Get More for lesser price

The way current economy is heading, that must be what customers are telling themselves as they enter the retail stores
Background: Watched an hour long program regarding WalMart in CNBC and was quite impressed by its history and the legendary Sam Walton. Sam Walton, I believe got to work very early in the morning and so the execs who worked with him. The same legacy is being followed and current day execs also make it quite early to work. Some of the things I liked: The vision of Sam Walton and and his approach to problem solving by involving his colleagues, which also included hourly employees.
Last weekend when I visited WalMart, CNBC story was still fresh in my memory and started comparing the retail industry (in general) and its unique challenges compared to the conventional industries;
a)Retail : Open to the general public -regulars and non-regulars. The challenge is to have an attractive / cost-effective setup. The other industries, example: Manufacturing has a regular set of workers who come in daily and don't expect lot of changes.
b) Merchandise: Retailers should stock seasonal stuff, offer discounts during the major festivals, events, etc. Placement and availability of the merchandise is one of the key factors.
c)Competition: The store is wide open for competitors to walk-in and evaluate the premises and the prices. Manufacturing companies have fewer visitors (except employees) and many processes are confidential
d)Operational excellence: This is the key to achieve higher sales. Some stores are highly efficient in addressing customer questions, providing help and answering questions. One such example: BabiesRUs -
There will be definitely a lot more comparisons ..but will conclude here to qualify for a short blog!

Kaadu Kudure

That's a kannada word, literally translates to forest horse! or wild horse. Well, here is the LINK to watch the song in Youtube. The movie, Kaadukudare was released when we were children and I vaguely remember watching this in the movie theatre. This song especially was a superhit during those days. It was quite a popular dance number too and the one of the most sought after songs in any orchestra those days. The song is shot with very little amount of light ....may be this is a art movie as per my own interpretation. I was always curious about Indian "Art Movies"....Doordarshan (the state owned television channel) played a lot of such movies. Many things common with the art movies;
a) Very limited use of lights ...may be cost cutting measure
b) Few songs or none
c) Strong on the theme, story and no masala ...or commercial frills like flashy dresses
d) Usually cast unpopular or upcoming actors than the existing ones
e) Very poor financial returns. I think there was even a subsidy available from the state to make such movies.
f) Not much fan following and does not reside in public memory for a long time.
Offcourse there are exceptions to the above and these are my own interpretations. I know of famous movie makers and directors who have excelled in art movies and later made classic movies in their lives.
Whatever, thanks to Youtube and the person who uploaded this song. I was tired looking for it in the kannada music portals... Neevu Haadu Keli, Enjoy Madi... ( Hear the song and Enjoy)

Visit India

The long awaited India trip went like a whirlwind and before I could realize, the 3 weeks were over. Account for 3 weeks; The onward and return journey -4 days, US Visa interview at chennai: 2 days. Sick: About 1.5 weeks - both me and my daughter together had health issues, 1 day to my office to collect visa papers, 2 days to fix my apartment door lock! - There you go: very few days left. In that majority of the day time would go away in the traffic jam or the commute between the places. But in all, it was a hectic trip. One satisfaction is that of spending some quality time with family and few friends. There were numerous unfulfilled visits to friends and family, unreturned phone calls.
Bangalore in my eyes:
1. Many services are now available at a phone call . You can order food, groceries, mineral water, cab, ironing, plumbing and electrician services, value added services like telemedicine(call your family doctor). Almost everyone has a cell phone and the "missed calls" are the most effective way of communicating with the known people..
2. The prices of consumer goods and eating at restaurants has become very expensive since the last 2.5 years. In one of the Andhra restaurants, carrier meals ( take out lunch or dinner) for 4 people costs Rs.89 while an appetizer like Gobi Manchurian costs Rs.69!
3. Lots of new hospitals and educational institutions. Number of engineering colleges in Bangalore might exceed number of schools in some of the states in the US!
4. Retail revolution: This was predicted back in 2000, that India will witness a major revolution in the retail segment. Malls are there in almost all the upscale residential and commercial areas. I was surprised to see many stores in the fresh produce segment. Though small in size compared to their US counterparts, malls and department chain stores are attracting the current young generation. Most of the malls have huge floating population and the food courts are jampacked with people.
5. Commute: No doubt, commute time has increased multi fold, thanks to the short sightedness of the successive governments. The improved bus service is just inadequate to catch up with the growing human and vehicular population. However some of the major highways like the Bangalore-Mysore road have been turned around and one can reach Mysore in about couple of hours. I will not be surprised if some one starts off a helicopter service for commuting within Bangalore.
6. Airports: The existing Bangalore airport looks more like a typical bus terminal in any Indian city. Thanks to the booming (or now slowing?) IT market, emergence of new airliners - According to a report there are about 150 take offs and landings in one day!... I remember in the early 1980s, there used to be hardly 10 or 15 flights a days - 4 flights to Mumbai(2 outbound and 2 inbound), 2 to Delhi, 2 to Chennai and few more...The visitors also contribute majorly to the chaos. From what I have seen in my own eyes, a local bangalorean set to fly overseas will be seen off by at least 2-3 visitors and there is no upper limit! - I have seen groups of over 30 people sometimes!. I think it is time the government must intervene and stop visitors to the airport :) ( to reduce the proportinate amount of traffic)... Or they can even think of converting the major bus terminals in to airport pickup points!
7. Cars..
Till few years back, one had to go overseas to see the internationally renowned cars. Now all these cars have set strong foot in India and there is no looking back. Expensive cars are now visible almost everywhere. Maruti 800, Santro, Zen are considered to be entry level cars.

