Memoirs.....Musings of a sales guy at heart.....

Episode 11

Field Sales Officer-FSO-Chennai 1983-86

HL purchased their own office @Rosy Tower, Nungambakkam High Road. A beautifully laid out office with two cabins for the RM, ARM and a small cabin for the FSO. So, for the first time, I got an office space...lovely feeling....

Along with me Kandasamy (Kandan) also got promoted. From a single FSO to two FSOs and also an RM and ARM for South. The reason being that business started growing in South and TN  finally opened up for alcohol. TN announced setting up a corporation for purchase and distribution of alcohol. Tamil Nadu Sales and Marketing Corporation LTD (TASMAC). All the private WS licenses got cancelled and also government had given licenses for bottling of alcohol to 5. MBDL, Balaji, SAFL, Empee and Shiva were set up between 1983 to 85. Business started growing and the real competition and fight started so all the operating companies were in full throttle right from setting up a Route To Market-RTM to offices and FF. So HL also got in to the fray but sadly was running with a handicap-Dipys on its shoulders.

TN was split into two...vertically. Those days the railways had meter gauge and broad gauge. MG was from Chennai to Kanyakumari through coastal and central TN. BG was Chennai to Ooty. I was given the MG and Kandan was BG. Chennai was also split into two with South and North Chennai. My team members were Dwarak, KG Ravi both at Chennai, Narasimhan at Trichy, Kalyan at Madurai, Manohar at Tirunelveli. This was my team and Kandan had JP and KS Raghavan in Chennai, Panneer at Salem, Noor at Coimbatore. (later Vivek) and ALP at Salem.

Both self and Kandan were to manage TASMAC HO. We were to manage order generation from TASMAC to all the depots and to avoid overlapping, we were given 3 days a week each for TASMAC HO follow ups....Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays by one and the other days by the other....I realised immediately it was nothing but stupidity as it created confusion with TASMAC purchase guys and also misunderstanding between Kandan and me. The reason being that both of us were only focussing on our territories and pushing stocks for those depots only. But bosses didnt bother or understood...In retrospect, what the bosses should have done was to keep one FSO for market and another one for Tasmac management (Key accounts management).  After a few months, I reached an understanding with Kanadan and he started managing the logistics with TASMAC and I started focusing on the markets and the depots directly. Instead of HO pressure on order generation, I started making the depots to place indents and exert pressure on the HO and it worked well.

As an FSO (later this designation changed to ASE-following McD's footsteps) the pressure was to deliver the numbers for half of TN for both liquor and Dipys. I also had Pondy under me but that time Pondy was not under focus for HL and HL was happy with whatever they were getting. The bosses of HL failed here too as Yanam which is part of UT of Pondy was playing a big role in cross border sales-MSR Group mastered it and promoted McD in a big way thru Yanam RTM. Mahe was under Kerala and Mahe was contributing decent volumes but Pondy was neglected. Pondy was also under MSR and was managed by Dharmaraj-King of alcohol in Pondy-Dharma was a great human being but his loyalty was completely on McD and Hl was nowhere in his radar. I tried to take away the distribution from him but that was not supported by Tomy and later to open up the market and that was also negated. So Pondy was more for Dipys than Liquor...surprised, right?. Initially the supplies were from Bihar, UP and Rajasthan till Balaji unit in Chennai, became operational. So managing the logistics was so very vital. As mentioned earlier, it was all Datta, Datta and Datta...right from excise office to coordinating with the units and also at the borders of Odisha and AP. While we have to (HL) run pillar to post to get our supplies, McD never had such issues as they had their own distilleries and they were given the first preference. By the time we manage the logistics and bring the stocks, we need to also pull back consumers who had switched over to competition due to non availability of our stocks 24x7....but this was initial hiccups but thanks to timely intervention of HO, we managed the supplies well and started going all out.

