Young and ambitious entrepreneur Omkar Gaonkar conceptualises his vision of eco-friendly and green solutions to ecological concerns with Beaumonde Lifestyles.
Fascinated by the idea of having his own business, 21 year old Omkar Gaonkar founded his venture Beaumonde Lifestyles which he currently operates from his residence in Taleigao.
Speaking of how Beaumonde Lifestyles happened, Omkar says that after graduating in Commerce from Vidhya Prabhodini College, he knew that he wanted to get into the entrepreneurial space, however was a bit unsure of what his product was going to be.
Being an environment lover, he was intrigued by the idea of coming up with an eco friendly substitute to plastic. Upon further researching the idea, he discovered that cotton bags could be a viable option. Cotton being re-usable and washable, could be used for multiple purposes. Omkar then went on to visit various cotton manufacturing hubs like Erode, Mumbai, Solapur, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, etc that aided him in establishing connections with prominent cotton fabric manufacturers.
Elaborating on what Beaumonde Lifestyles is all about, Omkar says that he started off with cotton bags, and soon realized that it was getting difficult to keep up with costs as he was not manufacturing the bags and could not provide customisations to his clientele. That is when he decided to set up a small manufacturing unit of his own at Bhiwandi, Mumbai under the name ‘Green Planet Packaging’. Initially it was hard gathering clients as he found fierce competition in the form of fabric bags made from synthetic fiber, even though his environmentally friendly clients were in regular contact.
Omkar’s plan for the year 2020-21 was to venture into trendy handbags and shoulder bags. However, all his ideas came crashing down when the globe was struck by the COVID-19 catastrophe leading to the collapse of the consumer market. Nevertheless, Omkar did not let that get to him. Instead, he decided to switch to another product that would be the need of the hour during the pandemic and decided to manufacture reusable cotton masks.
Speaking of his signature products Omkar says, “My signature product is the line-up of my ‘Inhale’ brand of masks. We have developed the mask to perfectly fit men and women as we have two sizes. The shape has been perfectly designed to fit each one’s facial structure. We have two lines of hosiery and knitted masks over a range of 8 attractive colours. We also have two variants in fabric layers – two layers and three layers. Our best selling product has been the 2-layer hosiery cotton mask. Hosiery material is the well received due to its soft touch and highly ventilating material.”
Acknowledging the response to his ‘Inhale’ range of masks and expressing his happiness over the fact that the response so far is positive, Omkar says, “My clients have been ordering more and more quantities every week. We have also reached out to our end user customers and have been collecting feedback to constantly innovate our products. People are appreciating the fact that the masks are breathable and that they find it comfortable to wear for hours long. Up until the month of July, I have sold more than 25,000+ products. One of my batches of the 3 fastest moving colours went out of stock within 3 days!”
Commenting upon his thoughts of who or what his target audience would be, Omkar mentions that every individual who wishes for a comfortable and breathable mask at his or her disposal at the best possible price would fit the bill. He further
mentions, “We at Beaumonde Lifestyles want to reach out to every nook and corner of the State. As of now ‘Inhale’ has masks for teens and adults. We are also in the process of developing masks for school going kids.”
Additionally, as far as manufacturing face shields is concerned, Omkar says that the target for such shields are professionals who come in frequent contact with multiple people each day such as bank officials, taxi drivers, Government officials, business persons, media persons and so on.
Shedding light on his plan for the future, Omkar expresses his deep interest in developing more varieties of masks that are not only at ease but are trendy as well. He plans to venture into the world of the fashion canvas and cotton bags alongside developing a leisure-wear brand in Goa through ‘Inhale’ so as to provide the local as well as national customers with a wide range of casual clothing-line to choose from, that not just suits their taste but also the environment.
When asked what his message to his present and future clients would be, Omkar signs off saying “The COVID-19 pandemic has created an artificial economic crisis across the globe. We need to change our traditional ways of business and move towards a modernized way of management. It takes a strong network of interconnected entrepreneurs to grow and prosper collectively as a community. An empire cannot be built by one person alone, hence we all must come together and grow as one strong industry.
Our growth will further enhance the economic prosperity of thousands of workers, cotton farmers, retail employees, logistics and so on. It’s the time to keep up the pace with the prevailing situation and make the best of it. Your progress will result in my progress”
