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

Episode 28...

As mentioned in my earlier post, things were going so well and we as a team Diageo India were on cloud 9. 

The leadership team jelled well and connected great with 8, HP, London.

Stuart Fletcher replaced Andrew Morgan as head of our divsion. Andrew was non interfering and a great guy to work with. As we realised, the corporate house keeps changing the heads often and the process of reestablishing ourselves start all over again.

One major issue cropped up meanwhile. ITDC-a GOI run company-under tourism ministry, was the major operator in India controlling major airport's Duty-free across the country. Though Flemingo-a small time DF operator then, sneaked in with their first entry in to Trivandrum airport and Calicut, ITDC still continued more than 90% of the business. ITDC was a typical government run corporation with major focus in their hotels like Ashoka in Delhi, Kovalam beach resort in Trivandrum, Temple Bay in Mahabalipuram et al-had no clue how to run the DF business n shops and how to increase the foot fall. The shops were controlled by the unions and the employees were never bothered about attending to the consumers and were only focussing on a different kind of RTM (Route To Market). But, we had no other operators to fall back and hence were totally dependent on ITDC. After I took charge, spent a good amount of money on increasing our visibilities across their shops and also conducted awareness sessions with their counter salesmen-imparting product knowledge and also soft skills. We also established great rapport with the HO in Delhi. RC Gupta was head of purchases and Majumdar was his deputy. But despite best efforts, changing the WOW of ITDC was a big challenge. We changed our way of working and started direct interactions with the shop managers and the counter sales guys and started offers to compete with the Dubai DF and Singapore DF which was a major competitor for ITDC and our business (Diageo India). Diageo announced a price increase, which is an annual affair, and before it came in to effect, we wanted to push in some stocks to ITDC. We represented to ITDC and RCGupta and his team understood the impact and logic and agreed to take some good quantities. Most of the companies, as we all know, take the impending price increase as an opportunity and pump 2x stocks. We agreed on the quantity to be lifted by ITDC and advised HQ  to reserve the stocks under old price. We had some deadlines to meet to lift the stocks before the price increase, but ITDC, like any other government sector suffered some major red-tapism, resulting in delays in releasing the purchase order but as we were sure of getting the PO we gave the green signal to despatch the stocks. The invoices were raised and stocks were sent and ITDC cleared those stocks too and the POs were also released.

Amitabh Kant became the MD of ITDC. Very dashing and with clean hands. That time Mrs. Renuka Chowdhry was the tourism minister and ITDC was under Mrs Chowdry. Some one who was against the existing system and us, highlighted this anomaly about the whole transaction and it hit the headlines. The issue was the date of invoice were ahead of the date of PO. The reason was as explained earlier. There were no hidden agenda or any transactional benefits to anyone. I met Mr Kant and explained the whole business logic and he completely understood the commercial angle and sided with us but not openly. We were convinced that we havent dont anything wrong and we explained this to all those who were involved. And our payments were put on hold...it was a huge amount. Amar also used his good offices but we headed nowhere....

While all these things were going on, one evening Sridhar and Nalin barged in to my cabin and informed me (in disgust), that Ravi Rajagopal was appointed as the CEO of Diageo India replacing Amar Raj the incumbent CEO. Ravi was our CFO before he got transferred to London. Very intelligent and a great finance guy but had no prior experience in sales or marketing or strategy and the leadership team was completely taken aback. Amar was also very upset. The moment I heard this from Nalin and Sridhar, I completely lost it and broke down. I was uncosoleable, and took some time for me to come to terms of this new development. Trust me no one in the team had even 1% of liking towards Ravi, for whatever reason.

We were trying to handle the ITDC issue and sorting out as huge money was stuck. When Diageo announces any change, it gets in to effect immediately. Ravi took charge sooner than expected and in our first meeting, he informed me that Diageo India cant have a CEO and COO and hence the HO would try to get me a job outside and if it fails, I would be made redundant.....so first time a major blow....it took some time for this to sink in....anyway I didnt bother much about it as I had the backing of Nalin (our HR guy)....meanwhile Ravi R was a bit supicisious about the ITDC episode and felt we must have done something to get the business and probably wanted to implicate me but when he met RC Gupta, it was a slap on his face as RCG made it clear that it was just a PO related issue and nothing else. 

