In 1962, N.M. Habibullah, a resident of Parrys, started a stationery store on Anderson Road under the name Olympic Papers and Stationery. With Habibullah’s work, the business flourished. Five years later, during a pensive moment at the store, when he was turning over in his mind various strategies to expand his business, two stores for wedding cards caught his attention.

In 1967, Habibullah switched to selling wedding cards. It turned out to be the right move. In 1974, his son, H. Noor Mohamed joined him and took the company to the next level.

“Until the mid-1960s, there were only two shops in Madras for wedding cards, Ramakrishna and MN Swami; and both wound up their businesses in a few years. Even in the 1970s, there weren’t too many stores for wedding cards. Sensing an opportunity, my father started this new business. As the basic raw material was paper, which is what he was selling in the stationery business, it took him only 15 to 20 days to set up a wedding card store,” says Noor, the current managing director of Olympic Cards Ltd.

Olympic Cards Limited was first set up on Anderson Road. In 1982, Noor and his brother Saladin Babu established a second store at No. 194 (now 195), N.S.C. Bose Road, and this went on to become the main office.

“The five-storey building, which originally belonged to the East Indian Company, was demolished and reconstructed to accommodate the showroom and the office,” says Noor.

Soon, Noor’s sons N. Mohamed Faizal and N. Mohamed Iqbal joined the business as the executive director and production head of the factory respectively.

Quickly, Olympic Cards Ltd. spread to other parts of the city: Kodambakkam, T. Nagar, Anna Nagar, Peravallur in Agaram, Velachery and Thiruvanmayur.

“Wedding preparations involve considerable stress for families. So, they would gravitate towards a wedding card store that is located in or close to their neighbourhood, sparing them a long trip. With this thinking, we began to take our collection to different localities,” explains Noor.

Besides wedding cards, they sell office envelopes, calendars, diaries, notebooks, account books, business cards, letterheads, files and folders, scribbling pads and greeting cards. They also have provisions for instant digital printing, design creation and proofreading at the outlets.

In addition to an outlet in Coimbatore, they have 25 franchise stores in Chennai, Puducherry and Kerala. There are plans to expand their franchising operation across Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala and Karnataka in the near future.

On how difficult it is to manage several branches, Mohamed Faizal says that besides training the staff, the heavy stock has to be managed and their timely delivery ensured every day.

“We cannot maintain all stock at all the outlets. Therefore, we keep all our stocks in Parrys. Whenever there is a requirement, we send it to the respective outlets,” he explains.

The waning demand for greeting cards too keeps the team on their toes. “We not only cater to direct customers but retailers as well; the latter look for variety. Creating designs that are different from previous year’s can be challenging. We create 20 to 30 designs once in three months. If these don’t sell out in three months, we incur a huge manufacturing loss,” says Mohamed.

Despite all these challenges, the business is growing, as is evident from the size of its manufacturing unit.

From a 13,000 sq.ft factory at the Vyasarpadi Cooperative Industrial Estate, the company now handles the production from a two lakh sq.ft factory near Periyapalayam. The factory is well-equipped with advanced machinery.

“Contributing to the creation of a healthy environment, we have installed 0.5MW solar power production facility at the unit. This way, we ensure all our products are manufactured in an eco-friendly manner,” says Noor.

Olympic Cards Ltd. will soon test the waters in the others areas of the print industry such as packaging and pharma-printing and luxury packaging.

“We have taken baby steps by way of outsourcing packaging jobs and associating with their print partners. We hope to get into mainstream packaging shortly,” adds Noor.

Name and fame

Olympic Cards Ltd was first incorporated as Olympic Business Credits (Madras) Private Limited, in April 1992 under the Companies Act, 1956. Subsequently, in October 1996, it became a public limited company and the name was changed to ‘Olympic Business Credits (Madras) Limited’. In 1998, it was renamed Olympic Cards Limited, in 1998. In 2013, the company offered IPO and successfully subscribed and listed in BSE.

A ringside view

*H. Noor Mohamed: “In India, the wedding card market is booming, despite the advent of e-cards and Whatsapp. So, any aspiring entrepreneur can enter this industry confidently.”

*Mohamed Faizal: “My father has cultivated a habit that has contributed immensely to his success. Every morning, he jots down the details of his tasks for the day, this is a habit he picked up from his father. This practice has made him so self-disciplined that he never forgets to take his pen, cellphone or wallet with him. It has helped him considerably in his business.”

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / by Shiba Kurian / February 24th, 2017