Tonca horticulture outlet’s daily revenue touches Rs 45,000

PANAJI: The horticulture outlet opened by the Goa State Horticulture Corporation Limited at Tonca, Panaji, in August may have got off to a slow start, but has now picked up the pace and is raking in the moolah.
Inaugurated on August 28, a few days prior to Ganesh Chaturti, the GSHCL venture, with its high-facilities along the lines of a hymart, provides residents in the vicinity with a range of fresh vegetables, fruit, spices and even coconuts.
“Initially we would earn just about Rs 22-25,000 per day. Now, our daily turnover touches nearly Rs 45,000,” said GSHCL managing director Sandeep Faldesai.
Apart from subsidised pricing, Faldesai also attributes the success of the outlet to additional facilities provided such as products being stored in chillers and coolers, thus increasing their shelf life, as well as air-conditioning of the premises, which he says, are drawing more and more people to the outlet.
Meanwhile, the outlet at Altinho, the first to be established along a hymart design, sometimes brings in revenue of about Rs 1 lakh per day, horticulture officials said.
The Tonca outlet opens as early as 7am and sees a steady stream of shoppers through the day. The outlet’s manager, Ankush Kundaikar, says, “We have been getting good footfalls.”
Dr Maria De Souza travels all the way from Dona Paula to Tonca specially to purchase the fresh greens available there. “The vegetables at all GSHCL outlets are cheap, but the added factor here is the digital billing system. Every purchase is accounted for and customers are finally presented with a machine-generated bill,” she said.
Another buyer, Vijay Aroskar, said that all vegetables are displayed systematically and are at eye level. “This makes the process of picking as easy as that in a supermarket,” he said, adding that the corporation should ensure that the premises is kept neat clean on a regular basis.
Buoyed by the response of customers to the Tonca outlet, GSHCL now has plans to outsource around 300-400 new outlets over the next few months. “At the last meeting of the board of directors, we have outsourced approximately 85 outlets. Currently, there are about 1,300 GSHCL outlets across the state and we intend to increase this number to 1,800 outlets by the end of 2019-20,” Faldesai said.