Food n Bengaluru.....my take....

I spent around 5 days recently in Namma Bengaluru. The purpose of the visit was to attend my partners daughters wedding but we decided to spend a couple of more days to visit some friends and also enjoy the weather in Blr...

When ever I visit Blr I made it a point to have a meal/Tiffin at either at MTR, Adigas or any other local joints.

This time too, I visited different places - Krishnam n Rameshwaram Cafe...

Guys, these guys offer the best of Dosas and Vadas....We, the Tamilians, are very proud that Dosas were invented here but let me tell you - the Kannadigas have mastered it....Nowhere, I repeat nowhere, one can get such brownie exterior-rusk like-crispy dosas....TN has lost it....I dont find the dosas in TN mouthwatering anymore...there may be some exceptions but in Blr every single joint serving Dosa, its just great.

Rameshwaram Cafe is probably a year and half old but today its the happening place....I tasted their 'Thatta' idli, Dosa, Vada and 'akki' roti....every single item mentioned here were out of the world....no wonder they have such huge fan club.

And tiffin is not at all expensive. 7 of us had dinner at Krishnam to our hearts content and the bill was less than 1000.

All these joints are highly hygienic. And the staff are courteous and serve with a big smile....

Compared to this, I find Chennai very expensive and the food is not all the great and most of the restaurants, the staff are a bit rude too....

I had given up coffee some 36 years ago but tasted a bit at Rameshwaram Cafe the other day and fell in love....

Someone should replicate this Blr model in Chennai and at prices as low as Blr.....( Eating Circle on CP Ramaswamy Road but thats a poor cousin to Krishnam....)

You would also find 'Darshinis' across Blr....its stand and dine joints - a la fast food-serving south Indian snacks...hygienic and tasty...( Nothing in Chennai)....

I hope one of the aspiring chefs read this post and start the KTK style tiffin room with the same quality, quality price and service sooner in Chennai....

Till then I have to keep visiting Blr to satisfy my taste buds.....

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

Episode 29...

Forgot to mention in my last episode, a great getaway meeting when it became certain that I would be moving out....We planned a trip to Kumarakom backwaters in Kerala and it was, self, Nalin, Sudeep, John, Sridhar and Ravi....Krithi to join next day....we played a prank with Krithi (this is something we used to do often....once with Deepak and then with Amar and it was executed so well that in both the instances these guys almost got a heart attack!) and asked him to come prepared with a presentation to be made to Ravi on DF business and his thoughts/ideas on how to double it....Krithi burnt lots of midnight oil and next day he arrived. We all assembled and asked him to start the presentation....he started off very seriously and in all earnest and in just 5 minutes, Nalin got up and told him, 'Krithi, enough of this nonsense....we are not here to discuss business....let's have a beer!' Krithi didnt know how to react and we all burst in to laughter....it took some time for Krithi to realise it was a prank....and a great sport he is, he enjoyed the fun too.....Ravi R left next day and we all had great fun sans the presence of Ravi.....that was my last official togetherness with the guys in India....

I narrated the above episode to drive home how important it is to have a wonderful bonding with your colleagues and how important it is to have better understanding between the members of the leadership team. If you ask a military man, he would say drinks and women bring them together.....The leadership team in a company is the driving force and are responsible for strategic thinking and execution. The 2002-5 was a fabulous period for me in India and for all of us....

Now over to Dubai....

My son was not happy to shift to DxB as he just moved to +1 and wanted to get coached for IIT entrance and he felt shifting to DxB would not help him to achieve this objective as the coaching centres in DxB were, at that time, no match to anything in India. Also he started liking Podar in Bombay....

We went to DxB....all 3 of us and looked at many options in terms of acco but finally froze on my predecessors villa in Umm Suqeim....excellent location and in close proximity to the beach and  Jumeirah Beach resort....

Next was to get my sons admission...+1...lot tougher...I approached the Indian school through a contact and met the principal....he said he would give the admission after going thru my sons credentials but they were ahead by 3 months and he insisted those missed portions the student has to manage with his classmates....My son was okay with that...

I have to also get my sons and wife's visa...since mine was a clear (Dubai Airport Free Zone Authority viz DAFZA) one, I applied for the visa and paid all the fees (quite a lot in DxB)...went to the immigration and when my turn came, the person at the counter, looked at the visa application of my son and told me that I have to get from the school a letter confirming my sons admission...this was a shocker...I tried to reason that I would be stupid to apply for my sons visa if I wasn't sure of his school admission and he didnt like that at all..He was a bit rough and told me that he cant do anything and I have to come back with the confirmation letter from the school. So I rushed to the school...fortunately for me Keerthi, the PR guy at our DxB office was with me and hence moving around DxB was not an issue as he knew the topography well....met the principal and he turned down my request saying that he has given the word and once the visa is approved we can pay the fees.....he said convening the board meeting for this insignificant and routine thing wont go well with the board members....I pleaded but he was unrelenting....I spoke to some of my contacts and they also said if the immigration guy wants that, I better get that....and the Principal was unrelenting and kind of shut the door on me....Since i didnt know what to do, I thought I would go the Immigration and plead once again...rushed back to the immigration and went to the same counter with all the papers....but the guy who was there in the morning, was replaced by another..Krithi told me that we should come back the next day as if this guy rejects, then nothing could be done...I thought for a moment, prayed and decided to proceed....I gave him all the papers and told him the school refused to give a letter confirming admission but assured admission after the visa is stamped....he looked at me, puzzled and asked me who told me to get the letter from school? I said it was his colleague who was sitting in the same chair a couple of hours ago...he muttered something in Arabic, shook his head and told me in English "not required' and stamped the visa and gave me.....for both my wife and son.....I didnt know how to react...at one point, I thought it would be a long battle for my sons visa but within hours it changed....what do you call that? divine intervention....same immigration office but different persons and different stand...

