Young Samson’s adventure in Pettah

The success stories of local businessmen are fascinating. Often, they narrate the tale of a young man walking out of home looking for a break – always in the big city. He undergoes a tough time. Courage, patience and perseverance keep him going. He doesn’t give up. In the end he succeeds and he quietly builds up a solid business. Hard work is the secret of success.

 

Many are the lessons to be learnt. It’s also encouraging to see that these success stories are being documented – a practice which was essentially limited to big corporates. Well illustrated coffee table books often related the progress of big companies over a long period of time.

I recently got a copy of the ‘DSI Legacy’ – the story of a ‘cottage industry rising up to a corporate entity’ over fifty years. Today DSI is a big name – a name remembering the founder Diyanuge Samson.

It narrates the story of a young man from Galle who comes to Colombo and works in a tyre shop in Pettah, then collects enough money to start a ‘sudu redi’ business on his own and quietly builds it up. Being war time with World War II creating so many scarcities, his product was in great demand.

Young Samson makes contact with a group of Tamil businessmen who imported goods from India via Velvetithurai. He starts going up to Jaffna a couple of times a month, brings the cloth and starts selling on the pavements in Colombo.

Carrying a bundle of cloth on his shoulder, he moves from place to place. It is tough going yet he perseveres. With sales improving, he gets a nephew to assist him. They move one step further – they erect a makeshift rack between the walls of an oil boutique and a dry fish outlet at the Fifth Cross Street – Price Street junction and start selling the cloth. As business improves the young man looks for a little shop and finds one in First Cross Street.

The Japanese air raid on 12 April 1942 forces the young man to abandon Colombo. He gets back to his native place, Bataduwa. When things settle down, he gets back and resumes the business. He borrows 250 rupees from a chettiyar at an interest of two rupees per day – later increased to five rupees – and expands the business.

He adds another item to his list – shoes made at Dias Place as a cottage industry. He was going to pay for the shoes only after he sold them. The business picks up. He takes more staff for sales increasing the total to eight.  This is how the self-made man, who lost his parents when he was a child, laid the foundation for a big enterprise.  The next step was importing shoes at the same time setting up his little ‘factory’ at Kaapiri Mudukkuwa in Pettah to make shoes. With the restrictions imposed on imported products in 1962, he successfully negotiated with his Japanese business contacts to manufacture shoes in Sri Lanka.

Necessary machinery was imported and a workshop was set up in Galle.  There was no electricity in the village and the machines were run on a generator. The range of products gradually widened – starting with ballerina ladies shoes to slippers and children’s shoes. Vehicles were bought to distribute these throughout the country. The factory was enlarged to manufacture other products as well – the first being travel bags. Suitcases and file bags were added later.

Having got married at the right age, Samson Mudalali brought up a close knit family with five sons and three daughters who, in due course, were groomed to take over the business. He promoted the sons to work with him during their university holidays thus providing them with an opportunity to familiarise themselves with the business.

Thus DSI was established in Galle in May 1962 – on Samson Mudalali’s 50th year.