As a child, Sruti Harihara Subramanian enjoyed her summertime visits in Kerala. Spending long hours by the Meenachil near her grandmother’s home, she found joy in the elements. The river is has been lost to pollution now, degraded by the people’s irresponsible consumption patterns, in a matter of ten years. The tragic change made Sruti realise that “change was essential and it must begin with myself.” Her oneness with Nature and a personal need inspired her to seek a way to live sustainably, every day, and she founded Goli Soda in 2013.
Accessible solutions
“Chennai, where I live, was not equipped with the basics of an eco-friendly way of living a decade ago,” Sruti says, “and so I specifically fashioned Goli Soda as a comprehensive next-door store, online platform and manufacturing hub to help myself and others embrace sustainable solutions without having the challenges of accessing the same, and thereby enabling a substantial lifestyle transformation, which would be of equal benefit to everyone.” The founder envisions Goli Soda as the most trusted and recognised D2C sustainability brand, globally, by creating a positive social and environmental impact, placing its products in every household. “We are creating an ecosystem guided by our core ethics and values, focused on customer aggregation, marketplace discoverability, expansive distribution and a strong digital presence, all of which are robust and efficient in the most diverse conditions,” she informs.
Sruti is a National Award Winning film maker and a theatre actor with a deep love for animals and the environment. Apart from managing her venture, she works on her artistic side, bearing fruits in form of awards and recognition from the nation’s best representatives. Additionally, she conceived and directed the Amazon Exclusive musical docu-series “HARMONY with AR Rahman.” Her entrepreneurial skills have also paved a way to her being awarded the FICCI Ladies Organization (FLO) award for Upcoming Entrepreneur of the year. Sruti received the award from His Excellency, The Governor Of Tamil Nadu. The same year she was awarded the Yuva Samman Young Achiever award by the MOP Vaishnav College For Women, Chennai, in the Best Entrepreneur category. It was the result of a tedious trail.
Awareness to purchases
“In the initial years, the market was still unaware of the concept of sustainability. Many people were curious but unsure how the products can be incorporated into their daily lives and how to live sustainably. For this we regularly held free workshops around various topics on sustainability. This gave us a platform to create a community, clarifying all doubts and mind blocks and also gave us an opportunity to explain how many of our products could be used and the importance of it. This also built the trust factor of the brand,” Sruti recounts the initial challenges. However, she has clearly come a long way, testified by the wide product range of Goli Soda, under the personal care, home care and stationery categories. “We are the only brand in India that infuses probiotics in our personal care range. Almost 90% percent of our products are handmade.”
The most popular items in the Goli Soda store are the shampoo bars, coconut coir scrubbers, face wash bar etc. Every Goli Soda product is made of natural or organic ingredients, completely abandoning toxic chemicals. Their sale goes on to support various self-help groups and other small and eco-friendly businesses. Fair trade and ethical behaviour among the stakeholders are the two principles of the Goli Soda team, ensuring their growth together. As a cherry on the cake, from the ingredients to the packaging, Sruti ensures no use of plastic at all. She adds, “we also believe in giving a second life to most non-perishables and focus on upcycling and repurposing of products to reduce the outflow of waste. At Goli Soda, we are providing sustainable careers to largely women-led businesses, manufacturers, designers and brands, and work closely in nurturing these partnerships with our expertise in the various marketplaces.”
New products, new habits
At the moment, Sruti is working towards more efforts in the Indian market. “We will focus on exports after we have a achieved a certain target in India,” she says. Her short term goals include addition of more members to the Goli Soda community, tied through the thread of sustainable living. She aims for increased market penetration in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities and towns across India through innovative digital marketing initiatives. Moreover, she plans to establish product experience centres at strategic locations, and expand Goli Soda’s existing product portfolio by 5X of current levels by entering into new product segments. Sruti concludes with her idea of a truly eco-friendly lifestyle; “Sustainability is not limited to being eco-friendly, environmentally conscious and consuming organic produce; it is a lot more than that. Being truly sustainable is about examining the entire process chain that goes into each and everything we, as consumers, buy. Goli Soda is a conscious brand that examines who we work with, where our products come from, how it is manufactured, what goes into the product, how it is packaged and even how it will be recycled or discarded.”
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