It is inspiring to hear the stories of young entrepreneurs who have built their own businesses with passion and pride. In this post,fulfil we bring to you the story of of a Snapdeal seller who lost almost everything in the Chennai floods in 2015. He continued to work hard irrespective of the challenges that life threw at him, making the most of every opportunity that came along.
I learned about the value of money very early in life
I grew up in a small village called Pallapatti, located in the foothills of Kodaikanal. My father was a farmer there. We lost him while I was still studying. As we tried hard to move learned about the value of money very early in life. In school, once my teacher asked what I wanted to be when I grow up, my spontaneous response was to be a rich man. I was never scared to work hard. I knew I had to do it. At 18 years, in my quest to start earning alongside my studies, I sourced T-shirts from Tirupur and started selling their customized version online. There was hardly any money but found this to be a good start. I completed my engineering and joined a leading consultancy firm. I got the opportunity to work on an onsite project and moved to Chicago. The USA was going through a major e-commerce boom back then. It was exciting to experience the online shopping buzz that Amazon had spread. E-commerce was the future of commerce, and I was fortunate to be able to witness it first hand! I brought back some food for thought when I returned to India in 2013 to get married. My father-in-law helped me to start a wholesale stitching unit in Chennai. I invested all my savings to procure quality fabric, machinery and recruited a small team as the first few steps towards expansion. While my father-in-law took care of the manufacturing, I worked with my wife to understand and generate business opportunities in the Indian market. In December 2015, as we started to stabilize and grow in the offline market, our city got hit by one of the worst rainfalls that flooded the entire city. The entire stock in the warehouse got washed away and our business suffered a major setback. We were back to zero and had to restart from scratch. I took this as an indication from the Supreme Power to change our course. Inspired by the online buzz abroad, and knowing that the time was ripe, we decided to take our business online.
The swift registration process on Snapdeal gave us the confidence that we were on the right track
In March 2016, I initiated the registration process on the top 3 online portals in the country. While I was still working hafulfillconditions on other portals, Snapdeal registration was completed and approved. This swiftness was a big encouragement to our hope and an indication that we were on the right path. It took me about half a day to upload my products and within a couple of days our listings were approved and were live. The user-friendly seller portal empowered us to take our assortment online in just a few clicks. I feared excel sheets and formulas but on Snapdeal the steps were simple and easy to follow.
Our business has grown 3x in the last 1.5 years with Snapdeal
Snapdeal account managers have played a very critical role in the way our business expanded in such a short time. They have worked closely with us like mentors helping us to understand what kind of product lines have scope. The portal is intuitive to let the sellers know the top selling items that are trending. This feature enabled us to understand what kind of products have an opportunity to grow and at what price points. This is what enabled us to choose our range of traditional kids-wear line. It was awesome to know that someone is always supervising our business closely to not let any slip happen in the day to day business operations.
Snapdeal nurtures and cares for its stakeholders
One thing that has always been constant at Snapdeal is the commitment to upgrade the processes and technology. We are pleasantly surprised by the new feature innovations that Snapdeal keeps working towards. As a seller on Snapdeal, I feel that my voice is heard and there is somebody out there who cares if we have a process concern. The payments are timely and we know what to expect and when. This is critical for managing business operations.
Snapdeal has empowered us to be a brand that consumers follow
The uniqueness we bring to our brand has been very important for an identity that Snapdeal has helped us to build. We feel proud when people find us and follow on Facebook. Customer reviews and ratings have played a very critical role. They not only help us spread the good word about our Brand but also help build a lot of credibility. This trust and belief that customers have been able to have on us are very precious to me.
The Snapdeal Seller Excellence Award is a token of respect for our commitment
This certificate means a lot to us. It is an attestation of our success in the online business world that was only our hope and aspiration 2 years ago. Snapdeal has been a true business partner who has worked relentlessly to help us grow and spread our wings. There is a personal connection with the team that inspired trust in us and gave us the courage to work our way forward. The pride and joy our team experienced for being acknowledged are priceless. There are miles to go for us as a business but with Snapdeal they are only milestones waiting to be achieved.
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