Read an exclusive excerpt from Brick by Brick and discover the journey from middle-class hustle to entrepreneurial success.
Brick By Brick
Manish Vij
Aaj bhi truck jana hai, sir? (Will the truck go today as well, sir?)’ I was asked by the Public Call Office (PCO) booth operator, a young enthusiastic chap, who was about my age. That he was
happy to encounter a high-value customer was evident in his smile. This wasn’t the first time that he had tried to strike up a conversation with me. On other occasions, I would end up spending a few extra minutes responding to his many questions. Today, however, I barely had time to nod and get to the business at hand before rushing in to attend a Business Management class where the professor was a stickler for punctuality.
I had started flexing my entrepreneurial muscle from a rather unusual workspace. A PCO booth—those yellow kiosks that had at one time ushered in a communication revolution in the country—was the seat of my early entrepreneurial journey. Come to think of it, today’s generation may not have even heard of their existence, let alone seen them stand on street corners, not when everyone carries a phone in their pocket, anyway. I had only recently been packed off to the city of Indore from Delhi, which had been my family’s home for decades. I was to pursue a course in business management at a time when business education was just making an appearance on the scene. These were times when every student worth his salt aspired for a seat at the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) or a good medical college. An average student, I had also given the entrance exam a shot (and failed at it) as a rite of passage.
Fortunately for me, my parents were far-sighted enough to see that it was time for me to cut my losses and try my hand at something different. When it came to my father’s notice that his friend, Mr. Khandelia, who was working as the CEO of a large spinning mill, was sending his son, Ashish, a bright student, to Indore for a course in business management, he decided that I should follow suit. It was on the Malwa Express enroute to the International Institute of Professional Studies at the Devi Ahilya University in Indore that I first met Ashish who was to be my partner in crime for the next few years. We were to be picked up at Dewas station by Ashish’s uncle, Ashok Chacha. While I was a bit nervous, stepping out of home for the first time, I soon realized that my fears were unfounded. Ashok Chacha, a textile mill owner in Dewas, and his wife, Kanta Chachi, welcomed me with open arms and over a period of time, became my extended family.
Yarn Trading
‘Ek business opportunity hai; tere paas time hai karne ke liye (There is a business opportunity; do you have time to pursue it)?’ This question from my father, on our weekly long-distance call from Indore, had sparked an old hustling muscle in me. A textile engineer by profession, my father had spent his entire working life in the textile industry. He had harboured entrepreneurial ambitions at a time when entrepreneurship wasn’t as cool and shiny as it is today. His early attempts to put up a yarn spinning plant had caused him to lose a lot of money but hadn’t prevented him from continuing to hone an entrepreneurial mindset. Driven by his fervour, I had also spent a large part of my school vacations accompanying him as he visited various textile plants. My early interest in the industry had even led me to undertake summer training in a textile factory in Sangrur, Punjab, at a time when summer internships weren’t as regimented as they are now.
My old interest in entrepreneurship was reignited. Within minutes of my father posing the question, I found myself ready to turn into an entrepreneur from the very PCO booth from which I had made a call to him. It turned out that my father was friends with someone who ran a spinning mill in Nepal, a man who was keen to export yarn to India. He also happened to know a few potential buyers in Ludhiana who were keen to buy their goods. All that was needed was someone who could reliably liaison between the two parties. A few statistics from my father and I had already made a quick calculation that I could stand to make as much as Rs 8000 for every truckload that made its way from Nepal to Ludhiana.
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