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Wave of enterprise
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The beach is proving to be a safe bet for small businesses. GEETA PADMANABHAN on what makes them tick
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BUSINESS BINGE Entrepreneurs are all set to attract beach-goers. (Below) Sevai on wheels and herbal drinks for joggers PHOTOS: N. SRIDHARAN
Their business model may not find mention in B-School texts. Talk of supply chain, six sigma, bottom line and market cap, you'll likely get a "Huh?" from them. What they did before opening a business could be written on an A4 sheet with enough space left to calculate profits. A shot at their B-plan would go like this.
Rental for premises: It's free-space marketing except when the fuzz demands a price.
Shop floor: A rickety wooden structure strong enough to hold the stove and stock. Or a low wall space you grab on a first-come basis. If you're up-market, open the cleared-up boot of your car.
Timings: Whenever the crowd gathers — generally the pre heat and post heat hours.
Location: Hey, what's the beach for?
These unsung entrepreneurs surveyed the crowds, noted the composition (a.m.: homogeneous, p.m.: mixed), invested the capital, bought the goods and rang in the business. Want a taste of it? Get into comfortable clothes and pull on your sneakers. Jog down Elliots Beach when day is breaking. Be a (paying) guest to a number of small, sunrise enterprises.
Young Murugan pedals down his front loader filled with tender coconut at 6.30 a.m. — just when you've finished pounding the promenade and "Hi-ed" your fellow huffers. What's ten bucks when you're dying of thirst? "A hundred get sold out," admits Murugan, sticking a straw. "I retail coconut water for a couple of shop-owners in Adyar." School? Feel free to interpret his shrug.
Health drinks
For more health potions, walk to Sudharshan Herbal Products spread on a simple table. A cheery Maheshwari standing beside the banner, will measure out coloured, 6-rupees-a-glass extracts from ginger, soya, banana stem, drumstick leaf, herbs or plain Bermuda grass (arugampul). "Made with sophisticated machinery," she assures you, "with no preservatives or colouring agents." In three years she has become part of the dawn brigade, dispensing health tips and info about her self-help group. Pointing to her additional inventory of sprouted cereal, she croons, "Counselling? Body massage? Call me all 365 days!"
If it's Sunday you need to postpone those calls. The Indica has arrived to a swarming welcome from sweatshirts. Even as its rear opens revealing neatly covered silver foil lunch boxes stacked in large baskets, the orders rain in. "It's home-made sevai in three tastes," says a pleased N. V. Kumaraswamy, handing out carry bags to son-in-law Sridhar for distribution and cash collection. "Please write of us as kitchen-stress-relieving people. No one has the time to make this anymore." And why would you? All you need to savour string-hoppers is a pair of sharp elbows. Push `n' snatch is profitable exercise.
For consultant Mridula, ready-to-eat-sevai means a kitchen-free Sunday. "I buy because it's sold from a car not a cart," is hubby Jose's logic. "The business," he nods, "has three important ingredients — location, timing and packaging." Value-adds Shanti, an elderly walker, "The sevai hasn't had a single dissenting vote so far. I buy so I can laze around when I go home."
In a shrewd pre-sales survey, Kumaraswamy first talked to women at temples and then walked into ladies club gatherings to make presentations — about carbohydrates in Coreldraw. "Sridhar designed the sevai machine," he boasts. "It's AS 316 stainless steel, food grade." Oh, hum.
With breakfast behind you, it's time to pick up the day's crime stories from the "paper mart" on the periphery wall. Business is brisk, news analysis hot and the paperboy mutters, "I just take the unsold ones back. No problem." And optimism is what drives the man with the odd-looking machine offering to check your BP and blood sugar for a fee. A few hypochondriacs are tempted but others are too scared to know who they are, healthwise. Anyway, fresh greens are getting downloaded across to keep your health count up.
Kids, target of commerce
At 6 p.m. on the same spot, there is hardly any standing room. Kids are now the target of commerce. Kites and balloons, pinwheels and roasted peanuts, merry-go-rounds and milagai bajjis fill the evening breeze. "Looks like a carnival," says a visitor, biting into an ice-cream cone.
All this doesn't discount the permanent structures across the road. From contemporary arts and cool casuals to used DVDs, the beach is testing ground for every B-idea. Even as one hole-in-the-wall outlet (one sold body jewellery!) closes down, another appears with more exotic ware. But it's food that proves a safe bet. Pushcarts adorned with green chilli or dried fish garlands, corn turning invitingly on its cob in a sparking spit, sone pappdi in tall jars — every venture can count on clientele. After all, an excuse to hang out can be a simple, "How about boiled peanuts on the beach, machi?"
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