All sorted in DxB and we returned to Bombay, packed our stuff and left for DxB....after spending more than a decade in Bombay in IDV/Guinness UDV/Diageo....with a heavy heart to leave the city which really helped me to grow professionally and personally....the trade and the team....Thanks to the Almighty for the lovely team he provided me which made my life easier. Some of my customers came home to bid farewell....and some amazing friends too...

We were put up in a nice hotel in DxB for 15 days...It was mid of Ramadan and my first experience during this fasting period......it was September 2015....everything was slow in the day time.....immigration, business, government offices....but evenings would be fun n frolic across DxB.....DxB was full of fabulous restaurants and world cuisine....I would leave my wife and son and would go to office and come back around 3 as every office closes by then....

Jeff did a good job inducting me and introducing me to almost all the customers across Gulf...and a brief on the business we do with them...it was very formal....I tried to grasp whatever I could....there were some shockers too....the first one being the new rule imposed by the Bahrain administration banning sale and serving of alcohol during Ramadan...till that time, Bahrain was seen one of the progressive countries in Gulf when it comes to alcohol as it was the only country where stand alone restaurants were allowed to have bar and sell. This news was broken to us by our distributor as soon as we met them (with a sarcastic look of 'this guy has brought bad luck to our business!'...but the shocker came from Bahrain....

We visited Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Dubai Duty Free, Abu Dhabi Duty free and our local distributor African n Eastern.....Jeff didnt bother to take me to Northern Emirates...no introductions to any of our Northern Emirates customers....our office was in Airport Free Zone...a decent office....Apart from me, we had the head of finance and three   (Venky, Pramod and Pradeep) assisting him. Syama as office receptionist/secretary, Felicity Sparrow as another secretary and marketing was looked after by, Peggy, a Lebanese..

This girl was the secretary to the ex GM-Gilbert another Lebanese, and dont know what kind of potential he saw in her, he transferred her from Beirut to Dubai to look after the marketing for the entire Gulf ( am not against bringing people from different areas and trying them but this one was unexplainable as the Beirut office also felt the same)....I found this person wanting in many areas but most of the time, she was on WFH mode (even in 2005) and it made things difficult. Keerthi was the PR guy in the office and 'go to' man for many things. 

The finance guy was a Brit and he was the head of finance for the entire gulf and north Africa region. 

There were few major issues which I inherited. Just a few months  before I took charge, Jeff changed the distribution from MMI to AnE...Let me explain this to you guys....MMI and AnE were the only distributors licensed to sell in Dubai Emirates....(Dubai is one of the states in United Arab Emirates...others being Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Umm Al Quain, Ajman, Ras Al Khaima and Fujairah ). And MMI and AnE were given licenses to operate retail stores too in Dxb local....But the major share of business in Dubai domestic used to come from on trade only as the retails were to pay some local taxes apart from the 50% import duty + can sell only to foreigners with permits + their huge margins. These two companies held the market between them very tight and never allowed outsiders to set up shop. But the beauty is, both of them were managed by the government. MMI was wholly owned by Emirates airlines whereas AnE was partly owned by the person who was the chairman of Emirates + Fosters + another partner....

And changing distribution from one to another was never heard of in DxB, earlier. Before the change of distribution AnE used to distribute PRG (Chivas Regal) and after the change, PRG went to MMI. Both MMI and AnE were the kind of CnF for Dubai Duty Free as due to space constraints DDF preferred this model and Diageo + PRG controlled more than 50% of the DDF business. And both MMI and AnE did this service with a thin margin but the volumes were much higher than the domestic business they were doing.

This change of distribution has affected Diageo with their inflight business with Emirates airlines...Emirates Airlines is one of the large buyers of alcohol as they serve generously in-flight and also in their in-flight duty free business. We lost pouring status of JW Black and Red and many other brands except Bailey's. The boss of MMI was the CEO of Emirates Airlines too...

And another stupid mistake Diageo did was to make AnE to distribute to the Northern Emirates customers discontinuing direct supplies to them. This made the NE customers very unhappy as they lost their special status. Obviously AnE would not sell at the same price but would keep some margins. All the other manufacturers including Diageo's major competitor PRG were happily supplying to the customers in NE sans Diageo.

Also apart from Duty Free and Domestic there is another very important, highly volatile and price sensitive channel called RTM (Route to Market). This term RTM is quite common but in Gulf, especially in UAE, this has a different meaning. Jebal Ali, Sharjah, Ajman and Fujairah ports are the ones used for trading to many African countries as these ports are very professionally run and completely digitalised. Since UAEs import duties are the lowest in many categories (alcohol 50% compared to India's 164%) many customers from Africa, Eastern Europe, Middle East throng UAE to get best deals and lift stocks from here. Alcohol is also majorly traded thru these ports to different parts of the world including Europe. Also since major brands in alcohol and beer are price sensitive, the UAE customers especially the ones based at Northern Emirates always look for the best global prices. Whatever the manufacturers do in terms of stopping these parallel trading, no one has every succeeded as it is only illegal from the manufacturers point and not from governments side.

