TAKING FUN SERIOUSLY

We expect manufacturing activity to pick up in future thanks to the new initiatives from the government in promoting India as a hub for toys, says R. Jeswant, CEO, Funskool India

- Niranjan Mudholkar

Although you have taken charge as the CEO of Funskool India rather recently, you have been associated with the organisation for almost two decades. How would you briefly analyse the evolution of Funskool in the last twenty years?

We have been operating since 1987. We started off as a joint venture with Hasbro Inc., a US multinational and remained so for nearly thirty years. We continue to represent several toy majors but over the last few years we have also successfully built many brands of our own. Our export business has also grown exponentially and while emerging as a major sourcing destination for many international companies we have also simultaneously been successful in establishing a presence for our own brands in several markets outside India as well.

What have been your priorities, after taking charge as the CEO? It must have been quite challenging to take up this responsibility at a disruptive time like we are going through right now!

Yes, it has been quite a challenge! With a complete lockdown in April and almost the whole of May, our peak selling summer vacation period ended up as a total wash out! However our team has successfully emerged out of the extremely trying period thanks basically to the exports business which has remained quite robust since June. The domestic business too has been picking up. From a disastrous start to the financial year, we can proudly say that the business is now firmly back on track! The experience gained in fighting the odds should be valuable for our team in future.

How was the last fiscal in terms of business numbers, and what kind of target are you looking at for the ongoing financial year?