.
Chandiran spoke on the humble beginnings of the brand and how from a single shop they have gone on to open 25 stores in different parts of the country.
“We have started our business with strong human resources. I spent my early days working as a government servant for the BSNL at a Rs 500 salary. Slowly gathered money and started the business with a seed capital of 3-4 lakhs. Now, we have about 25 stores of Chennai Silks across Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Our manufacturing activities provide employment to people in and around the areas,” Chandiran said.
On Challenges
Speaking on the challenges, Chandiran mentioned how they learnt the importance of store location for business to flourish in the year 2001. They experienced setbacks when their store was located in a remote place at Madurai. Learning how important it is to be connected to people, all their stores are now located at prime localities accessible to customers. Also, as a first graduate in the family, it was challenging to build such a huge textile company as financial literacy was lacking. But now the next generation in his family are well educated from top B-schools in the world and their knowledge of the business is quite different and profitable.
Green energy way to green future:
According to him, acceptance of green energy in the market is growing. Today the share value is Rs.1000 per share compared to Rs 320 back when he invested. “Corona gave us all a good lesson to treat mother nature well. Therefore, it is very important to be socially conscious as a company,” he said. Further, he added that great lessons were learnt from the giant conglomerate TATA group. Now, drawing a similar vision to be socially connected like them.
He further spoke on how brands are endorsing the concept of green energy and environment conservation.
The luxury of poverty
The journey of this experienced man explains it all. For a handloom weaver’s son to establish a listed company all it took was the consciousness of business. Along with textiles, they now own the Kumaran Thangamaligai, a 35 stores business of gold and silver.
“Understanding the pulse of the consumers has played a key role in the growth of our ventures,” Chandiran concluded.