One opportunity came up in Nigeria to be the head of sales..Keith Taylor was the CEO of Nigeria and it was a big market for Guinness stout. I went to Lagos to attend an interview...it was not an interview but was a kind of workshop, with many aspiring candidates being part of the workshop and many of them from Africa itself. Nigeria was considered a 'tough terrain' and hence instructions were given not to venture out alone and not to leave the hotel. The adventure started before I landed in Lagos. I flew by Emirates and the flight was to land in Lagos early evening but just before landing the captain announced the flight is diverted to Ghana as an aircraft was stuck on the runway in Lagos. First jolt....could not communicate this to the HR in Lagos. We landed in Ghana and the chaos started. The local Nigerians were just bothered about their baggages as they feared someone would knock it off as the baggages had lots of stuff they bought and brought from Dubai. Total chaos in the airport. Finally the accomodated me in an Air France flight and I landed at Lagos around 9ish. Fortunately for me the company PR was waiting and he made all the efforts to get me out of immigration and customs asap. The instruction given to me was not to lose sight of my bag and also not to handover my passport any unknown person. Got out and headed to the hotel. We were accommodated at a place in Wellington Island-a safe place. One evening we were sent on a market work...visiting some local joints to understand the trade. The whole process of workshop went on for around 4 days. My participation was well appreciated but I didnt get the job....it was one way good as I dont think I would have enjoyed that place. I came back to Bombay and Nalin became desperate to fix me somewhere. I was also getting a bit edgy and started sending feelers to competition. But by the grace of god, Simon Lenton sent a message to Nalin that the head of Gulf was getting transferred and my name has been suggested for that position. But I have to be cleared by Ron Anderson, head of MENA. (Middle East North Africa and Global Duty Free all under Ron.  Ron was ex IDV and had visited India during our initial days and worked with me. He was head of Global sales division who awarded me the US trip for our great sales initiative. Was sent to London to meet up with Ron and the interview went off well....I was asked to meet up with the HR head, Nikki, too. Came back to Bombay without knowing whether I was in or out. A week or so passed---tension times....Nalin informed me that Simon Lenton would call me that evening and discuss the job....

I was at home and around 7pm that day to speak with Simon. Simon called with Jeyanthi and my son around me....I picked up the phone and the first thing Simon said was 'Well Done Rajah and congrats....u can pack your bags to move to Dubai"....what a joy it was.....and he asked me whether my family would be happy to move and for which I said, without thinking, in affirmation....

Diageo had certain principles. Before one takes up the offer, he/she to visit the country, spend a couple of days, understand the living conditions, possibilities of their children's education et al and confirm only when the person is absolutely clear....So, I visited Dubai with Jeyanthi and my son. Spent a couple of days and came back and informed HR am all game. My appointment was confirmed and I had to move. 

Guys, I never dreamt of any overseas posting but this was something which had fallen on me and thanks to Nalin for the efforts he had taken to get me an assignment outside. The region was called MENA (Middle East and North Africa). Entire Gulf, Lebanon, Syria, Jordon and North Africa. I was incharge of Gulf for both Duty free and Domestic business.

Went and stayed at Dubai for a week to finalise the acco and other things. Jeff Biggs, a South African, my predecessor, took me around and introduced to all the customers. Mostly Brits and Irish.....I also said yes to the same villa he was staying and the same car.....

And India was part of the same region and the same boss. The boss was Simon Lenton ( he was head of HR for the same region but someone in HQ thought he should get some commercial exposure and made him the business head). 

From 2002 to 2005-the time just flew....it was different way of working and with full freedom to experiment. The entire team jelled well and apart from work, we all had fun together and still in touch and continue to be friends.

I had mentioned earlier too that Amar was a great boss and he always insisted that the leadership team is together whenever there is any important things come up and a call has to be taken.

During this time, Flemingo started sneaking in to the DF arena in India but the 8, HP were very suspicious of this company and was not ready to blindly support them. The reason being that Flemingo was just a small trading company based at Jebal Ali Free Zone, Dubai and were in to parallel trading too. Viren took a major stake in to Flemingo as there was a pre condition while bidding for the DF shops in India that the bidding company should have some DF presence somewhere...but the beauty here was Flemingo ran DF only for diplomat channels and not in the airports or seaports but Flemingo managed this well and became a force to reckon with in India. Also they got some international airports. But what they got in Trivandrum and other small airports was very small but there was no option. The airports those days were small and Airport Authority of India had no clue on whats duty free business in the airports are for and what kind of revenue those shops can generate for the operators and the owners. Their eyes got opened up after seeing Cochin Airports shops and they started slowly opening up but still the space problem continued. Consumers somehow never had the confidence of stepping in to the Indian DF shops, as happening now due to its size and availability of range compared to Gulf, Singapore, Bangkok and KL to name a few....Today (2022) things are different when you look at Blr, Hyd, Mumbai and Delhi airports. From necessity shopping to experiential shopping....So I carried with me this impression of Sub-continental DF images to Dubai....(!)

Diageo India organised a great farewell for me and it was one of the best I had attended...sheer love and affection....it happened in our dining area in the office with full attendance....I was still part of the same region...so I could visit Bombay officially too....