Chandarias built a global business empire that will not stop growing

 

Businessman Manu Chandaria during the launch of the biography, "Manu Chandaria, Success To Significance" on August 7, 2024. [Kanyiri Wahito, Standard]

While Premchand Chandaria’s (Manu’s father) eldest sons, Devchand and Ratilal, had taken charge of the family’s trading and started Pure Food Products in 1943, the family saw them as torchbearers of its manufacturing future.

The emergence of Pure Food Products attested to the ability of Devchand and Ratilal to adapt and address the dynamics of the market.

 The company was inspired by the demand for pasta to feed the large number of Italian prisoners of war in Kenya during World War II.

Pure Food Products also made juices, sweets and soda.

The family swiftly disposed of Pure Food Products to concentrate on expanding Kaluworks, which manufactured pots and pans. The decision was significant because the founding Oshwal businessmen targeted products that every household would need.

 The Chandaria family of 36 stayed together in one house. There was only one motor vehicle available for all of them. There were six Chandarias among the 40 employees of Kaluworks.

 In under four years, Kaluworks increased production and as a result, expanded its workforce to 800, and it branched from pots and pans to manufacturing hurricane lamps, pressure stoves and nails.

Manu who was the second engineer remembers opening the gate of the factory, invoicing, taking inventory and doing whatever else he was asked to. He had to cut short his delayed honeymoon in 1958 when he was summoned back to Nairobi by Devchand to go and market Kaluworks products in Uganda.

Manu was unhappy with his eldest brother. “I am an engineer and not a marketer. What do I have to do with marketing?” But it was to no avail. Duty called and off he, Aruna (his wife) and their two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Priti, went to Kampala.

 From the mid-60s through the 70s, the Chandarias expanded outside Africa. Ratilal and nephew Praful (Devchand’s eldest son) established and oversaw the family’s business interests in the UK and Europe.

The Chandarias prioritised Europe because of the growth potential that the market offered.

Between 1966 and 1974, the Chandarias expanded by entering into partnerships, making strategic investments or taking over manufacturing firms in the UK, France, Belgium, Holland, Italy, Spain and Switzerland.

The family business also expanded into North America and Southeast Asia. It was also at this time that the family established operations in India, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nepal, and Australia.

 At the time of his death in India on September 13, 1969, at the age of 79, Premchand Chandaria must have looked at the work of his children and nephews, excelling in foreign lands he had only heard about, with both approval and pride. They had extended his dream of half a century beyond his imagination.

 In 1952, the family up small aluminium pots and pans plants in Burundi and the Congo, which signalled a desire to expand manufacturing outside Kenya.

In 1954, the family resolved to import an aluminium hand-rolling mill from Italy to eliminate the importation of aluminium circles, which are crucial in making pots and pans.

The matter initially split the Chandarias, pitting the younger men against the seniors led by the patriarch. The latter baulked at the idea of the family taking out a big bank loan to finance operations instead of the concern of financing expansion from internally generated revenue.

 Consensus was, however, reached and a $25,000 loan was successfully negotiated with the Standard Bank. Keshav (Manu’s elder brother) was dispatched to Italy to be trained on the running of the mill and was accompanied by two Italian technicians on his return. They were tasked with training staff on how to operate the mill.

Present at the commissioning of the plant, the first aluminium mill of its type on the East African coast, was Sir Evelyn Baring, the 27th Governor of the colony of Kenya. It was a testament to the importance of the event and the emergence of the Chandaria family as a key player in industry in Kenya.

 The family set up plants in Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Zambia, and Burundi, which resulted in their domination of the East African region and presence in central Africa in the 1960s, before venturing into the developed world in the 1970s and 1980s.

In the 1990s, Manu says with a hint of pride that the Chandarias had set up operations in 40 countries and employed 40, 000 people.

Comcraft, short for commercial craft Services, was established in London in 1960 and also registered in Nairobi as a coordination hub to enable the Chandarias to manage the growing international presence of their businesses.

The entity organises the managerial requirements of the family business (Comcraft Group) and provides specialised services to support its operations. These services include, but are not limited to executive management, investigations, specialised expertise, technical support, consultancy and advisory services.

Premchand Brothers, the shop Premchand Chandaria began with siblings Maganlal and Chagalal, in Ngara, Nairobi, in the 1920s, and was incorporated as a trading company in 1941, had gone continental.

 The Chandarias, who were previously Kenya-based importers, commission agents and exporters dealing mainly in Indian and European groceries, had become the owners of a conglomerate.

In Kenya, through as many as 20 different companies, by 1973, the Chandarias were involved in trading (importation and distribution of general goods, including textiles), food processing, manufacturing (steel and aluminium and matches), sales (chiefly by Pembro companies, including Galsheet), construction (window frames, and wax products), managerial and secretarial services, galvanised roofing sheets, books and stationery, plastics, paints and property development.

 The expansion, in terms of growth of companies, acquisition of new ones and diversification in industry and products, continued throughout Manu’s chairmanship of the family business and will not stop because each generation and leadership has the responsibility of growing it.

As Manu reminisces over the family’s far-flung empire, he is happy to say that Comcraft now comprises many companies in 40 countries on five continents and employs more than 40,000 people.

Comcraft firms are among the world’s largest in making computer and electronic parts, coat hangers, plastic cans and packaging while still maintaining dominance in steel, aluminium and property development.

While the family concentrated mainly on steel products, building materials and plastics because of the knowledge, experience and expertise it had accumulated in these areas, the business had gone global and positioned itself for growth as a transnational.

It was no mean feat, which is why Manu would declare in an interview with Knowledge at Wharton, a journal for the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, in 2013 that in 25 years the Comcraft Group was in 25 countries.