Orissa Stevedores (overseas) Pvt Ltd came into being in the year 2001 (a subsidiary of OSL), and started with a marginal working capital of Rs.30 Lacs and only four staff-members. Mrs. Arati Mishra took up the unit and by her continuous and all out efforts and well articulated PR strategy, excellent managerial capacity, the unit is able to register an Annual Turnover of Rs.90 Crores in FY 2014-5-16. Now OS(O)PL has a 100 plus work-force. She is now the General Manager of the unit.
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Under the leadership of Mrs. Mishra, OS(O)PL has created its exclusive identity in the market of Textiles. It is now the Sole Distributor of Bombay Dyeing, Trident, Global Corp Ltd, D’décor and Sheela Foam Ltd for Odisha. OS(O)PL is also the Super Stockist for FMCG Products of Reckitt Benckiser, Dabur India. Nestle, Pepsico (Fritolay Division) and Ferrero etc.
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A tete-a-tete with Arati Mishra by Brahmi Priya Samantray & Sandeep Pattnaik of ashapradeepnews.com. Excerpts.
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01. You joined as an executive in OSOPL and elevated to GM rank over the years. Which are the challenges you witnessed being at a senior level?
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The vision to elevate the ground-zero bases to a spectacular height transpired me to strive hard and I have been able to achieve a satisfactory success in my mission. When I took over, the market for OSOPL was extremely negligible. It was a real difficulty to establish in the contemporary market. I took initiative to form my own team with young and effective professionals, counselled and trained them well with my expertise and put them to the market. Their concocted efforts and zealous marketing yielded well.
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02. The unit’s present combined (both textile and FMCG) annual turnover is close to 90 Crores. What are your future expansion plans to augment your top-line numbers?
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We have presently 3 Retail stores – 2 at Bhubaneswar and 1 at Cuttack. We wish to develop these enabling them to have easy access to reach the end-user. In FMCG sector we wish have some new additions for business expansion.
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03. OSOPL has operation in textile segment. How competitive is the sector according to you?
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Because of niche players like Welspun, Portico, Raymonds, Weaves in the textile sector, completion is immense. However, we have a strong professional team,that is immensely capable to accept this challenge and has been able to fetch substantial outcome.
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04. What was the annual turnover (2015-16 FY) of the unit you manage pertaining to FMCG segment? What are your future strategies?
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The annual turnover of 2015-16 was close to rs 90 Crs. This is the combined turnover of both Textile and FMCG products. Out of this rs 90 Crs, turnover in FMCG segment is around rs 55 Crs. Our consolidated projected turnover is pegged at rs 100 Crs for the year 2016-17. We aim to expand our unit further by adding more units in future.
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05. You as a lady entrepreneur give some message to the women of Odisha in general.
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I wish women of the state must be self-confident and contribute towards betterment of their families, society, state and nation. They must prove themselves to be the Roll-model of the present era.
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06. What is your budget for CSR activities for the current FY 2016-17? In which fields your CSR activities will spread?
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As such, we have no specific Budget for CSR activities. In the CSR field, we have our contribution for Social and Women Welfare. There is a CSR committee in our organisation who decides the financial budget on case-to-case basis.