TASMAC initially didnt know much about logistics and procurement as the people appointed to manage the business were not from a business background and especially the section heads. Both chairman (Mr. Karuppannan) and his deputy (Mr.Nammalwar) were teetotallers and completely clean...it took some time for them to figure out the logistics and procurement, and then it was left to the companies to manage the movement of stocks from the retail points. We also had another great person in Abul Hassan head of Finance in Tasmac...later he became the commissioner of Chennai Corporation.

It took some time for me to understand the new role as hand holding and tutoring was never part of HLs culture especially in South those days- key lesson for people who rise from the ranks--you have to start working on man/people management, managing bosses, upward and downward communications and keeping in touch with the market and having a good understanding of competition. Customer relationship by the boss is also very vital as the salesmen, mostly, tend to bull shit their way which can land the boss in soup..one has to be weary of this always. This is the key learning for me as initially my focus was in my earlier strong territories but soon I realised it was more of a 'comfort zone operations' and hence started focussing on other markets too. Get out of the comfort zone as you need multiple skills to climb the ladder which sometimes would be spiralled. 

The 3 years I spent as FSO (83-86) gave a great foundation for my supervisory skills and people management. 

The tough market was Chennai as both for Dipys and to some extent for liquor it was challenging. Though Chennai was contributing maximum for Dipys overall but market share wise still very negligible. And Kandan and his team had Salim Bhai as their distributor and his partner, Wadood Bhai, of Zeenat International which was in to ship-chandling, helped to a very great extent in this channel. Raghavan and JP were able to push anything and everything thru this channel and we have to toil (Dwarak and Ravi) everyday knocking at each and every door and were heavily dependent on retail. The silver lining was the distributor we had for Dipys, Madras Associated Agencies, owned by Mr.Shukla, and always support our efforts. Dwarak managed him very well. A word about Dwarak here....Dwarak is 6+ footer, with great personality and command over English. Also he was fluent in Telugu and Tamil. Rest of us were good only in Tamil and with some English. Ravi (KGR) managed his business partners with his numerology skills and as a pay back those guys started patronizing our brands both Dipys and liquor. But the beauty was even Raghavan, on the sides, helped us without the knowledge of his boss, Kandasamy as Salim was not very strong in retail. I, kind of encouraged, Ravi to do cross border trading and Ravi got it right and made inroads into Nathan's, a shop in Parrys corner, which catered to many small retailers in and around north of Madras. This guy were also related to Ravi which made it easier. When I say cross border, it is trading in areas which is out of your bounds. Once we came to know a big retail stores at Perambur called Demiris, was not getting serviced well. I took Ravi there (Perambur was not in our territory and hence cross border) and stuck a deal with the shop...these two guys were great contributors but it took some time for Kandan to figure this out but we managed even after that. Our distributor MAA Shukla helped us with cross billing too. Also with Ravis numerology got great business with DK Wines Karunakaran in Ranipet and Sri Krishna Wines, Thangam, in T Nagar(just examples out of many). Dwarak built a fantastic relationship with the Taj Group especially with the head of procurement (another Telugu speaking guy) and this account gave us some big numbers too. Tomy didnt know much about key account management and hence it didnt percolate down with in the state or even in South. But we understood the importance of the contributions from the key accounts like Taj, Chola, the clubs, big bakeries, super stores like Nilgiris and Bombay stores in T Nagar, and Ambicas. We also got hold of another ship-chandler, who was giving tough competition for Zeenat, on our side. (Alankar International). This was also under Kandan but Alankar didnt want to buy from Salim due to the Zeenat factor. We exploited it well. So it was competition with in the company but we ensured it didnt get personal. There was rivalry between self and Kandan but that was only in business.

Narasimhan at Trichy, Kalyan at Madurai (from Hubli I pulled him to Madurai-finally Kalyan got some fantastic break), Manohar at Tirunelveli...Very solid team. The entire TN team was envy of everyone as we all jelled very well.

I was always a tough boss when it comes to deliverance as I never take 'No' for an answer from anyone and hence my guys have to run that extra mile to deliver their numbers but they did it with aplomb. Narasimhan didnt need much of spoon feeding as he was master in his market. Narasimhan turned around Trichy and made inroads in to the English Warehouse (Jaya Shopping Center who also got a liquor retail license), Pandiyan and Priya wines....Also we cracked it big in Karur...