There are some more..keeping them for the next post..

A unique Store

One store caught my attention while I was walking around in the near by mall. The name was very unique, "Art of Shaving". This instantly reminded me of Sri Sri Ravishankar's Art of Living....

Curious, I peeped in and could tell it's an upmarket store with lots of shaving products and accessories stacked in the shelves. Also interesting is their services offered. The Royal Shave comes at $55 only!.There were other services priced lesser than that. What I appreciate is the innovative thinking of the person(s) who started this kind of business. I really wonder what a royal shave would be.... After coming home I found out from their website that it's quite a big chain and they are present in quite a few locations across USA. They also offer lot of reading stuff on their website.

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year

For those of you checking this blog on the new year's eve, Wish you & your folks a very happy and fulfulling new year. A year is just 365 days, 24 hours - Enjoy every moment of it..

As usual, we have a 10 days winter break. Last 2 years we did not go anywhere and this time. We did not want to break the tradition this time. It's just another 2 more days to go and we have spent all the time at Seattle itself. Except few outings to the local stores and downtown, we are pretty much at home. This holidays was different from last one, my daughter is here to play with this time!. We've had a wonderful family time coupled with meeting my local friends who came over to spend some time with us. Known for my sudden and unplanned trips, few friends called to enquire if we are still at Seattle. My daughter has added few more activities to her list. She now knows where her tongue, head and nose are!. In all, it's been a wonderful relaxing holiday - looking forward to get back to work soon and head out to another holiday break (shh....suspense, you will know shortly)

Over the holidays, few more things accomplished: Sorted some of the paper work and getting rid of old / wanted papers(still in work).

How's your "happy holidays" going?

Music director Pairs of Indian Cinema

I was watching an old kannada movie Kittu-Puttu and the songs were simply superb and I looked up who the music director was. It was the famous Rajan-Nagendra who composed those melodious numbers. For those who are not familiar to Kannada cinema, Rajan-Nagendra is not one person, they are in fact 2 people and they are brothers!. It is quite common in Indian cinema to find such a 2 person team in the music director seat. I am not sure how many such duos exist(ed) in kannada movies but there are a lot in the hindi movies. Just to name a few: Laxmikant-pyrelal, kalyanji-Anandji, Jatin-Lalit, etc. There might be few more additions to the list, I have not kept myself updated on the latest entrants...

Following link provides more information on Rajan-Nagendra. In the earlier days, radio was only popular electronic media and hearing movie songs was one of the favorites for many people. Just before a song is played, they would announce names of the lyricist, music director and the play back singers. Some of the melodious songs were repeated for a long period. Probably, this repeated mention made the music directors get mileage and made them popular. Current day vibrant FM stations are more interactive, play songs on request but do not always provide the information about the people who created that music. However, the good music directors are still in great demand. As melodious numbers are key to any indian movie's success, the popular music directors are in great demand. Their names are now prominently printed on the movie posters and gain significant attention in the premieres, and pre / post release press conferences.

