Crown Decor is known for producing Compact board laminates, and largely focused to export market. The company has designed its manufacturing infrastructure as per overseas consumption, having 10 ft and 12/6 ft size presses. They have added one more press this year and would plan to put one more in this FY. Now, they have ambitious plan to cater domestic market and reaching out pan India focusing on retail demands. Their young and dynamic team at their production, marketing and sales work endlessly to make sure that they are one in the market. The Directors of the company Mr. Manish Patel and Mr. Shiv Patel shared their thoughts and discussed the plan with The Ply Reporter for catering domestic demands.
Our projected growth in the next year would be around 40% of our current turnover. Considering current year growth of 30%, I’m really optimistic about reaching our target for the next two years.
Our projected growth in the next year would be around 40% of our current turnover. Considering current year growth of 30%, I’m really optimistic about reaching our target for the next two years.
Q:- Please brief about Royal Crown’s manufacturing capacity, production, infrastructure and specialty of its plant?
A:- Our current production capacity at Crown laminates stands close to 3.6 million sheets annually and the infrastructure is driven by the need to make production and operational systems semi automatic, as we have a larger focus on Compact board manufacturing. Considering that to making a lot of technical products at Crown, we also have a lot of emphasis on R&D. For that, we have a wide range of testing equipments in our laboratory.
Q:- What is the ratio of exports vs domestic consumption from this operation? How is the exports business?
A:- The current ratio of our Exports to Domestic is 70:30 with focus on domestic, set to gain in the coming year. Our Exports business has now gathered steam with advent to adding many countries this year and therefore we are now exporting to more than 60 countries. And will be adding more feathers in our cap by the next financial year.
The HPL demand in the past has been pushed by manufacturers themselves as they have been able to reach out to more and more avenues due to the extreme competitiveness of the industry.
Q:- What is the plan to expand Royal Crown laminates in domestic market?
A:- Our main strength in the domestic market has always been our focus towards the retail consumer and we have been able to reach out to them consistently successfully, our next focus would be reaching out to Architects and Interior Designers coupled with towards OEMs.
Q:- How much business do you target in the next two years from domestic market?
A:- Our projected growth in the next year would be around 40% of our current turnover. Considering current year growth of 30%, I’m really optimistic about reaching our target for the next two years. Our share in 1 mm market segment had been increasing slowly initially as we were a new entrant but since last two years, it has seen a sizeable jump for us in that category and we would like to keep the juggernaut going.
Q:- Who are the target customers for Royal Crown such as (High, Mid or Low segments) and why?
A:- We have never segmented our customers in categories as we consider all our customers as high segmented, as they are and have been our growth drivers, we tend to focus on our strengths, which help us manufacturing high quality laminates. Yes, we tend to be a bit expensive than some of the other manufacturers’ offerings. We make pure phenolic laminates but over time we want to reach out to our consumers and educate them regarding the benefit of our product which is ten folds better than others.
Q:- Besides 1mm range, do you plan to introduce other thicknesses and varieties/ranges such as colour core, digital, etc under Royal Crown brand?
A:- Of late we have forayed into the 0.8mm range which has been in the market for just under 6 months and we anticipate good business in the next financial year from the same. We have also introduced a 10 feet by 4 feet laminate range in of the widest ranges of laminates in the industry.
Q:- Would you go with distributors of Royale Touche or looking for new ones for this?
A:- We already have a different set of distributors from Royale Touche as our focus is to making a recognizable Brand out of Royal Crown in 5 years from now and it is possible only if there are distinct
distributors for each brand. It has been a hard journey walking in the shadows of mother brand but I’m happy to say that Royal Crown has started to gain popularity of its own.
Q:- What are the best things with Royal Crown brand other than it is sister concern of Royale Touche?
A:- Like I mentioned earlier, at Crown Laminates we are making a lot of products as compact, exterior grade, Lab grade, Antistatic, post forming which cater to the Domestic and Export markets.
We also have a wide array of sizes which include 8 x 4 ft, 10 x4 ft and 12 x6 ft. At the core of our organization, we have a young and dynamic team at our production, marketing and sales which work endlessly to make sure we’re one in the market.
Q:- Would you plan to expand production capacity further, if yes why?
A:- Yes, our expansion plans have been put into action as we will be starting production in one of our newest presses in a month time and we will be adding another press in the coming financial year as well.
Q:- How do you see India’s HPL market in coming two years?
A:- India has seen a significant growth in the usage of laminates since manufacturing started in India and the growth has been consistent however currently the scenario of demand v/s supply is a bit lopsided with supply easily outgrowing demand in the past few years. So we will witness a lot of manufacturers focusing on exporting their material and therefore making India a global hub for manufacturing laminates.
Q:- Who will drive the growth of HPL demand in future, and how?
A:- The HPL demand in the past has been pushed by manufacturers themselves as they have been able to reach out to more and more avenues due to the extreme competitiveness of the industry. In my belief the future will see a lot of innovation happening with products and applications which will sustain the growth rate of HPL.