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How to build businesses for profits and social impact
Summary
Rudra Chatterjee of Obeetee Carpets and Luxmi Tea on building businesses with impact, profits and imagination
In The Diary of a CEO, Steven Bartlett writes that the first law of business and life is “filling five buckets"—knowledge, skill, network, resources and reputation. For Rudra Chatterjee, each bucket is full to the brim. The 47-year-old chairperson of Obeetee Carpets and managing director of Luxmi Tea holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and a Masters in design history from Oxford University; his network comprises advisors and friends like Nobel laureate Abhijit Banerjee and current Bangladesh PM Mohammed Yunus; and both his companies have received numerous awards.
Growing up, Chatterjee studied at St. Xavier’s school in Kolkata and spent his vacations at the Shyamaguri tea estate with his grandfather, Paresh Chandra Chatterjee, a freedom fighter who started the tea business in 1912. His early memories are of spending time in homes of tea workers sipping black tea brewed with a pinch of salt and served with puffed rice. It forged a sense of community—that he calls emotion—to run a business.
Also read: The diplomats who built India's foreign policy
What do you enjoy most about your work?
I have an interest in everybody's business, not just my family’s. I love all facets of running a firm, from finance to marketing and operations. I applied for an internship at the management consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton after Columbia Business School, and it taught me to open the hood and look at businesses. I enjoy looking at the numbers all the time and like to be multi-dimensional. The end game is to build businesses with impact, profits and imagination.
Who do you consider your mentor?
When I was at Columbia Business School, I met someone who had a lasting influence: Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus, who started a global microfinance movement to eradicate poverty. While chatting with him, I felt it was a much better model, especially for us because we employ weavers and tea workers. To learn more, I started hounding him for an internship. Although he told me he didn’t have an internship system, I managed to convince him. Eventually, I interned with his venture Grameen Bank that gives small loans without any collateral. That experience strengthened my conviction that our tea and carpet businesses can also be social businesses, along with being profit-making. I was determined to find ways to empower workers. Taj Chia Kutir Resort & Spa opened at our Maikaibari tea estate in Darjeeling in 2020. It boosted tourism and local economy. And I saw this as an opportunity to build rooms in the homes of the tea estate workers that they could rent to tourists who couldn’t afford to stay at the Taj. Similarly, the workers are encouraged to grow ashwagandha, turmeric and tulsi which we buy for our flavoured teas. I've recently invited Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to work with Luxmi Tea to see how we can supplement incomes of our tea workers.
How do you unwind?
I discovered a love for trekking on a college expedition to Machu Picchu. A decade or so later, I planned one of my first treks in India, the Sandakphu route that needed a pit-stop in Darjeeling. The family knew Rajah Banerjee who owned Makaibari in Darjeeling and I stayed with them. We were enjoying an evening together when Rajah asked if I’d be interested in running his estate, and that's how I acquired Makaibari in December 2013. Somehow, work intersects with my love for trekking. I made a trekking expedition to Tanzania’s Kilimanjaro in 2014, and that’s where I started looking at African tea estates. I’m also interested in craft, which set me off on another academic pursuit. In 2023, I got a Master’s Degree in History of Design from the Oxford University.
Monday Motivation is a series in which business leaders discuss their mentors and their work ethics.