More to come: Indian movie related posts...

My days as a production engineer

One of my posts regarding the early morning commute to work brought back the memories of the days when I was the production engineer

Here are the things I liked with that company;
a)One uniform dress code for all employees including the CEO
b)Once a year allowance to buy new uniform(with free dress material), new pair of shoes, nope no receipt required
c)Daily stand up meetings the managers had with their supervisors discussing the production, rejection and other matters. Display boards in each production area offering production and rejection rates. CEO, in his early morning walk around the plant would stop occasionally at such boards and ask the nearest engineer or manager to explain the numbers!. Managers spent significant time in reporting such metrics and preparing for any surprise questions.
d)Excellent food & snacks at rock bottom prices - Just Rs.1 per day (It is approx. 2 cents (USD) in the present conversion rate!) which included unlimited breakfast, lunch, coffee / tea./snacks during the two breaks. During summer, fresh fruit juices were an additional choice during the break period
e)Yearly gift to the employees – Usually a household item like designer cutlery, refrigerator, etc. The management and the employees chose the gift jointly and this was well appreciated.
f)Drop by car option for managers and engineers during the night shift, provided to those whose homes were far away from the bus stop and for those who missed the bus due to some pressing work.
g)A well-organized family day visit to the manufacturing premises during the Ayudha Pooja day. Welcome package included a full breakfast, sweet box for all the visitors

Some or all of the above might sound ordinary compared to the current scenario where some IT companies take good care of its employees. The point to note is the willingness of such manufacturing companies to provide these things in spite of relatively low profit margins

Remembering Deepavali...

Deepavali (also called Diwali), one of the popular Indian festivals was celebrated early this month. As a kid, this was one of my favorites because this is one festival when we kids got involved completely like in the run up to the festival, which involved purchasing and bursting crackers, eating sweets, meet with friends and family and wait a minute – get a new pair of clothes. Preparations for deepavali would start typically a week or so earlier. We would buy small quantities of firecrackers from the near by shops for the run up. A day or two before the festival, we would buy significant quantity of crackers from Bangalore’s city market wholesale or retail sellers. We always compared our scale of celebrations with our neighbors who some how beat us in the quantity and the variety of firecrackers. Firecracker packing material, left overs made up majority of the roads and the front yards and definitely this was one of the indexes used to measure the level of celebrations!

Over the last few decades, there have been some changes to the firecrackers supply chain and the ways the firecrackers reach common people. After a major fire accident destroyed many firecracker stores in city market area, retail firecracker sales moved to open grounds where vendors set up temporary stalls. These vendors attract budget customers who constitute significant population. As always, the “big” customers have their own sources: some go to the wholesale stores in city market area, some to the TamilNadu bordering town, Hosur. Some even buy crackers directly from the manufacturers at Sivakasi, Tamil Nadu. Firecracker buying associations are common sight in many organizations. People enroll themselves in such associations to gain a) collective discount based on the large base; b) Make monthly contributions towards the firecracker fund to get avoid huge expenditure in one particular month. These associations perform quite well, meet their objectives and offer token gifts to keep their customers happy. Association representatives visit manufacturers well in advance, negotiate prices and the custom packing. In addition, it is common to find businesses, industries distributing sweet boxes to their employees. Deepavali is the major motivator for retail sales in India and is comparable to Thanksgiving or Christmas sale in the USA. Retail stores, popular shopping streets, malls are decked with lights, decoration stuff and the ambience is simply superb.

In Bangalore, I found that the business community spends significant amount of money on firecrackers compared to the salary class. In addition, many big restaurants, apparel shops conduct fireworks display, which are open to common people. Wilson Garden Janata Hotel’s fireworks were a delight to watch and people would flock around the hotel around 11PM on the deepavali night. After cordoning off the roads, the hotel staff would entertain the people with the fireworks display for over 30 minutes.