Abraham, who was instrumental in my getting in to HL, had resigned and took up a job in Gulf...he could not jell well with the culture of HL.

HL got a new RM in Navratan Dugar (IIM C) with great pedigree. He was a great boss to work with and learnt a lot from him. His letter dictation style was something one should see to believe. His home at 24, Poes Garden was a lovely place. He had hosted many dinners there and his wife Manju Dugar was a great hostess too. But only vegetarian and no alcohol there. Few years ago he razed down the independent house and built a 4 storey apartment there called 'Sky Villa'. He later moved on to head Balaji Distilleries in Chennai. The only negative thing about ND was he was a bit egoistic and we had issues with him when he was in Balaji to get our share of supplies. 

I used to travel a minimum of 12 days a month and also when in Chennai spend a minimum of 5 to 6 days in the market. This helped me to have a clear understanding of the market and its dynamics and also building relationship with key retailers. In alcohol business, as I always said, relationship is key. Compared to FMCG the liquor universe is too small. You need to have a great relationship with the trade as otherwise you would not be able to make any inroads. For example, a place like Mumbai has just 500 retail vends. Considering its population, Bombay should have a minimum of 1500 retail vends but the government had frozen it and not issued any licenses in the last, to the best of my knowledge, 4 decades. But they give licenses to bars and restaurants but no retail vends.

Even in Goa, where almost every 4th house is a bar/retail, relationship plays a key role.

Within few months of our moving in to our office in Rosy Tower, a massage parlour came up as our neighbor. That was the time these massage parlours started mushrooming in Chennai. The purpose was multi and we had some great VIPs visiting our neighborhood that included the late Gemini Ganesan. Many of our retail dealers were regular visitors there and used to drop in at our office with a sheepish smile. Fortunately within a year or two they all shut down and we bought that space also and annexed it to our office.

We were supported in our office by Datta, Sheigar K, LT Murthy, Hari, Shankaran, Babu and Anbu. All these guys were fantastic in their work. We had our warehouse in the basement of our building where we used to store Dipys and giveaways. Murthy used to handle cash and the moment he gets our expenses statement approved by Tomy, he used to call and disburse cash. And it was a big family....vasudeva Kudumbam.....

Also Tomy used to insist that we meet the parents of the candidates we recruit to ensure the parents were aware that their son was joining a liquor company. I still remember when we recruited Baksha I met his parents and took their consent.

Tomy was a different character. He used to spend maximum time in the office and very less of a market guy. Very seldom he visited the distributors and market visit used to be a bit of a tension and also fun. Tension in terms of his firing on the spot and fun in the evenings. He never trusted people instantly. We used to joke in the office about his reading the carbon copy of the letters he was signing!!! He always went home for his lunch and would come back to office around 4 and work till 5.30. 

There were no Emails and everything used to be in letters or telegrams. Telex was just introduced then. And there was power cuts too. But I dont think we ever cribbed. Market visits and doing business was always fun. 

Once the purchase guy at Taj was acting indifferent with us. Dwarak informed me and I rushed with Dwarak to meet him but could not crack. We waited for a day and informed Tomy. He got up and told us that we would go to Taj to meet him. Taj was just 10 minutes from our office. We went straight to the purchase department and to that person who was acting indifferent. Tomy gave him a piece of his mind and we didnt know how to react. He just let his steam off and left. We thought the business with Taj is lost forever. But to our surprise the very next day he called Dwarak and gave him a big order....When we informed this to Tomy, he just burst into laughter.....

As a bachelor in Chennai life was total fun. My elder sister was in Chennai and most of the time my food would be in her home. I have taken almost every single colleague of mine to my sisters home for a meal. Also to my Srirangam sister Radha's home...Whenever i felt like having home food, I would just drop in at her place. Mostly for lunch. 

Woodlands drive in used to be our meeting point. What a lovely place it was. Our government should have continued the lease with the Woodlands guys. It was the landmark of Chennai. 

