Kite-flying corporates

Corporates are placing last minute orders for kites with their company logos to gift to clients this Makar Sankranti

Telling your boss to go fly a kite or carrying a kite to your corporate office while on duty, may not get you sacked on the spot.
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Though orders for kites during Makar Sankranti usually come from Gujarati-dominated housing societies in and around Mumbai, kite manufacturers have been seeing a huge bulk of orders pouring in from a very unlikely source the corporate sector.



Corporates have been placing last minute orders for kites with requests for their company logos to be printed on them.

However, according to dealers, most of these orders typically come in between November and January 14, and due to the urgency of demand, keeping up is sometimes difficult. Being a seasonal business, it is difficult to find labour at such short notice.

Until last year, a major chunk of the business came through bulk orders placed by Gujarati dominated housing societies. Kite makers however confirmed that presently, orders from their earlier customers make up only around 25 per cent of the kites sold in Mumbai.

Kite orders during the kite flying festival celebrated by Gujaratis, have been seeing a steep drop in orders since more and more people preferring not to fly kites.

Though wholesale and retail markets have experienced a drastic drop in orders from the usual customers this year, manufacturer and dealers have managed to stay aloft with almost 75 per cent of orders coming in at the last moment from the corporate sector.
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"It seems that corporates are more interested in buying kites as gifts, rather than traditional kite flyers," said Suraina Rane, who owns the Khar-based Orion International.

"similarly, one hotel has placed an order with us for 50,000 kites. Likewise, this trend has caught on with radio stations as well," said Suraina.

In India, the kite industry is scattered and is unorganised being a small-scale sector. Besides, overheads have become dearer and the cost of paper, string and bamboo have increased.
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These overheads force manufacturers to sell at 25 per cent higher and the price of glass coated kite string (manja) has gone up by Rs 15. "We get 1,000 metres of raw manja for Rs 95 and then sell it for Rs 150 after coating it with glass," said Asif Khan, owner of Bandra-based, Standard Kites.

Another developing trend is the invasion of Chinese kites and string, especially in the retail segment.
This is mostly because Chinese kites are available in bulk, and although Chinese kite string is banned in India, it continues to sell.

Rs 400 cr
The kite industry in Gujarat has seen a spurt in its annual turnover fromu00a0 Rs 35 crore to Rs 400 crore in the last three years, according to figures of the Tourism Corporation of Gujarat Limited