He watches one Hollywood movie a day. Well, almost.
He collects crystals of all shapes and sizes. Well, almost (his mother has done most of it and he is carrying on the legacy).
He loves cooking. Well, almost (his culinary skills don’t go beyond making a delectable cheese omelette).
He trips on fine food. Well, almost (Continental is close to his heart, or rather his stomach, especially Shepherd’s Pie).
Arif Saleem Padiath is all of this and the brand manager of Fastrack jewellery and Fastrack I Gear, the new range of trendy sunglasses from Titan. It’s a far cry for this Cochin-born who first came into the limelight winning the bravery award in the third standard at Campion School in Mumbai. “I missed my school bus on Cooperag Road one day and decided to walk home,” he recalls. “Campion being at Cooperage Road and my home being on Carmichael Road, walking was definitely not the best option for a nine-year-old. While passing through Nariman Point, an old man walking his dog noticed my school t–shirt and informed a cop. The rest was history. I was taken home in a cab with two cops sitting on either side. The next day, my class teacher whipped me for allegedly having caused so much concern for my parents and the vice principal, god bless his wise soul, gave me a medal for bravery.”
That was not all. Padiath sang the Jamaican Farewell and won an inter-school singing competition with his aunt playing the guitar. When he was in the fifth standard in Dubai, he won the 50 and 100 metre dash and the shuttle tournament at the Indian Sports Club. In Montfort, as captain of the junior football team, he won the district level tournament (Salem). He was also part of the tennis and table tennis team in college.
After a year’s sabbatical in Jeddah where his family lived, Padiath took up his first job in Chennai when he was 20. Carrier Aircon was his first employer. And he was a sales executive with a monthly salary of Rs 3,000. Two years later, he moved to Titan as a junior sales officer. From the sale stint which started at Hyderabad to helping form the canteen stores department within the company and looking after both the south and east regions meant living out of a suitcase. “I travelled from Trivandrum and Kanyakumari to Bhutan and all the places in between,” says Padiath. “I had to meet up with all the defence canteens along the way and generate a requirement from them. They would in turn, send it to their area depot and the actual release order would come from the CSD headquarters in Mumbai.”
And that included militant-prone areas in Bihar and the northeast. “I travelled atleast 25 days in a month and got to see a lot of places I never dreamed existed, like a place called Lumding in Assam.”
Padiath’s stint at Titan, which began at Hyderabad, proceeded to Bangalore, then to Hubli, Cochin and back to Bangalore. By the end of it all, he had domain knowledge of sales, marketing, department store projects, retailing, promotions, e-commerce, advertising online and launching of the company website.
The I Gear range took a year in the making. And Padiath was in charge: right from sourcing to studying the sunglasses market overseas to freezing on the product range with the design team to working on communication, advertising and distribution. “You get a phenomenal sense of satisfaction seeing a dream turn into reality,” he says. “Our core target group is anyone between 15 and 25 and our augmented TG would be 25-35.”
And here is where his overseas research has helped. “The Fastrack I Gear range in various tints and colours is not available even in a Rayban,” he says. “And our price range of Rs 695-1795 is unbeatable. If the average price of a Rayban is Rs 2,800, it’s 1,200 in Fastrack.”
That’s not all. “I Gear comes in 20 frames and that means 50 variations because of the colour options,” says Padiath. “And all these comes with a one year warranty against any manufacturing defect.”
Not to mention, the lenses are made of polycarbonate whose inherent property is to deflect ultra violet rays and is highly impact resistant. “Right now, I Gear is available in 10 outlets in Bangalore,” says Padiath. “The national launch will be in November when we would be covering five more cities. By March 2004, we would be in the top ten cities of India.”
Single and all the more happy to mingle, Padiath has his own airy pad in Jayanagar 3rd Block with four balconies. And his lineage is quite unlike him. While he has an honours degree in English literature from Cochin University, his mother is trained in transactional analysis from Paris, UK and the US; his younger brother is doing his post doctorate in genetics at Stanford; and his late father was a Harvard graduate in business administration.
When his job is not occupying his mind, he’s marking time reading MAD magazines and Harlan Coben novels, writing poems and smoking cigars at home.
And the road ahead? He’s set on further education (possibly an MBA from Harvard), marriage and kids. Well, almost. Because he’s not sure as yet ‘though I can relate easier to kids than adults’.
1, ME, MYSELF
Arif Saleem Padiath, 33
Brand manager, Fastrack I Gear
BA Hons (English literature), Cochin University
Previously worked with Carrier Aircon
Trips on Steinbeck, Marquez, Ayn Rand, MAD magazines, Hollywood, crystals and cigars
He’s single and very ready to mingle
(First published in City Reporter, 2003)