The basic intention of some organisations is to fulfil its social purpose
On that fateful day of 3 April 2015, the village of Candolim in particular and Goa in general earned the dubious distinction of being a voyeur. Mrs. Smruti Irani, the erstwhile union Minister for Human Resource Development stepped into the ‘fabindia’ store to pick up some articles of interest. She raised an alarm claiming that a camera was placed in the direction of the clothing trial room. All hell broke loose. The minister’s husband rushed in, local police were roped in a jiffy and even the MLA of the constituency arrived with lightning speed while the employees rooted to the floor scared stiff. Immediately a FIR was lodged and some employees arrested who at the earliest opportunity petitioned the court which in turn pulled up the police for trampling upon the liberty of the people so lightly and declared the arrest was unwarranted. The store came out unscathed and continues its good work for the hundreds of thousands of village artisans of India. The store chain ‘fabindia’ is the internationally known brand for Indian ethnic products from fabrics to curios, from furniture to art work. It is a private limited company and yet it has all the characteristics of a non-profit or social purpose entrepreneurship due to the fact that their products are essentially ethnic, produced aesthetically and with traditional techniques employing and empowering the thus far neglected rural artisans.
The ‘fabindia’ story began with John Bissell, a consultant of Ford Foundation (USA) that was established 1936 by the Henry Ford family for advancing human welfare. Bissell’s two-year brief, when he landed in India in 1958, was to advise Central Cottage Industries Corporation (CCIC), a Government of India undertaking, to promote exports of Indian handicrafts. He had gathered enough knowledge about the market for Indian fabrics abroad, and at the completion of his contract with the Ford Foundation he started Fabindia Overseas Pvt. Ltd., in 1960. The business that started in his house in New Delhi, today apart from the phenomenally growing trade abroad, in India alone is marching towards the 300 stores chain and has already ₹1000 crore in sales. It relishes its ‘Celebrate India’ motto to the full.
By strict classification it is a registered company with the business purpose of making profits. The difference, however, lies in its business plan of not only gainfully employing over 55,000 rural artisans and crafts people who produce world class quality products but also empowering them both economically and socially. This exactly is the aim of any social purpose entrepreneurship. According to a study by British Council of India there are over two million social purpose organisations in India and yet the country is home to the largest number of poor in the world. If, and only if, Indian industry could adopt the ‘fabindia’ business plan, they could have both profits as well as render best service to India. The ‘fabindia’ model has blurred the line between profit making and non-profit making enterprise.
There is another organisation in India which has obliterated the divide between a cooperative and a company – Anand Milk Union Ltd (AMUL). Amul is a household name and the product thrives on its motto, ‘The Taste of India’ which earned the sobriquet of ‘White Revolution’ and today flourishes on selling over 400 products and exports to more than 20 countries. Everything about this milk cooperative that was first formed under the inspiration of freedom movement in 1946 and started functioning in 1948 by Dr. Verghese Kurien is to be described only in the superlatives: over 3.5 million base of milk suppliers from Gujarat, and 15 million from across the country in 22 states, revenue ₹28,000 crores, the largest milk producer of the world, etc. The origin of the cooperative is thanks to the protest by the milk suppliers of the village of Anand against the milk cartel that exploited them. The credit of creating a new business model that eliminated the middlemen goes to this world’s largest cooperative – AMUL.
Manthan, the mythological churning of the ocean by the gods versus demons to extract ‘amrit’, the elixir of immortality was metaphorically applied to Amul that churns out its delectable products, by the famed film maker Shyam Benegal in 1976 which won the National Film Award.
In the above case, although Amul is formed and founded as a cooperative, successful global companies would envy its management model and its operations as the perfect examples of best practices. For instance, its advertisement blitz is just incomparable and no company ad in the world can beat it for relevance, humour, current affairs consciousness and the sheer range of issues that keep the hoardings change every week. The mascot of the ads is invariably the same pretty little girl, mischievously smiling, pony tailed with a polka dotted frock and a matching ribbon – and above all a well Amul buttered toast impishly directed towards the onlooker. That is not all, the quip that goes with it is a jibe that disarms, criticises, creates controversies, and brings social awareness etc., all of this going on since 1966. The creators of Amul ad campaign, Sylvester da Cunha and Eustace Fernandez, too have become equally famous as the great founder, manager and chairman Dr. Kurien. Some examples of the ad quips:
- On Satyam corporate scandal: Satyam, Sharam, Scandalam! Amul Butter yum!
- Welcoming Obama to India: Obamasala nahin? Amul nice without spice!
- A jibe at Smriti Irani’s cultural conservatism: Sanskriti Irani! Amul Swaadishtam!
- Lamenting cricketer Rohit’s inconsistent form: We want Ro hit not No hit! Amul Conistently good!
- On the 94th birthday of Dr. Kurien, the founder of Amul, the mascot kneels to pray: Give us this day our daily bread: with Amul Butter utterly, butterly, delicious.
Above, we considered two unique enterprises which despite their individual nature possess a singular intention – the social purpose of their respective enterprises. By definition a company is run to make money from its customers; a non-profit organisation, on the other hand, a co-operative is run to serve the people; the former emphasises money it earns from the people whom it calls customers, and the latter emphasises the service to the people who solicit their goods and services. Although both tantamount to the same activity, yet it is the basic intention as to the objective of an organisation that gives it its identity. The above two cases are not merely unusual businesses, but they are fundamentally transformative in nature.
All that has been said above and all that could ever be said could be expressed in a very brief sentence by Albert Einstein: Try not to be a success, but rather to be of value
