Vidya and Nithya were interested in making jewellery. I was not sure how committed they would be, in doing it if it takes a bigger dimension. From a conservative middle class family, with loads of domestic chores naturally, I was not sure whether they would be interested to take it up to the next level, if I could help them leverage it.
Despite the limitations by means of time and stress, they managed to just blow up my mind with the commitment and interest.
Steve Jobs on Passion and Loving what you do!!!
What Next!!
And post my Vietnam experience; I could sense the need in the market;women needing trendy wear and clutches.
When I was back from Vietnam, Lakshmi and Nithya were, also doing networking well without even realizing what they were doing and the potential of tapping it. There was a wide awareness in the locality (no need to say, things get viral when its all about women and jewelry. Pun intended 😉). They had enquiries not only from the city but also from neighboring cities like Tiruppur and Erode. They started selling custom made designs for people coming from various places and that too in this short span of 20 days. There was almost a bulk order from family’s members for an upcoming marriage of theirs.
Now, that they needed more to produce and more to procure, I helped them procure from Chennai where there were good quality material and at better prices on bulk procurement. The options were also great.
Just by then we came to hear that that an exhibition ‘ Sunday soul Sante’ is to be held at Bangalore the first week of June. That should be the better place to kick-start introducing Vaijayanthi to the professional crowd. We wanted to be there. But it needed more production, better quality, better presentation and needless to say more procurement. We couldn’t think of anything less than 150 pieces to be there in a stall. Else it would be a few strands of hair in the bald.
Despite making almost 7 -10 pieces a day, they couldn’t manage to get in the numbers. We decided to quit and thought there is always a next time and here it is after 3 months.
What do we do next? Procure more, scale –up, but we stuck to the idea of not recruiting any one unless we are at the bottlenecks. The ladies were guided to pool in the money they make, back to procurement with very less support from outside.
The outcome was great, there were almost semi-precious beads everywhere in their room, kids and family members had to adjust timings (that includes me). But the ladies managed to show well, we are still happy.
I helped them with more procurement by importing materials from other countries.
With almost 10 pieces adding up to the rack everyday there were parallel interests in getting to know about this initiative. There were more pages and articles in the www and especially the social media.
They had a paradigm shift in their thoughts. “We need a web presence. We’ll reach out to the world. We’ll have a website for ourselves” (Till date I am not sure whether it is part of my influence that gave them the thought).For them it was a game and for me knowing it better, it was good but needs a strategy by itself. It’s a different ball game.
When I was able to convince them earlier, it was their turn around and they convinced me to use my team to support their initiative. Off course they also promised to pay me back.
Vaijayanthi needed an all exclusive unique collection website. We would position ourselves that way on uniqueness; just inspired by the various signature collections. The idea was to make unique designs wherein every design will not exceed more than one piece, except for few that would be two.
Lakshmi and Nithya had to now bang their heads on the wall. They could make more pieces of same design, but conceiving a design keeping the wide strata of consumer was a real challenge.
Every penny back from Vietnam, few from the family is put in back into production(the ladies didn’t take much from the family, keeping it in store for their subsequent moves and am waiting for that surprise soon with a cheque leaf).
We were also told about an exclusive shopping mela at Coimbatore for the select crowds happening on Aug 30th and 31st. We enrolled our stall there too, only later realizing Coimbatore and Bangalore events are going to be back to back. Yes, ‘Sunday Souls Sante’,the Bangalore event falls on 1st September.
I had to spend more time guiding them on premium packaging methods and materials, labeling and stationaries.
Thanks to my Haritham Team, from mid- July they are building an E-commerce website for Vaiajayanthi. There were less bed time. They were all awake through late nights and weekends. It has been quite a while working like this. In the nights they were just wearing their Tees and at times “Banians”.
Our air conditioners couldn’t help the heat when we always said, “Developers, Developers…’ as Steve Ballmer would do. The only video I liked from this guy.
Man, I like this community, they change the world, and they change it fast. Now they do it for me.
For me personally, it is all from “TheRodinhoods”, understanding, experiencing and acknowledging entrepreneurship. They made me feel good. They made me feel strong. They affirm that I am right when I tap opportunities.
Saying that, this day the 26th Aug 2013, I declare it open it to the world; www.vaijayanthi.in live and from here and from now.
I could hear all your claps and cheers.
Thank You Rodinhooders for being with me always, for guiding me, for supporting me with all your posts and comments. For those Open Houses.
Special thanks to the Sensei.
Please visit our website, post comments, and send me mails, feedbacks, strategies, ideas, warnings.
If you like it Share it and if possible buy from there 😉
Also, I am introducing two new Entrepreneurs to this community for all you support and guidance.
Lakshmi Vasudevan
Nithya Sugumaran