During the music season, December, used to frequent all the Sabhas, mainly for the food/canteen and acquainted lots of friends. Also attended lots of concerts and gained some basic knowledge of carnatic music. Chennai is different during December with weather being nice and the music season. Amaravathi's Bahar restaurant specialising in tandoor stuff, was an  awesome place. This was another joint we used to frequent.

Since i was a bachelor and was in a two bedroom apartment, most of the get together with colleagues and friends used to be in my place only. And it used to be very difficult to get good accomodation if you are a bachelor. Once during my initial days as FSO when i was searching for an acco, I saw one advertisement in the local newspaper and went to see the place. It was in VM street Royapettah. The owners had a bungalow and behind that bungalow this two bedroom house along with few more row houses. All within the complex. The owners refused to let it to a bachelor. I pulled a fast one and told them my wedding is fixed in the next 2 months time. I also told them I would bring my brother to confirm this. I rush to Bhaskar's home and requested him to come with his wife Bharathy and act like my brother. He said yes immediately and visited the owners with me..the owners were elderly couple, very nice and courteous. They got so impressed and gave me the place. I moved in and with in 10 days my Indian Airlines  friend Radhakrishnan also moved in. Center of the city and a great place to live. After around 3 months the owners started nagging me about my wedding and they were getting really restless as they didnt want to keep bachelors there. They also had a lovely daughter whom we nick named as 'Contessa'.

Once they called me and told me they are getting complaints from other tenants that they dont want bachelors around. A kind of ultimatum they had given me. Radha got a wind of this and moved to another place. What I did to manage this is completely out of box. 

Near Hubli-Karnataka in an unmanned railway gate an accident happened and few people died. This was reported in the local newspapers of Chennai. I called Kalyan, who was HQ that time in Hubli and asked him to send me a telegram 'Geetha dies in a train accident. Sad to inform you'. Next day morning the owners son, knocks at my door with a very serious face and hands over the telegram. It took a few seconds for me to realise that I have to react to this telegram and did a Sivaji act. He didnt know how to react and asked me who was this Geetha? I told him it was my fiance' but not sure how and what happened. I bought some time....went in and closed the door and opened it after a couple of hours and went out. Returned in the evening and straight went to their house with a long face and told them that my fiance' was coming back from her pilgrimage and was in the same ill fated train and lost her life. I had to shed some tears too. They genuinely felt bad and left it like that. So for a couple of more months life was normal. But on the 3rd month they called me and asked me about my future plans? I told them I cant think of another girl in my life for sometime (unless it is your daughter!!)....They comforted me by telling that life has to move on and I should get married soon as they cant allow a bachelor to continue there!!! So ultimately I have to move out but I managed to stay there for almost a year.....a bachelor midst of family people!!!!! I stayed with Zulfiq for sometime on Luz Church Road ( I had seen Kalaigar playing shuttle with Kanimozhi-just adjacent to the place I was living) and finally moved in to Ganesh Apartment where my sister Bhanu was staying. 

That was the golden period of my bachelorhood. Ganesh apartment was in Alwarpet and had 4 blocks. One of the very first apartments to come up in Chennai and especially in the prime Mylapore area...people bought two bedrooms at just 50k...The owner of my apartment Dr. Shyamala was moving to US for a couple of years and hence wanted someone to take of the house when they were away. They locked one room and kept their things and the rest (one bedroom, hall and kitchen) were all mine....decent rent too. My sister was in the next block second floor and no worries for food. That one year was the best time I had in Chennai as bachelor. Though all the other residents were orthodox and family men, they didnt object to my parties or people visiting me. The only issue I had was the noise my Yezdi used to make. My return used to be always late when many residents would have gone to sleep and it disturbed them.  The association told me that I have to switch off the engine outside and come in pushing my bike. They also constructed a speed breaker at the entry of the apartment. But every one of them were so loving and affectionate. The Ganesh temple on Warren Road was a must visit before starting for work. Raman used to be a frequent visitor to my office along with his colleague Manohar. 

