Over the week end we went to the Cottage Industries Emporium at Janpath after a long time. While Delhi continues to change with malls and shopping centers sprouting in every neighborhood, The Cottage Industries Emporium remains unchanged.It seems to be stuck in a time wrap.
We have been going to this cornucopia of Indian delights since the sixties. It had a mix of of inexpensive and expensive handicrafts, sculptures, carvings, textiles,silver and brass gifts and furniture. Also thrown in was a mini boutique selling leather goods and a picture framing gallery . When I first left for the United States in the early seventies, I bought some gifts for my host family. After getting married, we furnished part of our house in Singapore with Indian furniture.Every time we visited from Hong Kong or Singapore a stop at the Emporium was a must.
The idea of having all the handicraft at one place for the tourist was a excellent idea. In Hong Kong when I arrived there in nineteen seventy five, there was China Products Emporium which was a broad based department store and you could buy anything from a sewing machine to household furniture to sweaters to fine carvings and porcelain, all at very reasonable prices. The designs might not have been the most stylish, but were functional and served the purpose. I have cashmere sweaters bought there from the eighties and still going strong. The objective of the store was to earn hard currency for China. There were four or five of them scattered over Hong Kong. In addition there were one or two China Arts and Crafts which sold a smaller variety of products and as the name implied, concentrated on arts. However starting from the mid-nineties, as China started opening up, China Products gradually started shrinking and by the late nineties had pretty much disappeared. In the meantime China Arts and Crafts went up market and and brought in designers for their garments and started selling wood, stone carvings, porcelain and paintings by master craftsmen, all bearing certification of authenticity. Price range for some of the items could be in hundreds of thousands of dollars It is still one of my favorite stops, even if I do not buy anything.
The Cottage Industries Emporium could follow the example of China Arts and Crafts and concentrate on selecting the best of the best,arts and crafts from each state. This is now easier to do since most states now have their own emporiums as well and they can sell a mix of low end handicrafts.It needs to upgrade the contents,design and visuals and truly make it a show case of the best of the best of what India has to offer.
The payment system has not changed since it first opened. Although the various departments are scattered over a few floors, payment still has to be made by queuing up at the ground floor at the few counters where there appears to be a competition among the cashiers as to who can win the prize for being the slowest. Once the payment is made, you then have to go to another counter to pick up the goods which might not have arrived. Finally before leaving, a guard at the exit has to punch your sales ticket which he does without bothering to check whether the goods match the sales ticket. I know we need to create employment, but this is taking it to an extreme. Perhaps the concern is that of shop lifting. Department stores all over the world sell hundreds of items scattered over several levels with more than one cashier at every level. Surely the Indians and the visiting tourist do not constitute a larger number of kleptomaniacs. Why not have a cashier at each level ? This would make it more efficient.
Having said that, it is not all bad, the store does have a good mix of offerings such as textiles, fabrics, sculptures and furnishing. The sales staff when ever they are not chatting among themselves are reasonably polite and they do know the provenance of the goods sold.
Get rid of some of the departments, concentrate on the arts, high end textiles and fabrics in a pleasant , welcome environment and you will see turn over going up significantly. Open a food court with food from different states so that people can not just visually feast their eyes, but also enjoy the taste of Incredible India. But then perhaps the objective here is not to make money......and who gives a damn ?
We have been going to this cornucopia of Indian delights since the sixties. It had a mix of of inexpensive and expensive handicrafts, sculptures, carvings, textiles,silver and brass gifts and furniture. Also thrown in was a mini boutique selling leather goods and a picture framing gallery . When I first left for the United States in the early seventies, I bought some gifts for my host family. After getting married, we furnished part of our house in Singapore with Indian furniture.Every time we visited from Hong Kong or Singapore a stop at the Emporium was a must.
The idea of having all the handicraft at one place for the tourist was a excellent idea. In Hong Kong when I arrived there in nineteen seventy five, there was China Products Emporium which was a broad based department store and you could buy anything from a sewing machine to household furniture to sweaters to fine carvings and porcelain, all at very reasonable prices. The designs might not have been the most stylish, but were functional and served the purpose. I have cashmere sweaters bought there from the eighties and still going strong. The objective of the store was to earn hard currency for China. There were four or five of them scattered over Hong Kong. In addition there were one or two China Arts and Crafts which sold a smaller variety of products and as the name implied, concentrated on arts. However starting from the mid-nineties, as China started opening up, China Products gradually started shrinking and by the late nineties had pretty much disappeared. In the meantime China Arts and Crafts went up market and and brought in designers for their garments and started selling wood, stone carvings, porcelain and paintings by master craftsmen, all bearing certification of authenticity. Price range for some of the items could be in hundreds of thousands of dollars It is still one of my favorite stops, even if I do not buy anything.
The Cottage Industries Emporium could follow the example of China Arts and Crafts and concentrate on selecting the best of the best,arts and crafts from each state. This is now easier to do since most states now have their own emporiums as well and they can sell a mix of low end handicrafts.It needs to upgrade the contents,design and visuals and truly make it a show case of the best of the best of what India has to offer.
The payment system has not changed since it first opened. Although the various departments are scattered over a few floors, payment still has to be made by queuing up at the ground floor at the few counters where there appears to be a competition among the cashiers as to who can win the prize for being the slowest. Once the payment is made, you then have to go to another counter to pick up the goods which might not have arrived. Finally before leaving, a guard at the exit has to punch your sales ticket which he does without bothering to check whether the goods match the sales ticket. I know we need to create employment, but this is taking it to an extreme. Perhaps the concern is that of shop lifting. Department stores all over the world sell hundreds of items scattered over several levels with more than one cashier at every level. Surely the Indians and the visiting tourist do not constitute a larger number of kleptomaniacs. Why not have a cashier at each level ? This would make it more efficient.
Having said that, it is not all bad, the store does have a good mix of offerings such as textiles, fabrics, sculptures and furnishing. The sales staff when ever they are not chatting among themselves are reasonably polite and they do know the provenance of the goods sold.
Get rid of some of the departments, concentrate on the arts, high end textiles and fabrics in a pleasant , welcome environment and you will see turn over going up significantly. Open a food court with food from different states so that people can not just visually feast their eyes, but also enjoy the taste of Incredible India. But then perhaps the objective here is not to make money......and who gives a damn ?
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