Skirting around in Mahabalipuram

 Coming from a field of fashion and stuck in a place with blistering heat, with nothing but denims, I had been eagerly looking to find a fabric shop where I could design something for myself. With my first few visits to Mahabalipuram, my hopes of finding a tailor and a fabrics shop dwindled. But this time around, when I went to Mahabalipuram with the purpose of doing a market research, I decided to walk the by lanes and find something unique I could write about. To my surprise I found this fabrics shop tucked between a local shoe shop and a handicrafts shop called Ponn.

I went in to explore the shop and the variety of fabrics available.I looked around and found two racks of ready-made clothes on display and a pile of old sarees lying in a corner of the shop. It was time to do the questions part, so I started with greetings in Tamil but sensing my discomfort, the shop owner quickly switched to English to help me with my queries. I started by introducing myself and my purpose of being there. I inquired about his name, his business and his customer base.

 Here is what I found out: His name was Mr Lingam who was dealing with exports of women’s kurtas, skirts and cotton pyjamas and chiffon and georgette dresses. He had been in this business for over 30 years now, which was started by his father and now managed by him and his brother.  Later he expanded into making custom made outfits as well. His main customer base consisted of foreign tourists who frequented this area mostly from September to January.

I inquired about the prices of a few fabrics and also the stitching costs and following were my observations:

• The fabrics in his shop were priced at about 20-40% higher than the normal price available in the market.
• He was overstaffed. He employed 6 workers in his shop who mostly used to be idle during off season.
• He focused mostly on western wear because of which he missed out on the opportunity of the local population being his customer base. 
• He stocked chiffons, georgettes, cambric and varieties of silk. Most of which were not summer fabrics.
•  He was low on stocks of cotton especially cheaper variety of cotton namely mal which ranges between 50/-80/- rupees a metre, instead he stocked only cambric which started at Rs 160/- a metre.
•  His stitching costs though not very high were not attractive enough, though after gathering information  from a few customers I understood that he charged different prices from different customers.

      Glad to have found a tailor, I finally decided to get a full length cotton skirt made. The price he charged was 650/- rupees which was more than what I had expected, given the place, but what I did get impressed with, was his turn around time. He committed to deliver the outfit to me in less than 24 hours and he did!

      Done with having placed an order, I then decided to get some idea about the shop’s standing from the visitors and locals in the area and this is what I found:

      My findings were that the tourists preferred to buy ready outfits in bulk. Even though the delivery time was short they preferred to buy what they could see and readily pick up from the rack. From the price point of view, the foreigners, even though charged higher were happy with the prices. The locals mostly did not know about shop. The few who did know about the shop did not find it of any interest to them as it mainly stocked items of clothing like skirts and trousers. They instead purchased low priced Indian wear from a nearby shop. 

      From my interaction with Mr Lingam and a few customers I concluded with the following thoughts: the owner could expand his customer base by bringing in low priced Indian wear as this could help not just use his work force throughout the year but also reduce his dependency on the 4 months of the year and help him stay afloat during the off season.  With this I concluded my visit to the store determined to find come back and keep up with the journey of exploration.

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