So coming to the issues which I was handed over...

1) AnE, based on certain forecasting model devised by them, had ordered some huge quantities and opened with almost 5 months stocks.

2) Diageo increased the prices just before my arrival and the market got flooded with stocks as everyone encashed on the price advantage.

3) AnE's stocks which included the RTM (they were given exclusivity for UAE) were stuck as RTM channel started buying from other global players where the rates were still cheaper.

4) The NE customers were quite unhappy with Diageo's decision and hence started supporting Chivas Regal big time.

5) Aer Rienta another operator (primarily DF) was based at Bahrain and they were also, god knows why, given the RTM channel to supply. My predecessor who was looking after these RTM business based at Cyprus (see how Diageo was managing their business) has dumped some of these customers and one of them was Aer Rienta....And sadly their RTM was based on one customer and that customer stopped buying and hence they were stuck with huge stocks. Inundated with so much of problems...

And guys, I had numbers to deliver and no one was interested in stories. First couple of review meetings with Simon as head (these nuances never could get in to his head, sadly) this RTM issue and the overstocking at AnE and Aer Rienta was brushed aside...

So, I have to fight my own battle...clear the stocks first and then start getting the numbers. 

So clean up operations and aggressive push was required, which I think is my forte....

This and more in the following episodes....

 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.... 

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

Episode 27...

Diageo India....month after month, the performance started getting better and better....

There are some areas worth sharing here....

As mentioned in one of my earlier post, the GOI that time announced 5% roll back allowance for the hospitality sector on their forex earnings....this means if some one earns a revenue of say $200, they can buy things for $10 completely duty free...they have to just pay the local taxes..(there was no GST then)....the idea of GOI was this would attract more tourists to these venues and they can provide imported alcohol, beer and wine at a lower price. While the idea of the GOI was good but it didnt happen that way as the hotels looked at it as an additional income and never bothered to cut down the prices and there was no nodal agency to monitor this too....but we the manufacturers started enjoying better business for our imported brands. Wherever we could, we impressed upon the hotels to part a major portion of the benefits for their banquets....and it helped them to improve their income from the banquets...this was circa 2001/2...do not know whether it is still continued...if it is, the GOI should stop it now as it only drains their exchequer and benefits only the hotel industry....

Also many of these hotels and on trade, strike deals with the manufacturers and get their brands at a discounted price and make those brands as 'pouring' brands. What this means? When a consumer goes to a bar and ask for JW the consumer would get JW but if the consumer asks for scotch, they would get the brand which is the hotels 'pouring' brand...while the manufacturer has to shell out some additional (some time huge depending upon the power of the brand/company) money for making their brands to enjoy the 'pouring' status, it helps the manufacturers to get some decent volume plus greater visibility and trials.

Sudeep did a great job in getting Taj group and Oberoi as partners for us....he is a great negotiator and hence after lots of personal meetings with the F&B and purchase team, we signed off with these two...but the logistics were a nightmare as the supplies have to be effected from the respective distributor situated across the country....it was also a problem when the WS was controlled by state government run corporations....but Sudeep managed this well with his team. This had given us some great visibility across the country and also image and appreciations from HO....SMV and JW were the pouring brands in these chains....We took this model across and tied up with many hotels for pouring..Delhi where we were weak traditionally, went for a course correction and we cracked some great deals....

In the DF sector, Krithi got settled well and with his focus on numbers, we achieved our goals month after month.

But there were always issues with Alpha/the Colombo DF operator.... issues kept cropping up very frequently....

We felt, the domestic market of SL should be strengthened and decided to go for local bottling of SMV. We tied up with ID Lanka using my relationship with Mohan Dissanayake and set the ball rolling. The problem was SL did not have local grain ENA and hence it has to be imported from India....we managed things well and John G cracked every single issue and within 3 months we started bottling SMV in SL at a very affordable price. We wanted to give the distribution to ID Lanka as they had a better distribution set up across the country vis a vis Alphas Colombo centric but Paul T didnt want to let go....so we went for a compromise formula and in the process made all the stake holders happy.

We had a fantastic launch party and the entire Colombo glitterati was present in our party...it became the talk of the town...so another mile stone achieved...

In another get together event, Krithi invited Mahendar of Flemingo for the party and Paul T got very psyched seeing Mahender and threw a tantrum at Krithi and also called me on phone and complained....the reason being, Flemingo was trying to get some port DF business in SL and that has upset Alpha....but as the Karma would have it, Paul T, few years ago joined Flemingo as a consultant!!! Karma at its best.....Apart from these kind of occasional outbursts our relationship strengthened as we were always there for any upliftment of business with our partners. 

CIAL, where Alpha was their logistics partner only, was one area we struggled to get the business improving. In India Cochin Airport DF was the best those days as others were managed by ITDC and in places like TVM and Calicut it was Flemingo....small and dingy and not consumer friendly...but Cochin Airport was global standard but the problem was continuous availability of stocks...Also as a company, we were not getting the best price possible from CIAL due to the tie up CIAL had with Alpha as we need to supply at the same price of Alpha and Alpha would build in their margins and supply. We wanted CIAL to buy directly but despite number of attempts, that didnt materialise at all.

