We have reached a stage where the future is bright: Ajay Sharma, Baidyanath
In today’s edition of 'e4m Pride of India Brands' series, Ajay Sharma, Director of Baidyanath, shares with us the journey of the health, wellness, food and personal care products a century ago
Shree Baidyanath Ayurved Bhawan Ltd Group is an Indian Ayurvedic company known for its health, wellness, food and personal care products. Started as a small unit in Bihar a century ago, the Kolkata-headquartered company has now expanded its operations worldwide. The private unlisted firm recently forayed into liquid natural gas production.
exchange4media caught up with Ajay Sharma, Director of Baidyanath, to understand the brand’s success journey.
Edited excerpts:
My grandfather, who hailed from a small village in Jaipur district of Rajasthan, was a visionary. Starting from his village and then through Bihar, he set up his company in 1917 in Kolkata (West Bengal). What I gathered from his autobiography and other literature, the first motivation for him to start this company was to improve the financial status of the family. But the greater motivation for him was nationalism. He was a nationalist. He wanted to do something for the country. That time India was ruled by the British crown. People were part of the freedom movement. The nationalism and the resolve to succeed in the business were the two things that kept him going.
Today, we are the third generation, but have got the same vision and ethics in the organization. A century has passed and we are going even stronger.
What were your major challenges in the beginning?
The biggest challenge before ayurveda for a long period of time has been acceptability. In those days, and even now, the country has two parts: India and Bharat. It was quite challenging to provide medication to the people of rural India although ayurveda had acceptance there. At the same time, in the cities, the main challenge for growth was acceptance, as people were following the West and used to downgrade anything which was Indian.
Apart from these two main challenges, collection of raw material for medicines was also tricky those days. There were no organized agencies for procurement. Literature says that my grandfather used to lead expeditions to the Himalayas, hunting for raw material. Now, things are much more organized.
Who were your initial investors?
The business families in Gujarat and Rajasthan those days believed in investing their own money in the business to remain debt-free. My grandfather also invested money of his own family and that of his connections into the business. In later years, when banks were organized, the company relied on them. We are still very traditional as far as the holding of the company is concerned. Baidyanath is still a private unlisted company. We do finance ourselves by our own means.
Apart from increased acceptability and exposure to the advantages of ayurveda, the tremendous support from the current regime to promote ayurveda has benefited the industry to a great extent. This government created the ministry of AYUSH. The ministry has helped structure ayurveda as an industry. Besides, the industry also put its own efforts and zeal to take ayurveda to a level where it should be. Today, there is no product which doesn’t talk about ayurveda.
It's not just the marketability but the advantages of the products. Today’s younger generation, who has seen the ills of chemicals, wants to remain close to nature and are adopting ayurvedic products. There has been a complete transformation of our society over the years.
Besides, yoga has also helped ayurveda to grow. When the western world accepted yoga, they also started experimenting with ayurveda. This helped in wider acceptance of ayurveda in India as well.
A lot still needs to be done though.
Ayurveda is quite popular in western countries too. What are the major demands there?
Initially, people didn't want to take something internally. But they started taking external applications such as spa, panchkarma, ayurvedic massages, oil therapy and skin applications. After seeing the advantages of external applications, now people are ready to take medicines as well. Now, ayurveda has become a synonym for alternate medicines in the western world. That is a moment of pride.
However, still 90 per cent of Indians don’t consider ayurveda for medication purposes. This is the biggest challenge before us.
How has Covid brought change in your approach?
During the pandemic, the need for immunity opened up the benefits of ayurveda. Technology has opened up many things. For two years, technology tackled the way we do business. It was challenging in the beginning but now we are enjoying the benefits.
We did not hear about Baidyanath’s product during Covid. Baba Ramdev launched his formulations for use in Covid, although it ran into controversy.
In business, there is always some controversy. There is not much to read into that. During the pandemic, we focussed on products and categories that helped in immunity building, that is general immunity. We didn’t want to give products focussed on immunity against any specific disease.
What are your plans for the future?
We have reached a stage where the future is bright. India has opened up as a market for ayurveda, it is getting popular globally as well. There is a niche market as well which we are targeting as of now.
Your group has ventured into liquid natural gas (LNG), I learnt.
Ayurveda is our main stake and it is in our blood. But yes, our group has forayed into other dimensions as well. LNG is one of them.
What are your thoughts on leadership?
This topic is very close to my heart. I have just penned a book, ‘How to thrive in a family business’, published by Penguin. I believe we all are leaders in some or the other way. Each one of us is leading something, either a household, a club, a group or an organization. The leadership could be autocratic, transformational or charismatic. That is for you to choose, which kind of leadership is required to lead that particular organization.
