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| N.Ravikumar, Chairman & MD, Consumer Protection and Guidance Company, Ernakulam |
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It was a minor incident at a local restaurant that propelled a small time electronic equipments service shop owner, N.Ravikumar, to the chief of company with a turnover of Rs.500 crores in 10 years.
He had asked for a second helping of an onion-based curry for lunch, which the owner of the shop refused as the cost of onion had risen steeply to Rs.9 per kilo. A few days later he encountered street vendors selling the same product in Chennai for Rs.2 a kilo.
This set him thinking and the result of it is the Margin Free chain of stores, selling products much below the Maximum Retail Price. With the aim of buying products from their place of manufacture / production, The Consumer Protection and Guidance Society was registered in 1993. And in 1994, the 1st Margin Free shop under the ownership of Ravikumar and the guidance of the society started functioning at Pazhavangadi, Thiruvananthapuram.
The next 4 years were devoted to market surveys. They surveyed the production centers and the buying patterns without adding even a single branch to the shop at Pazhavangadi. But after 4 years, when the expansion began, it really opened the floodgates.
Starting with the 2nd shop at Ernakulam, the chain soon expanded to 277 shops including 11 in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. With this he is able to return 40 to 60 per cent or Rs.20 crores per year to the consumers.
As the shops increased in number, they were brought under a limited company with Ravikumar as the Chairman and Managing Director. While the company goes ahead with expansion into direct marketing and other schemes, 58-year-old Ravikumar is even thinking of starting a old age home at Pallippuram, Thiruvananthapuram at a cost of Rs.1.5 crores.
Courtesy: S.Santhosh, Mathrubhumi, September 29, 2003
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