Dhaka duty free was small but managed well by our agent Babu there...Nepal continued to pose problems but we managed to get Alpha and our agent Pramod to tie up on some kind of payment guarantee understanding....this helped us in the short run...the domestic business was excellent....

Bhutan is one area we didnt have to do anything....we just made one trip there to show our faces to the operators.....2 containers a year...nothing more and nothing less....and we were the first ones to visit the DF operator from UDV/Diageo (!)

But we built our RTM very well by tapping the best of bonders....and channelising the demands well. Nandish was brilliant and with proper management of stocks in his bond, things have started going well.

We had few overseas trips (the leadership team) and it was always fun. Half a day review and balance of time just moving around together and bonding well.

As mentioned earlier, Nalin Garg was one of our best HR guys....I remember, once I was home alone (folks were off on a holiday to Kerala) and I got a viral attack....Nalin came one evening around 4ish and spent time with me till 9.....just to give me company....he watched some stupid movie on the TV, ordered food, ate with me and left....such a wonderful gesture....

We as a team jelled very well....regular outings and leadership meets....and our reviews were crisp and to the point...

We had Nira (our own) and USL plant at Nasik but had to shift as we sold off Nira and we didnt continue our JV with USL....and fortune favoured us....Vishal Jaiswal set up a plant to bottle only Diageo brands at Aurangabad....and totally to Diageo standard.....we all went for the Bhoomi puja....and it became operational in 6 months flat....thats the efficiency of Vishal and his team. This plant helped our manufacturing team to produce world class without any compromise....

We started bottling Black & White, Vat 69, Entire SMV range, Gilbey's gin et al at this new plant.

Also built a strong relationship with the Maharashtra excise. Mr. Ramakrishnan was the excise commissioner during that time and what a wonderful bureaucrat he was.....always welcoming and ready to extend a helping hand and clear the road blocks....I feel Maharashtra excise department is one of the best in the country.

We also tied up with AABL at Indore, during this time to bottle our SMV there....we used to buy grain ENA from them and they had bottling facility too.....the idea being to supply the entire north and some parts of east from AABL... Anand Kedia the owner, young and energetic....wonderful guy to deal with....

UK was looking at a break through, in terms of business growth and as I had mentioned earlier, the agenda was to grow the super premium in India...the sale was coming from DF shops but that was not commensurate with the potential of this segment...Andrew Morgan and team were after us to come out with some concrete plans....they called us to 8, HP London for a review....the leadership team decided to send me and Amar Raj....and I was mandated to do the presentation....we wanted UK to see the potential in India for local bottling of JW Red and also the lobbying required to bring down the prices of BIO brands.....also look at local bottling of J&B with our world class facilities at KAM in Aurangabad....

If you are not used to the way of Brits working and also how the reviews are conducted, here the brief....

The meeting, mostly starts at 0800hrs....and everyone is there...there would be simple and nice BF spread in the conference room itself....and everything is as per the timelines....lunch is normally at around 1230 and goes for an hour and in our case it was in the ground floor of 8, HP....a beautiful bar with snacks.....and meeting gets over at 430....then to a pub nearby for a beer and straight for dinner....

Andrew Morgan chaired this meeting.....and there was some initial butterflies in my stomach as it was a huge opportunity for me to showcase my potential as a strategist and a potential CEO material...Simon Lenton was there too and other HO guys....the show started and went off perfectly well.....and all the questions were directed at me and Amar took a back seat and allowed me to hog all the lime light....it was one of my best days and our guys in Bombay office was anxious to know the outcome....so during the breaks a call to Bombay office...no whatsapp those days....whether things progressed on the dotted lines? 1) They realised lobbying is the most important thing and reduction in duties would make our brands affordable and coupled with our distribution strength in terms of availability the projected volumes can come thru...2) They were not keen on bottling either Red Label or J&B outside India but agreed to bottle some other scotch brand.....3) They agreed to release some funds from the central kitty for ATL and also send one of their master distiller/Blender to conduct the 'Journey of taste' sessions...part of the  experiential marketing.....Ian Williams was the guy assigned to India...Master Distiller at our Cardu unit.....This journey of taste was a huge hit with consumers....to cut the cost we started doing this consumer direct contact program with local talents. Another improvisation by team India. Santosh Kanekar as the marketing head was a relaxed, cool and easy to get along guy....he did a great job with initially Ashu as the BM and later Mohit.....

The leadership team jelled so well and Amar was a great boss to work with. Sridhar was a great support as head of finance and so as Nalin as head of HR. Nalin had a great equation with Simon the HR head of our cluster....

And we got Keith Taylor as our boss. Keith used to be part of Nigerian operations and got shifted to UK to manage India, Africa and ME....Another great boss to work with. 

When the UK team comes for review, initially we used to take them out to some nice joints for drinks and dinner but realised it would exceed our budgets and changed the venue to our guest house where Amar was staying. And it turned out to be a great idea as everyone appreciated this private setting and the expenses were cut down...

Krithi and Sudeep did a magnificent job and those 3 years were the best of times in my career. We all bonded so well and there was no back biting and there was so much of bonhomie and the targets were achieved in the 11th month itself and things were so smooth. 

