Meet the entrepreneurs taking their family legacy businesses to new avenues: top SMB stories of the week
This week, SMBStory spoke to entrepreneurs who have taken their family businesses to new avenues, a step ahead in building a family legacy, and other top stories of the week.
Staying relevant is the key to the success of any business. Especially for the decades-old established family organisations who have to be on a constant lookout to discover the next scaling-up plan.
This week, SMBStory spoke to entrepreneurs who have taken their family businesses to new avenues, a step ahead in building a family legacy, and other top stories of the week.
Dhruv Sayani, KT Professionals
For thirty-two-year-old Dhruv Sayani, joining his family business of comb manufacturing—running for five decades—came as a great opportunity, but one that entailed huge responsibilities.
In 2012, when he joined Crystal Plastics and Metallizing Pvt Ltd as a third-generation entrepreneur, he was faced with that fundamental question — what next? He ideated upon launching a haircare brand, KT Professional, to solve the rising problem of hair loss and thinning among urban customers.
Given the stiff competition from established players, the road ahead was tough. However, the backing of an established parent company, also an extension of the same industry, helped.
Founded in 2016 in Mumbai, , in six years, has expanded to 86 cities, 27,000 salons, and is present in more than 18 online platforms with 120 products in its kitty.
Jigar Gangar, Gangar Eyenation
According to Mordor Intelligence, the COVID-19 pandemic had a devastating impact on the global eyewear market. Disruption in the value chain, workforce loss, raw materials (lens materials, frame materials, polishing materials), trade, and more brought a lot of uncertainty within this sector.
Mumbai-based eyewear company is one such brand. SMBStory speaks to its Director, Jigar Gangar, whose father Champak Gangar and uncle Surendra Gangar started the company in 1977.
Gangar Eyenation is into retailing of spectacles, frames, lenses, contact lenses, sunglasses, etc., and is an official distributor of international eyewear names like Bentley, Mont Blanc, Gucci, Armani, Tommy Hilfiger, etc.
Jigar admits the COVID-19 pandemic had a catastrophic impact on the company, with its revenue plummeting enormously. The numbers almost halved in FY21 (Rs 59.34 crore) compared to FY20 (Rs 109.55 crore).
Jigar says that they kept in touch with customers constantly who would call them whenever they wanted to visit the stores. “We would tell them that it might take longer to get their spectacles made. Some of our customers had been visiting us for very long, so they understood our position and waited patiently,” Jigar says.
Despite many companies pivoting to D2C even before the pandemic, he adds that Gangar Eyenation will primarily focus on digitally enhancing its stores while tapping into the Tier II and III markets, where he feels the penetration of quality eye care services is limited.
Prod him on the popularity of D2C brands and the ease of ordering eyewear from home, Jigar says he has seen ample examples of people buying online and then coming to his stores to get the glasses fixed according to the customer’s face size.
Other top picks of the week:
MSMEs concerns over global market uncertainties
The mood at Dalal Street has been sombre for most parts of 2022.
The COVID-19 pandemic, a bearish stock market, the Ukraine-Russia crisis, devaluation of the rupee, and high inflation have added to the woes of businesses and investors.
Earlier in April, the wholesale inflation touched a nine-month high of 15.08 percent, while the retail inflation surged to an eight-year high at 7.79 percent, with prices of certain raw materials rising between 40 and 100 percent in the last year.
In its forecast for FY 2023, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has averaged inflation to stand at 5.7 percent, slightly lower (6.2 percent) than what economists in a Bloomberg survey forecasted.
Time and again, micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) have proved their resilience, and SMBStory reached out to ecosystem stakeholders to understand how they are coping with the current market uncertainties.
Edited by Suman Singh
