Popular curry-maker sets up new business

However, co-owner of Turban Brand Nanak Hardit-Singh and his sons Reza and Rishi did not wish to see the end of the family legacy and decided to open a new company, in order to pick up where Turban Brand will soon leave off.

Therefore, Turban Marketing Limited was launched in January 2011.

Business Day recently spoke with Reza Hardit-Singh, one of the owners and directors of Turban Marketing. He recalled that Turban Brand was founded by his deceased grandparents Hardit Singh and Shamsha Singh at the company’s current location on the Eastern Main Road in Tunapuna. Unfortunately, Singh died at a relatively young age of 50 and left his 19-year-old son Nanak to run the curry-blending and packaging business.

Over the years, the business expanded its line of products to include soy sauce, pepper sauce, cocoa, coffee, green seasoning and nutmeg powder. These are the products Turban Marketing now supplies to local supermarkets. However, all the spice blends and ingredients have either been changed or improved upon to create a different flavour.

For example, Turban’s three most popular products Tadjah Mahal hot and spicy blend curry for duck and goat, Rani curry and Raja Jahan all purpose curry are now Nadi Mahal, Chaandi and Kanchan Jahan curry respectively.

Turban Marketing also recently unveiled their Chunky Brand Special Madras Curry for duck, common fowl and wild meat. Not only is the curry processed differently but, according to Reza, it has a secret ingredient that brings out a different flavour in the meat. “One customer told us they loved the Chunky Curry because you don’t have to be a cook to use it and it’s great for everyday meat too,” he said.

Reza revealed that while Turban Brand is still technically open, it is in the process of “tying up lose ends” and is not manufacturing any products. In fact, Turban Marketing is renting everything – the building, vehicles, machinery – from Turban Brand and is maintaining the property.

“We have started over so it’s like a new business. We have no credit or overdraft from the banks, nor do we have collateral so the banks are not willing to give us a loan. Right now they want us to show that we can make it on our own before they approve anything,” explained Reza.

Turban Marketing therefore had to begin its large-scale operations as a cash-based business which has limited production considerably. In spite of that, Reza said “things are going well”.

The only challenge is that company now buys all the raw materials locally, which is more expensive than imported spices.

Turban Brand previously imported spices such as saffron, geera, coriander, cumin, turmeric, fenugreek, soumph, and ajawine directly from Vietnam, India, Holland and Sri Lanka. Raw materials are now purchased by Turban Marketing from local importers including RHS Marketing, Caribbean Spice and Andy’s Original Spices.

“We are trying to bring the company to what it was as Turban Brand. Over the past two years competitors took over the market so right now we are trying to fight back to our place at the top,” said Reza. “We had to do some advertising to let people know of the changeover but we have been well supported by the supermarkets – Turban’s previous customers – and things have started to pick up. In fact, the products are selling so quickly that supermarkets are asking for more. Hopefully, at this rate, in the next year and half, everything will be running smoothly. We may even own our own building and vehicles.”

There are also plans to launch another curry this year. At the moment the curry is in the process of being tested. There are also plans to supply more “small shops” in order to achieve higher sales, allowing Turban Marketing to have more ready cash so they can purchase more materials to process more products.

In the future, the company hopes to concentrate on exporting to other Caribbean islands, and to begin producing enough to supply markets in the United States and Canada