Diageo keeps coming out with something or other. They introduced something called Break through thinking and appointed this two member team who promoted this concept to conduct sessions on this...our divisions boss, Andrew Morgan got transferred to manage the Europe cluster and we got Stuart Fletcher in his place. Stuart a great guy but I didnt see any major contribution coming from him (!)....Team India were the Heros from 2002 to 2005 as we kept delivering our numbers...the going was so good....but....

One fine evening, at the closing time, Sridhar and Nalin barged in to my cabin, shut the door and broke this heart breaking news.....

Next episode..... 

.....

 Navratri/Navratra.’

In Tamil Nadu, this festival is celebrated with lots of devotion, getting together of friends and families and singing to glory. In other parts of India its fasting time and in Gujarat its Gharba and Dandia time…..In Delhi the beheading of the evil headed Ravana at the Ram Leela grounds takes place on the Vijayadashami   day….

This is the time to invoke the power of Shakthi within you by meditating on the Universal Divine power of Shakthi, celebrate the power of womanhood and rejoice the victory of dharma over the evil pulls within oneself.

I recall, during my childhood, this Navarathri festival is something we used to look forward to....1) Schools closed and 2) different varieties of 'Prashads' offered during this time in our neighbourhoods.....especially the 'Sundals'....

‘Kolu’ - a display of toys and artefacts with topical themes across homes during this period-no two Kolus would be similar/identical…the preparations would start at least a week earlier with the women folks at home putting together their ideas of what and how things should be displayed and converting their imagination in to reality….of course the men and the boys would extend a helping hand in putting up the stands and fixing it up to withstand the weight. In our home, these toys would be taken out from the 'paran' a kind of loft or you can say 'mezzanine' floor...these toys are kept in 'trunk boxes' in safe conditions....climbing on a ladder to the 'paran' itself would be a task and with not much of light, groping and getting the trunk without getting injured....

The fun starts from day 1 when the neighbours and friends in the vicinity start paying visits…well dressed and with excitement written on faces…mostly women….men stay at home as this is considered 100% a women thingy….The invitees, necessarily have to sing and mostly it would be Carnatic ‘keerthanas’ to invoke the blessings of the Divine Shakthi and also showcase their talents…..and many a times ‘match making’ would also happen. The aspiring to be MSS, MLVs et al....and most of them, due to their good coaching in Carnatic, would be excellent....

The boys would also dress up well to get noticed by their beloved ones and can be seen running around assisting the women at home….

From 5 to around 8 it would be fun n excitement time every day for the 10 days….one has to give company to the sisters and aunts at home when they go for the visits to the neighbourhood…..and in the process not only fill their stomachs but also their hearts and eyes with the divine ‘Prashads’ and the lovely n fully decked up girls…..Bonding  at its best….with the neighbours….

And of course, there would be also ‘gossips’ on what’s happening around and who is eyeing who kind of stuff….

For the students the ‘Saraswati puja’ day is very special as all their school books and things connected with their study would be kept in the ‘prayer room’ not to be touched for a full 24 hours….no pressure to study and do anything….mind you there used to be no internet or computer….or TV….so just play the whole day, eat well and keep eating……

Now a days, I feel, Kolu has become high tech and more of a formality than spending quality time…..And the ‘Prashads’ are mostly  by your caterers/Krishna n Grand Sweets….very few indulge in making things at home….and there is pressure to shoot and post on social media....and when you receive one, you have to immediately press the 'like' button...

Mani Ratnam and ARR westernised the whole ‘Kolu’ singing in Alaipayudhey and later ARR in ‘Kandukonden Kandukonden’…..

And many have forgotten the ‘concept’….primarily to get-together…and rejoice…..and know the neighbours well and bond better…..children are stuck with their home work and loads of tuition et al…..the Puja holidays were done away with, in TN....villages are no more the same...the 'serial' factor, YouTube, OTTs...T20's...and many a places only the seniors living alone with their children either in other cities (employed/studying) or overseas...  The place where I stay now, ‘Kolu’ is kept at the lounge and every day one family would do the ‘puja’ and offer ‘Prashad’ made at their respective homes….

Those who are reading this….My advice is to re invent....bring back the tradition…..use this occasion to visit friends and relatives and spend time with them….meditate….make ‘Prashad’ at home and in plenty….distribute….Sing and dance….enjoy these 10 days and most important….on the ‘Saraswati Puja’ day-avoid browsing and WhatsApp….spend time on prayers and meditation….and pass on your love to the fellow souls…..If you are a musician just deep dive in to it….or just listen to soulful music….And above all, hold on to the traditions....Our land is blessed with divine power.....inculcate this habit in to our children....today is just the second day of Navratri....if you havent done anything this year till now, pl start from today or tomorrow....

May Goddess Shakthi bless you and all your beloved ones with her choicest.

Jai Mata Di!!!

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

Episode 25...

IDV----journey continues....

The international brands division started delivering more than expectations and how.. 1) we plugged the loopholes in our distribution and RTM 2) Made major inroads in to Alpha-Colombo and ITDC 3) Managed the Delhi, Chennai and Bombay bonders...we had one in Calcutta too....4) In the domestic front, since there was no volume pressure could manage the receivables well and inventories with our distributors and focus on the 20:80 formula well....and more than anything the domestic team was so upbeat being called as the JW team....for many it was a kind of dream come true....

