Page 45 - Images Retail January 2018

AWARDS

CK KUMARAVEL

CEO & CO- FOUNDER, NATURALS SALON & SPA

K Kumaravel and his wife Veena set up Naturals in 2000,
a venture that has led to over 300 franchise outlets in 16
states. Naturals currently operates 390 beauty salons, with
220 of them in Tamil Nadu and 50 each in Andhra Pradesh
and Karnataka. Th e rest are located in other parts of the
C country. Naturals started making profi t from the fourth
year of its launch and had clocked a turnover of `270 crore last year.
Kumaravel believed that good beauty salons at the time were only found
in luxury hotels, which were very expensive and far from the reach of the
average customer and normal local salons and barber shops were also
out of sight due to their poor-quality standards. Most middle class women
would agree with this. Naturals fi lled the gap by hiring the Head, Taj’s Th e last 17 years have been very
beauty salons and asked him to set up operations by hiring a team of his exciting. We have learnt a lot, we have
own. failed a few times, and now we have 600+
Th e fi rst year, Naturals did a business of `2 million and with a loss of salons. We have created 300+ fi nancially
`1 million. Gradually, the turnover increased and loss narrowed and by independent women entrepreneurs and
the fourth year, the company stated making profi t as number of salons 8000+ direct jobs – the most signifi cant
inched up. Kumaravel preferred to tie up with ‘gracious partners’, a self
coined term of those who fulfi lled six of his criteria. Absolute integrity, contribution of Naturals. India is poised
willingness to be owner-managers, ability to lead a team, good customer for big growth and so is the beauty
management skills, the ability to invest money and fi nally, no knowledge industry in the country. My dream is to
of the beauty industry were his working criteria to make the business a make Naturals, number salon chain in
success. the world.

D NAGASWAMY

MANAGING DIRECTOR, DINDIGULTHALAPPAKATTI

indigulTh alappakatti was started in the year 1957
by Nagasamy as Anand Vilas in Dindigul. His wife’s
recipe of uniquely ground spices and masalas
coupled with the taste of seeraga samba rice and
mutton achieved a legendary status as his name
D spread far and wide and the restaurant became a
landmark for anyone visiting Dindigul. Out of love, the customers
christened the restaurant and branded it as DindigulTh alappakatti
Restaurant, in which name it has achieved worldwide recognition.
Since 2009, we have expanded to 40 In the year 2008, Nagasamy Dhanabalan, the founder’s
branches. Normally most of the restaurants grandson, took over the reins of business and expanded in
use basmati rice, and Chennai was Chennai, rest of Tamil Nadu and abroad in countries like USA,
no diff erent. We were the fi rst ones to France, Dubai and Malaysia. Today DindigulTh alappakatti with 43
introduce seerega samba rice. Biryani was branches worldwide, are serving over 5 million biriyanis in a year
with over 2000 employees and has crossed 200 crores of sales, is
initially cooked in a traditional manner arguably the biggest biriyani brand in the world. Th ey brand was
using wood and charcoal, but it didn’t awarded ‘Pride of Tamil Nadu’ in the food and beverage category.
suit our demands. We therefore imported
biryani machines from Taiwan, which are
now used in every outlet.

JANUARY 2018 | IMAGES RETAIL | 45