An interview with the street vendor and some management lessons emerging therein…

This is a story of street vendor named Mr. Ashok Ramdev Gupta doing business of clothes from past 25 years in an unorganized sector. Mr.Gupta started his business at the age of 30 years with the help of his elder sister. Setting up a business involves too many challenges such as choosing the location that would eventually help in publicity.

Business capital investment is another important decision. The vendor should know how much capital should be invested for earning better profit The important job of the vendor is to fix the price of product as per the price of the competitor. Demand forecasting is the biggest challenge. Vendor needs to purchase the clothes from the wholesaler and he has to pay rent for the place he is utilizing as his shop. The order has to be placed as per the demand in the market. At times, there is shortage of goods in the market, so in such a case the vendor forecasts the future demand and place the order by giving high price as compared to the actual price of the product.

Since it is a monopolistic market, customers have choice of buying similar products from different sellers. Out of the total capital it is considered that 60% is investment and 40% is profit earning. Since the clothes are durable goods which reduces the chance of damage in transit and since they are ordered in bulk it becomes heavy to carry which results in high transportation cost. Street vendor don’t have fix place and they have to migrate from one place to another. The vendor earns on a daily basis based on the sale of the product. They don’t have fix holidays on festivals or any other occasions. If they take leave for one day it becomes difficult for them to survive the another day comfortably.

Since there is no fix place of a vendor, building customer relations becomes a challenge and is an art. At times there is an entry of new vendor selling same product which may also result in conflicts among the vendors. Every town or area have fix market days, for example in Ambernath, there is ‘Monday market’.The products which are sold in these markets are sold at cheaper rates. This day is mostly very productive and gives good returns to the street vendors.

Mr. Gupta says that having experience of 25 years, it is easy to handle customers of different types. At times there is a negotiation among the sellers and the customers to reduce the price of the products. Customer satisfaction is the main objective of every vendor today in order to sustain the customer in near future. So,vendors make settlement so that the seller will be able to earn profit and the customer should also be satisfied by the product. There are chances where it is a loose-win situation, it means the seller has to agree on the price of the customer or there can be win-win situation, it means the customer as well as vendor are suitable at that price. Past experience helps the vendor in building a relationship with the wholesaler which helps in maintaining trust among the wholesaler and retailer.

Demand for some products is seasonal. For example umbrella,raincoat has a demand only in rainy season. Being a single seller handling a large number of customers it becomes difficult for the vendor to pay attention to his health. Sometimes the vendor don’t get time to have lunch or dinner because of the customer demands. It becomes inconvenience for the vendors to sell goods during the rains as it damages the goods. Income is not fixed as somedays there can be a high profits due to high demand or vice versa. Having advantage of internet the vendor would be able to place an order and can provide choice of the clothes by having the images forwarded through mobile phone as it takes less time. Sewing machine was the best innovation in the field of clothing industry as it helped in the manufacturing of clothes quickly in reasonable time which also helped in production in bulks.

MANAGEMENT LESSONS:

Business Strategy.
Fixation of prices.
Customer satisfaction.
Demand forecasting.
Managing workpressure.
Work life balance.