Nepal we had an agent only to manage the DF, as mentioned earlier, a local man and very elderly. Once I was in Trivandrum to visit the DF at the airport and I got a call from DR that I have to come to Delhi next day and fly out to Kathmandu to meet this person. I had to meet another important customer that evening in Cochin and drove down to Cochin from TVM and met this customer late evening and next day morning to Delhi to Kathmandu. Nepal DF is run by the government but this gentleman was our agent for ages (appointed by UD---those days, as mentioned earlier, UD never used to visit market and managed many a markets thru their distributors and agents only due to the size of the business). Oh what a meeting it turned out to be....our idea was to sack this person and appoint our local distributor to look after the DF too, as this person was unable to deliver..he brought his friend for the meeting and he acted as his spokesperson (excellent guy) and somehow he convinced DR that he is the best option we have in Nepal to manage the DF....hah.....back to square one....we will discuss this Nepal later...

The rumour on Diageo hiving off the domestic division in India started gaining momentum and we started getting visitors from UK but all hush hush....one guy who was kept on his toes was Rodney as he was privy to what was happening. Diageo HQ announced finally their decision to sell off domestic portfolio of Gilbey's range, polychem brands along with the bottling unit at Nira-Maharashtra.....and appointed a consulting firm to oversee the process..forgot the name of the company. The moment it got announced DR had expressed his intent to bid and Diageo decided that as an insider it would be conflict of interest and hence DR had to resign his job....that was a tough moment for all of us-the entire team....my association with DR dates back to 1988 from my AP days in HL..I still remember his first visit to Hyderabad as VP HL and our instant bonding...he came home for a cup of coffee.....our families also bonded well.....he was my mentor and played a major role in shaping me up and also in every movement of mine and had so much of confidence in my skills and capabilities and potential. Another thing which upset the apple cart was the insecurity it had created with the entire team....everyone knew that once the domestic brands are gone along with the plant there would be lots of pink slips...

And the parleys have started....every news was from the grapevine and nothing official. DR had to have partners to bid and he started approaching all his known contacts and few had shown interest but it kept fizzling out at the last minute....DR also got relieved from Diageo and all his time and focus was to get the right kind of partner...many other domestic companies were also in the run but finally when it got announced, we all got totally taken aback....DR pulled it off in partnership with VJM..this was the twist.....DR was jubilant as the final amount paid to Diageo was zilch.....from what Diageo started as first quote and what they finally got (!).....and DR named his new company as Triumph Distillers and Vintners (TDV) and set up a fantastic office in Parel....with the full backing of VJMs brand value....Bhanu Kaila our ex employee joined him as sales head and Rahul Tandon as head of marketing....I used to visit his office regularly and spend time with him as it was always a nice feeling to be with him sans the 'deliverance' pressures!!!

Amar Raj Singh, who was handling EA in Diageo India, under DR, was promoted as CEO...Amar was such an excellent boss to work with....completely hands off and left everything to the department heads and we need to only report to him if there were some issues. He didnt shift to Bombay but used to come on Tuesday morning and leave either on Friday morning or evening. He stayed few buildings away from our office in the guest house, earlier taken for our visiting managers....and it used to be always fun. He was a total contrast to DR....the office atmosphere became lighter....

Rodney left and Sridhar Iyer got promoted as head of finance...another great guy to work with...he is heading Pfizer India as CEO now...John George got promoted as head of manufacturing (Dr Puri left)....and the new leadership felt Anupam Datta of no great shake and hence he left and in his place Santosh Kanekar got recruited as head of marketing...Sudeep was promoted as National Sales manager...Ashu as head of West and East and Gaurav Sabarwal as head of North and East....the leadership was ably assisted at HO level in all departments...we had some excellent guys in finance in Pramod Menon (he got transferred to Diageo Dubai, later), Atul (he is still with Diageo in Taiwan), Jayesh....and in manufacturing we recruited some new faces too... Satwinder Singh was one of them...HR was also pruned down...Paul Varghese and Roland part of HR....two great guys...Rajinder Rao as head of IT...Pervin Setna left and joined DR at TDV...and we recruited Andria as Amar's secretary...young and full of energy....Maria continued as my secretary...Yasmin continued to look after the logistics of DF and international imports...Sarah continued as Sridhar's secretary....Asha part of HR and admin....Ashish Monga as head of Bombay sales ably assisted by Rustom and Rajesh Israni....Rustom another rock star and currently he is based at HK and managing the DF business for PRG....Sandeep Damdare was made the ASM for rest of Maharashtra based at Pune....As Daman and MP were small business, it was directly under Ashu..

Nalin recruited Darpan Kaur as BM for SMV and white spirits....another great find...Darpan came with full of ideas and she immediately jelled with the team well....it was more of quality selling with focus on visibility and consumer pull and trade promotions....this doesn't mean there was no pressure on volumes but the quantum was lesser....Darpan was ably assisted by Gaurav Rao....(Darpan went on a transfer to Diageo Singapore and later came back to India and happily settled down well in Goa now)

(This is something I forgot in my earlier posts and hence doing it now....I recruited Vikas Bhatia when I got transferred to Bombay in 95 as TSE for Bombay...this guy came down to Bombay and his dream was to act in films....but that didnt work out...but this guy was a huge Rajesh Khanna fan and in all our meetings he used to imitate kaka and make us all laugh. He did very well in his role and got transferred to Delhi as RSE....and later left and joined Red Bull and still continuing there....)