I got acquainted to Shankar in ganesh apartment only. His father Rathnam Iyer also became very close to me. The whole family. Shankar, his brother in law Balu and myself used to have fabulous time in Ganesh apartments. Shankar used to be with IOB. Well settled but he took a great risk, quit the job and started his own construction company and has done so well for himself. Very jolly good guy. Our friendship continues.....TV news reader Varadarajan was also a resident there. During the cricket matches we used to assemble at Sampath's flat (on first floor just above mine) and it was total fun. 

Work was also fun....market work with colleagues and spending the evenings together. We all bonded so well and when I look back, I can't say anything but a big thanks to the almighty for blessing me with such great colleagues who turned to be my very good friends. Its not that we didnt have our quota of misunderstandings and fights but we used to get them sorted over a drink.

TN liquor scene was different then. Only the WS was with the government and the entire retail universe was private. The license fee was not that much and hence the retailers used to make good money and also due to competition the consumers used to always get the best of deals. There was tough competition but no one crossed the line. 

As an FSO, my priority was to deliver my territories numbers in total which we as a team could deliver consistently-of course with some cross border trading too. Monthly review meetings were a must and started conducting them in upcountry too. The guys had a chance to get a feel of other markets too as we made it mandatory the market visit. Copied some of the earlier success formulas in other markets too and got some great boost. One strong area of us was the merchandising part. Made the team to believe in the importance of POS and POP and made it mandatory to carry enough materials in their kit. Also appointed, for the first time, merchandisers to help the team in merchandising and also spot selling activities. HL had a decent marketing team but they never bothered about TN as many of them were, what SSG used to call, 'armchair managers'. 

Krithi got married, I think in 82 and set his family in Madurai. His marriage was all fun. Raman got married in june 86. My other friends Kutty and Radha also got married at the same time. 

I need to also mention here that Dwarak helped me with a loan to complete my undergrad.... When I asked him for the amount, he didnt even hesitate for a second....Thanks a lot Dwarak. 

I will write more about all my HL colleagues in another post....

The 3 years period as FSO was one of the best period in my career. Time just flew as every day was exciting and threw lots of challenges. Performance wise management was so happy and just around July 1986, Tomy called me and informed me of my promotion as ASM TN. Another big break. God was so kind.

Once on my return trip from Madurai to Chennai, travelled with Manasvini aka Manu, wife of Krithi along with Krithi and Venkat of SW  in Vaigai express...I told Manu that everyone in my friends circle got married and I need to do something about it as I felt very lonely. She told me to advertise in the Hindu Matrimony, which I obliged. She helped me to sort out all the responses and we picked up the letter from Jeyanthi's dad and she responded to them on my behalf.

I took Raman with me to Trichur to visit them and said YES after spending a couple of hours there. Jeyanthis brothers had done some discreet enquiries on me at Chennai and gave a positive feedback to her parents (that surprises me still, though). We took the evening train from Trichur and came back to Chennai next day morning and I informed my folks....They all said yes and we got married on 7th Sep 1986. I was the incharge of my wedding and managed everything with help from Kalyan and my sisters. the wedding was conducted in Woodlands and it was just a days affair. As per practice with my Salem friends, I gave them a cottage for their stay and card session and joined them too for a game. Of course alcohol flowed too. The wedding happened on Ganesh chathurthi day and it was like sponsored by HL...Full team in attendance and complete assistance and support. Jeyanthi joined me in Ganesh apartments. We went to Ooty for our Honeymoon and the moment I returned to Chennai, Tomy informed me of my transfer to AP with Hyderabad as my HQ. It was unified AP then. It was a kind of bolt from the blue. He told me its an independent branch with full fledged office, warehouse and distributors. And company provided car...Wah....what else you can ask for? And I never used to bother about money or negotiate with management. My wife used to work for Bank of Travancore and had applied for a transfer to Chennai. The request got changed to Hyderabad and she got it too...

The 3 years spent in Chennai was absolutely awesome. Professionally and personally. Its bye bye Chennai and Hello Hyderabad.....