Udupi: Happy Time for Consumers as 'Harshotsava' Begins

Kevin Rodrigues
Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (SP)

Udupi, Mar 6: 'Harshotsava-2012' was inaugurated here on Monday March 5 to mark the silver jubilee celebrations of 'Harsha' retail. Dr Oscar Fernandes inaugurated the silver jubilee celebrations by lighting the lamp at the Harsha Show Room, here.

Blosum Fernandes, Suryaprakash M D Prakash Retail Udupi, H T Pujari, MK Sanil, Sudarshan of Disha Marketing, Prakash Kodavur, Suresh (director), Rajesh (director), Bhabhubhai Patel, Stevan, branch manager of Udupi were also present on the occasion among others.

Dilshaad - Gumpakallu Bappalige won the Panasonic rice cooker and Ashok N Devadiga, branch manager of Puttur handed over the gifts. Subramanya floor manager, Nawaz sales executive were also present on the occasion.

R K Bhat, Kumbra Puttur won another gift hamper at Harsha Putter on the inaugural day of the celebration and Benegal Nagappa Amin senior manager HR handed over the gifts. Subramanya, floor manager, Harsha Puttur, was present on the occasion.

V Barboza, Brahmagiri, Udupi won the MicroWave Oven and the gift hamper was handed over by the Nagaraja Upadhya, assistant sales manager and Sharath furniture section executive of Harsha Udupi.

As part of the silver jubilee celebrations, prizes and gift hampers are made available to shoppers at the Harsha showroom on the purchase of a variety of items at their respective branches.

About Harsha

‘Harsha’, which entered retail sector 25 years back in this town, has succeeded in introducing several new things to the people, and it was one of the first entities to have introduced shopping culture to Karnataka coast. PrakashRetail Private Ltd, which owns ‘Harsha’ brand,  opened its shop, ‘Harsha’, dealing in household goods, 25 years back in a spacious 4000 sft premises, when the average shops dealing in such goods were located in shops measuring 500 to 600 sft. It has since extended its business to Mangalore, Shimoga, Hubli, Puttur, Kundapur, Belgaum, Dharwad, and Bangalore. Harsha gets credit for introducing the concept of retail shopping, which was in vogue in big cities alone till then, to smaller towns.

Harsha, which initially confined itself to dealing in televisions, refrigerators, washing machines, water heaters, mixers and other such home appliances, has since brought over 200 branded products under its wings, in tune with the needs of modern retailing needs, and opened mega show rooms with enjoyable ambience for customers. The slogans coined by ‘Harsha’ like ‘dream shop for women’ and ‘you do not get these elswehre’ have not remained as slogans. The people who have visited ‘Harsha’ show rooms have experienced these statements.

‘Harsha’ organizes annual festivals like ‘Harshotsava’ during March, ‘Monsoon Magic’ during rainy seasons, ‘Deepavali Bazar’ during festival season, and ‘Harsha Happy Times’ during Christmas and New Year. All these events have been immensely popular with the consumers. Harsha started the practice of organizing ‘Harshotsava’ initially when the concept of giving discounts was not in vogue, to express its gratitude to its ever-expanding clientele. ‘Harsha’ has been practicing the principles of selling only good quality products to its customers, keeping prices at competitive level, creating conducive and comfortable environment for the customers, and providing good after-sales service to the buyers. These things have remained the pillars of its success too.

During the last 25 years, ‘Harsha’ has earned over ten lac customers, and every year, it sends invitations to about three lac customers for ‘Harshotsava’.

Most of the employees of the nine-showroom-strong ‘Harsha’ family were groomed in ‘Harsha’ showrooms. The firm picks graduates and provides them with training to make them fall in line with its culture. Rather than intelligence, being humane is the quality the firm looks for among the prospective employees.

This year’s ‘Harshotsava’ is being held in Udupi, Mangalore, Puttur, Kundapur and Shimoga showrooms of Harsha from March 5 to 11. During this period, the customers get special concessions, discounts, exhibition of ultra modern household equipments, and demonstrations about their working. The customers are offered the opportunity to check these things and practically experience the operations, before deciding about buying the goods.

These showrooms market wide range of colour televisions, LCD and plasma TVs, refrigerators, washing machines, microwave ovens, mixer grinders, audio and video players, mobile handsets, digital cameras, movie cameras, air-conditioners, computers, laptops, gas stoves, water purifiers, water heaters, and various other items manufactured by well-known brands like Godrej, Onida, Voltas, GE, IFB, Whirlpool, Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi, LG, Samsung, Bosch, Videocon, Hier, etc.  ‘Harsha’ offers extra benefits like concessional rates, free home delivery, attractive exchange offers, unique combo offers, special discounts, free gifts, chance to win prizes way of 100 micro ovens, 50 Panasonic automatic electric cookers and other attractive prizes through lucky draw.  For most of the products, ‘Harsha’ has been offering a discount of 25 percent on the occasion of its silver jubilee celebrations, which will be highly beneficial to the people.

Marketting director of the concern, Harish Kumar, said that LCD and LED televisions backed by digital technology, frost-free refrigerators, fully automatic front loading washing machines, top loading washing machines, and star-rated split air-conditioners which save power, microwave ovens etc will be added attractions for the customers this time.

Managing director of Prakash Retail Private Ltd, Sooryaprakash, says that the success of the firm rests on welcome with a smile, pleasant service, efficient after-sales service, and socially-committed ideals. He says meeting the expectations of the customers as far as quality of goods is concerned, and serving them to their satisfactions are the dual goals of his concern.