By Dr. Baiju Mehta
Family Values
The ethnic roots of the company are very deep. Inside Das Pendawala, it is very famous for its culture and warm welcoming traditions. The year 1918 marked the beginning of a new era in the sweet making in Savarkundla. Shri. VanmalidasDevchand (our forefather) started a milk and peda shop and soon it became famous as Das Pendawala.
Das Pendawala has faced many challenges since its inception about 100 years ago and has emerged out victorious. It is very rare to find a setup like this where the centralized production facility provides sweets to shops that are at a distance of as long as 400 km.
Consistency in quality is the pillar on which the existence of this firm stands. The penda you have today goes through a quality assurance test. It tastes the same every time you eat it.
Family-owned businesses often have important values built into their DNA (literally) – values like entrepreneurship, desire to promote the welfare of others, and many tightly-held beliefs that create a positive, productive culture.
Values are essential to success, but they truly come to life when they are a structured part of your family business.
Quality, purity, and hygiene have always been our motto.
The Role of Family Members
The next generation grows up within this environment in their respective cultures, and utilize the norms and values that derive from these systems. From this, children develop actions and learning strategies that will help them to cope with new or changed circumstances.
“Traditional recipe and advanced technology” has become the mantra of the youth, turning a normal business into big corporates and with application of advanced machinery and technology.
The Changing Perception of Younger Generation
The current young generation of our family is involved in the family business and its growth (by inculcating new ideas and technologies.) This is a natural outcome of having highly qualified family members having degrees like Mech. Engineer, C.A., M.B.A., M.C.A., L.L.B., etc.
The Role of Modern technologies & automation
The secret of our success is the consistency of our good quality which is due to recipes handed down to us by our forefather and modified by us to include mechanization and automation to increase output.
Another important attribute to our consistent good quality is the richness and purity of the raw materials and ingredients used in our products.
We firmly believe that with the passage of time, we have to adapt to present times. In the mithai industry, the packaging is the need of the hour. We introduced the first-ever single piece MAP (modified atmospheric packaging) for Indian Traditional sweets. The shelf life of sweets extends up to 3 months in ambient. With automation of penda making and packaging, that can increase the shelf-life of the product up to three months, the company is leaving no stone unturned to adopt new technology.
We also have our private in-house laboratory wherein our dairy technologist examines and tests the milk for purity.
Lockdown consequences
Covid-19 made the bonds in the family stronger. It made us realize the inter-connectedness of everything around us. Businesses found ways to improve hygiene, serve the customer, and provide safe and healthy food.