Jasraj wanted to come back to Bombay and we had to oblige and transferred Rahul to SL....another great guy...full of energy and pleasing personality....he immediately settled down in Colombo and became a darling of the Alpha team....retained Ravinder at Kathmandu....

I was given the task of who has to stay and who has to go...Nalin and me worked this out well and Nalin was very supportive and with great inputs...also Sridhar...he almost knew everyone in the company as he was also part of the system for quite some time.....calling someone and telling them that they do not have a space in the company and made redundant is something which doesn't go well with many people...as the news breaker you have to be totally composed and listen...mind you, this is not on performance based...its more of redundancy.... Sudeep as National sales manager also took some responsibilities in terms of communication to the employees.. one of the toughest task I encountered in my career but I think I handled it well with the total support of the leadership team. Every department had to break this news to their team but the difference was that in sales the numbers were much higher and the bonding ran much deeper...but what helped me was also the high probability of TDL absorbing many of our front line guys...Arunkumar, who was looking after DF, left and we recruited Krithivasan. Krithi and self were friends from my HL Madurai days....Krithi was with McD then...Krithi from Mcd shifted to Parry to Titan and later to a company based at Singapore with HQ as HCM city in Vietnam. He wanted to come back to India (this was around 2001 I think) and that time I put a word with Venky who was heading South for SAB Miller....Krithi got the job and was based at Bangalore, and was happy too selling beer....I felt Krithi would fit the DF job well and without any second thoughts, I called Krithi as soon as Arun left and  briefed him on the position....after some dithering finally he joined us....Rajkumar another great sales guy, got shifted to Bombay to look after CSD business....

We made Krishnakumar as head of South with just a 3 members team in KTK, 2 in AP and 1 in Chennai to look after the small BII business in TN and UT...We had George, Kannan and Mudhappa in Blr....Transferred Vipin to AP to work under Srinivas who was made ASE for AP....Vipin another great guy....very sharp and clear communications....he is currently managing the DF business for PRG based at DxB....We also had Binoy Karunakaran as part of our team in Bombay....another fantastic guy....he left Diageo later and joined PRG in India and had a stint in DxB looking after their domestic business in UAE...sadly I could not accomodate KGR. And he wanted to try his hand on some business in AP but with in few months he realised thats not his forte...I spoke to Rajasekar who was in SWC-Bombay that time for KGR and KGR got a job with SWC based at Blr....this was a major relief for me as I felt I let him down at that time.

The team was small and set...after a long wait, I got promoted as COO.....that was out of blue in terms of timing and of course, I was  much elated...Amar and Nalin were instrumental in that...another thing here...Nalin, as soon as he joined looked at my CTC and felt so embarrassed that a senior guy in Diageo was paid pittance.....he corrected my CTC-and it was a huge jump- and also that of Sudeep and some other key guys....the day I got promoted as COO, the announcement came in the evening around 5ish...and we had some event in the evening at Taj......DR was an invitee there and he called me aside and congratulated me on my promotion....I should have called him and conveyed this but it just slipped my mind due to some pressure in the office that day and he felt very hurt that he has to hear it from someone else and not me.

Diageo PLC those days had grouped the markets in to Major, key and emerging markets....and each of these were handled by very able guys...Ivan who was instrumental in the Diageo-PRG-Seagram brands integration got promoted and was sent to US to head the Americas....Andrew Morgan became the boss of emerging markets,  based at 8, HP, London...Simon, Nalin's functional boss, was the HR head...and we got in to the good books of Simon, thanks to Nalin's way of handling.......Paul Walch was the CEO of Diageo PLC and Nick Ross was the CFO...great team....and there was also this policing division to keep a track of global movement of stocks and to stop parallel sales...every bottle of Diageo brands had a tracking number and our job was, whenever anything suspicious, to pick the tracking number and pass on to the team in UK and with in a maximum of 48 hours we would know from which market the stocks landed at this shelf....such an efficient team but they could not stop parallel movements.... 

Finally things started settling down with the new team in place. We need to get better numbers for JW series and other BIO global brands..we also got some French wines (B&G) in to our portfolio and slowly everyone outside India started looking at India with keen interest...We made huge inroads in to the DF business. Flemingo international a DxB based trading company entered the Indian DF business in partnership with the Ahujas of Bombay. They got their first DF shop in Trivandrum and later in Chennai, Calicut, Mangalore et al....Thampi of Holiday Marine in Ajman, set up his bond in Cochin and we started getting some business from him but we had to tread carefully as these customers are known for parallel trading....Even stocks supplied to Flemingo came under radar due to their trading connections....

Those 9 to 12 months was very exciting as well as emotionally draining due to the pruning down and integration....

So Diageo India finally became a true Global brands company.....

Lots of new things and how we went about carving out new business and starting of KAM and our local bottling of SMV in SL....in the next episode....

Till then keep safe!!!

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

Episode 24...

IDV----journey continues....

