Have you ever wondered a small habit enforced in your childhood could help in a huge level in your life? An enforcement of using limited water for washing legs has helped this man in his business to use limited and scarce resources in an optimal way.
In one of their Business Visionary Series, the CIC featured Mr. R G Chandramogan, Chairman and Managing Director of Hatsun Agro Product Ltd, the largest private dairy company. His success story inspired the audience and will definitely inspire the aspiring entrepreneurs. Hailing from an agricultural background, Mr. R G Chandramogan had huge interest in doing business than in higher education. With the help from his father by selling family property, he started a small scale ice cream business with a capital of Rs. 13000. He was able to sail through the initial years with the judicial usage of resources that he learned as a child from his grandmother.
He was a pioneer in the Indian dairy industry with some of his major moves in the business. He penetrated the rural market to avoid heavy competition in the urban cities and climbed the top of the ladder by significant gain in the rural markets alone. IIT Ahmedabad was inspired with this model and did a case study on “Pioneers in penetration of rural markets” and later the multi-national companies followed his path of focusing on rural markets for their products. The unique marketing strategies and business policies gave Hatsun Agro a niche place in the dairy market.
His strategic plans and visionary helped the company spread into the milk business too which was dominated by the cooperatives. He pioneered in introducing automation in the dairy industry and also introduced efficient payment strategies to the farmers that minimized delays and prevented them from borrowing money from lending sharks to a large extent. His contributions to the Animal Husbandry Services are immeasurable. He used technology very well in implementing quality controls and efficient distribution of milk from farmers to the consumers. He was farmer friendly and contributed significantly in increasing the wealth of an average farmer. He educated the farmers in raising cattle when they were failing in their agriculture. His project white gold had a huge impact on the rural economy and improved the life of the farmers and places him high as a social entrepreneur for which he drew inspiration from two entrepreneurs in his village during his childhood.
The childhood lesson of using scarce resources in an efficient way helped him in introducing methods to save water and to use power produced from renewable energy sources like wind, solar and others. Hatsun is one of the largest manufacturers of Ice Cream and the largest corporate milk brand selling across the country. The Company has made sales growth of 18% for the last 14-15 years with a net profit growth of 25%. Being a state badminton player, he has also started a state-of-the-art badminton academy near Madurai, in Tamilnadu. He expects it to churn world class players in the next 6-7 years.
This simple man and his son draw one of the least salaries in any corporate with the kind of market capitalization their company has and is more inspired with the challenges posed by the business. He feels market capitalization is just like money in the mirror and he is never attracted to it. He has given employment directly or indirectly to more than 5 lakh people.
With total ignorance about the business when he entered, the confidence in him and willingness to learn paved way for a huge success. We truly stand inspired by the story of this business visionary.