The Aditya Birla Group is one of the homegrown brands in India that has consistently lived up to the expectations of the millions of customers and has always tried to evolve and adapt to the changing times. It has a diverse set of products starting from cements, apparel to even Information technology. While there are products from a number of brands from the stable of Aditya Birla Group that I have used but one brand that I immediately think about is the supermarket chain More which the ABG group recently sold off to Samara Capital. More was one of those brands that revolutionized the retail space in the country and brought supermarkets to Tier 2 and 3 cities. Supermarkets were restricted to big cities and until the advent of More, I was totally unaware of what a supermarket was. I belong to the town of Asansol in West Bengal which is an industrial city with steel plants and collieries. ‘More’ opened its first store in Asansol just beside my house and therefore I was one of its first visitors. I remember the scooter rides with my father to the More store every weekend. I remember how I used to look forward to my trips to the store and would always have a list of things in mind to buy for all the visits.Obviously, my father would not accept all my demands and it would require some coaxing. The More store literally housed everything under the roof. The offers and discounts would be really lucrative. Grocery shopping prior to this would require one to go to several stores to get different products but here you would get everything instantly. Not only did they have food and grocery products but also various household items as well. I remember how proudly I used to flaunt to my friends about my visits to More and guess what it did make many them jealous. Memories of my visits to ‘More’ do evoke loads of nostalgia. Though the brand has been sold off now,I feel it would always be a brand I would associate with the Aditya Birla Group. ‘More’ did break this perception of supermarkets being associated with only the elite and connected with the masses, winning hearts.
How I overcame my challenges to achieve my ambitions in life
The occurrence of ebbs and lows in life is a pretty common phenomenon and I am no exception. Without challenges, life would be mundane without any excitement and thrill. I do have a couple of such instances but theone which is recent would be the time when I left my job for preparing for my MBA exams and my attempts at learning new skills. Post my engineering, I joined an IT MNC and worked there for two years. It was during this time I got to explore this side which was decent at writing and blogging. I started my blog and started writing movie and food reviews there regularly. I also started getting invitations from restaurants which was great. I also got promoted in my job and life was indeed fun. However, slowly there was saturation and I felt life wasn’t heading in a proper direction. The office work did not excite me anymore and I found it difficult managing my blogging life with my job. My instincts told me I should give MBA a shot and probably study marketing or branding in order to align my interests. However, given the hectic night schedules at work and everything else, studying was an arduous task. I also could not apply for advertising agencies or startups involved with writing given I had little or no experience in it. I did go for some interviews with such agencies but found no luck. It was then that I took this bold step to leave my IT job and come back home. I tried my luck at content writing and freelancing. I was quite skeptical about what would happen but luckily everything worked properly. Today, I have freelanced with three travel startups and have written content from them. Along with my experience today, I also have these skills in content writing and digital marketing that I have picked during the freelancing stints that have helped me add more points to my CV. I also got time to manage my studies during this time and could focus on my MBA preparations. I also got through one of the premier management schools in the country. I feel it is very essential to take challenges head-on in life. It is never advisable to continue doing something that does not excite you. I am happy I could something I really wanted to despite the difficulties. I am sure there will be many more such hurdles that I will come across but atleast I know how to overcome each of them.