As said in my earlier post, creation of the international brands division has resulted in improved focus and delivering better numbers for all our international brands both BII and BIO. We got a consistent business coming from the bonders especially from Delhi (tough nuts to crack) and also from RR and Fairmax in Chennai.....

I need to also mention here about Yusuf Shamsi who was my teams CAM (consumer activation manager)....his job was the most unenviable one as the job involves managing the marketing BTMs thru the sales team....the mktg team has certain KRAs and sometimes those are made on the desk tops without understanding the ground realities and the sales guy would resist those knowing well the difficulties involved....and CAM has to manage it well without upsetting the apple cart....we had one BM for JW portfolio and BII scotches but a difficult guy...very intelligent and good but didnt have any clue on local issues and very rude with others....dont want to name that person here...but the money bag was with him....while the ATLs were never the issues with the sales guys as it was on dotted line with the global brand team (no one can change the guidelines without written approval....) the BTL, where it involved local issues, the BM was never supportive and that created lots of stress for Yusuf....we wanted to do a proper launch of JW series in the domestic market after appointing Suntan as our single window distributor. The idea was to create awareness with the trade that they can buy JW from the local distributors appointed by Diageo, instead of buying from grey and bonders-where the quality of the product would be suspect. We cut the company's margin and also negotiated with our distributors for a lesser margins and arrived at an attractive MRP for the consumers. Also were convinced that with availability and accessibility we can get some better volumes from the domestic trade...Yusuf wanted to create a trade brochure highlighting these and also the portfolio of Diageo brands 'now available under one roof'- we went ahead and created it-a day before the Bombay launch the BM got his hands on this and decided to dump it as Yusuf didnt get his consent before going for print....just ego and nothing else....I spoke to the BM very politely not letting my anger take over, but he didnt want to listen....and I didnt personally feel there was anything wrong with the brochures....it was just a copy and paste from the global communication....period....I got so upset and shot out a mail to the BM with cc to Anupam Dutta and DR et al. It was a Friday late evening...the mails were thru Diageo server....After sending the mail and going thru the same I realised I was very aggressive on the mail and felt bad rather awful..didnt know how to stop the mails reaching the mail box of the receivers....called Rajender Rao who was heading the IT and requested him to come to the office immediately. He was an asset to us and he understood the issues and came to the office within few minutes of my call....he went to the server room and managed to delete the mail reaching the mail boxes of the recipients....great relief for me and Yusuf....on Monday I went to DR and explained the whole issue and told him that we are going ahead with the launch with the same brochure...surprisingly DR was okay with that and called the brand manager and gave him a the required coating....

I am quoting this incident here not to malign the BM but to make the readers to understand on how to manage the internal stake holders without hurting the business and also managing the timelines.....in alcohol industry its the BTL which plays a major role as the TVCs are with surrogates and many a times consumers do not even understand the messages, whereas thru the BTLs we reach the targeted consumers faster and better...these are visibility drives, loyalty programs, dealer incentives, trade push, consumer contact programs, offers at the point of consumption and trials....et al...to increase the consumption of the brands....if run well with proper communication at the POP level....I am not saying ATLs - the TVCs, cinema hall ads, hoardings, sponsorships et al - do not work....it does work wonders but you need very deep pockets to manage these....as just a few TVCs or hoardings with your surrogate would take you nowhere....it should be in the scale of what Kingfisher-Royal Stag, Blenders Pride-Imperial Blue or McD No 1 do....if you dont have this kind of money dont even bother about ATLs.....just focus on consumer and customer driven activations to get your volumes...once the traction is achieved go for the kill....we will talk about the gulf markets where BTL is the only way of promoting your brand and how it helps the brands to deliver volumes-in the next episodes....

Barring these hiccups the run was smooth as there was no volume pressure since the focus was on promotions and visibilities. 

RR, the Bombay bonder who was supplying to the local trade, was very upset as we gave the distribution of BIO to our domestic distributors and in fact he threatened me and Nandish with dire consequences-and he had a gun license too.....(!)

We managed these threats and insecurities expressed our customers by just focussing on servicing their orders at a lesser cost incurred by them earlier when they were importing directly...in fact Suntan could deliver smaller quantities to them at their doors....

Diageo PLC realised that the domestic brands in India-the Green label et al were just pulling the company down due to very thin margins and also the tough competition from the domestic players and also PRG....so 8, Henrietta Place started looking at India differently and also started looking at me as a strategist....(!) from just being a salesman....guys pl also note that whatever you do and successfully too, pl ensure that you beat your own trumpet very well and in max audio....never be modest about it....do not allow the 'sticker' to be put by your boss.....the HO should know your potential and what you are delivering...

In one of the review meeting which was headed by Ivan at our Bombay office, it was only by the leadership team-I started off my presentation by saying 'we bring cash to the table for the marketing team to blow it'.....it was a below the belt for Anupam Datta and co but I said it in a jest....there was a pin drop silence in the room for few seconds before Ivan burst in to laughter.....DR after the meeting got over, called me and patted me and said that my statement made the atmosphere quite easy as Ivan was not happy about the green label contributions. I made it a point to highlight that despite a small team how the Global divisions in India delivered the numbers and bottom line....the mantra being focussed approach....this made Ivan to go deeper in to the business model of India and paved way for declaring selling off the Green label portfolio....(shock waves, rather)....

This and more in the next blogs.....

Cheers