Off late there is awareness about noise pollution, safety and the child labor used for manufacture of firecrackers. These may eventually reduce the firecrackers sales but cannot take away the spirit of the festival. Deepavali will continue to be one of the most celebrated festivals in India and definitely a great booster for the local economy.

Back to Square One

You have heard "Back to square one" number of times. It makes more sense when one goes through this in the real life. It happened in the last weekend trip to Leavenworth, wa - the bavarian village in Washington state. On the way back, we were looking forward to exploring Stevens pass. At one point on the state highway, there was a left direction to Stevens pass. We turned left and followed other directions got on to a 2 lane highway. The views of the mountains were breathtaking and the fall foliage was simply amazing. We were not sure how far to go and what to expect. I suggested pulling out at the next rest area which was 10 miles away. After about 30 mins ( with breaks for photo shooting), we almost reached the rest area. Just before making the turn, Dinesh said loudly "we've been here just half an hour ago". Me and wife dismissed his claim by telling him all the rest areas in the state look similar. Since there were light showers and my daughter was sleeping, I rushed to the place where they had set up coffee and snacks counter. For reasons that I don't know, some volunteer groups provide free coffee, cookies, etc in the washington state rest areas. Coming back to the story, I thought the 2 elderly gentle men looked very familiar to me. I asked them what to expect in the stevens pass and they took 5 mins and told me all they knew. Something was telling me I've been here before and seen these guys. However, i picked up my coffee and came back to the car. By then, the 2 other passengers in the car had made their analysis and declared we were back to square one. Dinesh submitted his evidences of seeing the same car/truck/sand dunes in the area. On the way back, we saw the same landmarks we had seen 45 mins ago. Actually before turning in to that stevens pass road, we had spent a good half hour in the very same rest area. Also, I had asked those 2 elderly gentlemen, creamer for coffee!. By going back to the same place, we had not only lost 45 mins, we also went 20 miles behind... No more doubts..we understood what "Back to Square One" means! - This is my first & unique experience while driving in the US..have you had similar ones?

Dasara Festival

The ten day dasara festivities in India concluded just last weekend. Given the work schedule and other things, I did not even realize when Dasara started and how it ended. Going back 3 decades, Dasara used to be one of the major festivals at my place. We would place our collection of antique wooden dolls, clay models of various gods & godesses and so many other fancy items. We would also create a small artifical "forest" with lots of plastic animals in them. Most of the traditional dolls were inherited. 2 pairs of couple dolls, made out of rosewood were the center of attraction. I was told they were at least 150-200 years at that time. My grand father was very popular in Mysore for displaying his collection of dolls and paintings during dasara time. Schools recognized Dasara period as a half yearly milestone in the annual calendar. We would finish our half yearly exam just before dasara and enjoy the mid term holidays which co incided with the dasara festival. We also would go around other houses in the neighbourhood to look at their display of dolls. I vividly remember my cousin taking me to one house in Tyagarajanagar, Bangalore where the entire ground floor of the house was full of dolls. They had displayed so many dolls, it almost looked like a doll shop instead of a house!. Half yearly holidays took us either to my grand father's house at Vyalikaval, bangalore or to the Dasara capital of Karnataka - Mysore.

My grand father's house at Vyalikaval would look like a family reunion with my cousins joining in from other locations. Our favourite past time would be taking care of our younger cousin, giving him bath, play with the dog Johnny or head out for long walks to Palace Orchards or Malleswaram or go to one or two movies. Palace Orchards was (still is) home to the famous film stars and politicians. My cousin used to show us around in this area, he some how knew most of the famous houses out there.

Our dasara holidays in Mysore was a different kind of a family reunion. As we descend on our ancestral home, there would be steady stream of visitors. Many of dad's siblings and other relatives lived within 2-3 miles distance and we used to get lot of invitations for breakfast, lunch and dinner. With so many cousins, I personally enjoyed shuffling between various houses, playing various games and enjoying the food specialities of each family. Once, one of my aunts took us once to the Khas darbar at the Palace and we were amazed at the grandeur of the Mysore palace. We watched the darbar from the near distance, the royal throne looked impressive. As we grew, other priorities came in and we gradually scaled down our dasara celebrations.