As a mother, a proponent of conscious, equal and gender neutral parenting, a champion of earth friendly and conscious living, an animal rights activist, a social entrepreneur, and co-founder of Almitra Sustainables, Anamika Sengupta wears many hats.
Driven by a passion to seek the most natural way of living for her son, she co-founded Almitra Sustainables, a lifestyle brand that she started with her husband, with the aim to provide eco-friendly alternatives for daily living, that can help replace plastic.
Anamika reminisces, “The vision and inspiration for setting up Almitra Sustainables, is my son Neo. As parents, we wanted to give him a Greener world to grow. We feel we owe it to the coming generation, to offer them a more pure, clean, and green world to breathe and grow. About the name Almitra, well, she is the protagonist in Khalil Gibran’s The Prophet. A book and author I ardently admire! She is the girl who asks the prophet a series of questions about life, love, children, grief etc., and the prophet shares his wisdom through these answers. I had always felt that if I ever gave birth to a girl, she would be named Almitra. And it so happened that my journey as an entrepreneur stemmed out of motherhood, when Neo was born. So although not human, I did give birth to my brand, along with Neo and I have been bringing up two babies since then!”
Barefoot parenting shaped the vision
Anamika’s philosophy of Barefoot parenting helped shape the vision for Almitra Sustainables. She and her husband have been raising their son Neo in the most natural way possible, allowing nature to be his first teacher. “That’s what Barefoot parenting is all about. And this has been a great experience so far. Neo is a completely gadget free child, and loves spending his time climbing trees, helping us plant and harvest our organic food garden, learn carpentry, play outdoors with his friends etc.”
In the process, when Almitra Sustainables was created, she also became acutely aware of the urgent need to help create a better future for children, with clean air and chemical free products. She was also able to see the struggles faced by other parents, seeking similar natural options for their children, and that is what has shaped the philosophy of our company.
Speaking on the challenges faced in the initial years, especially being a woman, she says, “I am not sure if getting into this field was difficult per so or just being a woman, as a whole, is difficult. I say this because I have experienced first-hand, the sexist corporate policies that are still very much in force, even in MNCs. When I resumed my management role with a leading MNC after my maternity leave, I was asked to leave abruptly, under the presumption that my productivity as a new mother would be diminished. This was one of the biggest discriminatory setbacks I faced because of being a woman and a mother! And it impacted me deeply! In fact, that made me realise the need of a more inclusive working space and the motivation to create it myself! Today I am happy to say that my workspace is an inclusive and diversity friendly space that supports breastfeeding, new mothers and young parents, as well as pet parents who can bring in their pets to work.”
Innovation begins at home
Almitra Sustainables works with artisans across India and leases out work units for production. Also, being a home grown business, all of its products are first used by Anamika and her family at home to see the effectiveness, before she starts selling them to customers. They have so far received reviews from the users, which motivates them to innovate more.
Almitra Sustainables brings a whole range of earth friendly lifestyle products that provide easy alternatives to everyday plastic products. The range includes products one would typically use through-out the day, starting with a bamboo tooth brush, to reusable straws and a complete range of innovative and revolutionary scrubbing and cleaning products made entirely out of coconut coir. The products come with requisite certification, especially the re-useable metal straws, which are food grade and certified.
When Anamika started the sustainable brand two years ago, she was not ready for the kind of overwhelming response it received. “We thought we would have to do massive awareness campaigns etc., but we were accepted warmly, especially by the younger college going crowd, who are more aware about environmental crisis and are the real change makers. And yes, surprisingly again, Covid-19 has made people sit up and revisit their ways of life, take efforts to make more conscious choices. However, so far our experiences are based on a short spike that we have noticed and so we will have to wait and watch how this progresses,” she says.
Almitra Sustainables has adopted a very sustainable work culture, including the entire packaging and logistics of the products. It uses cardboard and paper whereever applicable and individual products are encased in cloth pouches etc. Most of the artisans are locals and play a significant role in the production and distribution of the products. Almitra Sustainables even exports to Europe, USA and Puerto Rico.
Anamika outlines her future roadmap, “Our goal is to spread awareness about adopting sustainable lifestyle practices among masses, and our products can be key facilitators for this change. Our larger aim is to motivate people to make the switch. We believe in slow and conscious consumerism and are happy to grow organically, at a natural pace.”
