THE ART OF TIMELESS HOME FASHION

Skillionaires Podcast Episode 11

Vakil Kurshid

[Vakil Kurshid]

If you see in the marketplace today, almost every single brand, barring a few high-end luxury brands, very few, and you can name in one, two, three, every other brand in every category, have these discounts and promotions month after month after month to lure the customers, to give them better value. Okay, that's one way of attracting customers, but that's the way you actually dilute the brand ethos. We have taken it upon ourselves several years back that we do not want to go that route.

[Angela Thomas]

You guys, today's guest is actually a really welcome guest. I am having him with such a pleasant here. Thank you for being here.

It's a guest who has built a lifestyle brand empire from the scratches, leaving basically, yeah, Fortune 100 corporate company in 1997, right? Then you co-founded Marina Homes in Dubai, and you planned actually a perfection design or perfect design with Strategies, and also you were leading a very big, huge team, Cross Cultures. Welcome for this episode with Stories That Stick and Strategies That Scale, Kurshid Vakil.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Thank you for having me, Angela.

[Angela Thomas]

Thank you for being here and taking your time. I'm so blessed for having you in our podcast because your story really flashed me. I have actually met you first like two years ago in an event that has been held for real retail, especially.

And yeah, you beat there in a book that calls for more to souks or soup to mouth. I don't know really. But yeah, I read your story there and I was really astonished.

And also a dear friend, Dr. Heike has actually introduced both of us. So I'm very happy to showcase what is actually in your portfolio.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Very pleased to be here. Thank you. Yeah.

[Angela Thomas]

So, Kurshid, you have actually in the preparation of this interview, I was really not sure where to start with all the questions. And you also told me that you have done so many interviews, which were always the same somehow. And now I bring some valuable questions to you.

But please tell me where you started off as being an entrepreneur or what actually in your background needed for you to have entrepreneurial mindset. You grew up in Kashmir, as my research has given out and also was written in this book. So let me know a little bit.

What is the behind of your story?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Happy to share. Yes, it's true that I was born in Kashmir. I grew up partly in Kashmir.

And at that early stage, we had a lot of entrepreneurs in and around our family. So the entrepreneurial spirit was always there. But obviously, you cannot find that as a kid in yourself.

Fast forward, the education system that I was part of with and whatever teachings and learnings I gained from my corporate job, as you mentioned earlier, was fundamentally the initiation of the journey that I am in today. But to be very specific to your question, Marina Home was conceptualized in 1996, 1997, somewhere in between, where it was just a thought, a hobby, perhaps something that could lead eventually forward with, but it wasn't meant to be a very serious proposition at that time.

[Angela Thomas]

Is it so?

[Vakil Kurshid]

That is correct.

[Angela Thomas]

Okay.

[Vakil Kurshid]

So it started as a testing the waters, if you may, to understand how something new in the marketplace would place in the minds of all those people who come here from different walks of life, being such a very cosmopolitan country. We noticed that there was very little available in the marketplace at that point in time, which would make or qualify the term unique homes. So we started very small to see how people react, how people engage with the brand communication that we wanted to convey.

And basically to learn from the experience of that little testing waters to take the business forward.

[Angela Thomas]

Mm hmm. Interesting. As also in my preparation of this interview, I found that you founded the company with your brothers, right?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Correct.

[Angela Thomas]

With your family. So how does that work? I think that is something very challenging.

Or is it something that is meant to be coming from a background, Indian background is something very family orientated. And maybe you had this in your upbringing. What role was that playing in the whole journey?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Your question has two parts. And I like to answer in those two parts to make it a little more clear for listeners. Our grandfather and grandfather back in Kashmir were in a similar kind of business.

I'm a little beyond just furniture and home decor, but along those same lines. So there is a certain legacy there. But then it stopped in sometimes 1950s or 1960s.

The business for many reasons did not continue. So that's one aspect of it. The other aspect is the three brothers that we are involved in the business have been from the very beginning.

Usually one may think or perceive that while you work within the family members, this is a challenging situation, which is possible. We do also face some challenges from time to time, but we call them healthy challenges. I think the greatest strength that Brand Marina has is us three brothers.

There are two aspects to it, our team and us. We come from three different backgrounds. So we bring three different experiences on the table.

And we work that very well in the larger interest of the business. Yes. But we also believe that the strength lies in our team members.

Without the team members, you cannot have the company, you cannot have any forward progressive approach. So our most valuable assets are our team members. We lead them in different ways.

[Angela Thomas]

Yes, you lead over a thousand members in your company.

[Vakil Kurshid]

More or less, yes.

[Angela Thomas]

More or less, yeah.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Across many markets.

[Angela Thomas]

Many countries also, many cultures. And that is something that is a challenge per se. So I think having three brothers or having your family members brings a strong value towards those employees because I think they have you as a role model, perhaps.

You just can maybe line this out. But I think if a company with a family background leads a whole company, that is per se a very big role model in the members of your company.

[Vakil Kurshid]

I will only, absolutely, you're very, very right. What I would add to that is that we are not just members. We are part and parcel of the businesses.

We work as employees, our associates, from morning to evening. We are completely immersed and involved in our respective roles. And it's our job.

We do not consider ourselves as owners of the businesses when we are in the offices. Our respective team members, heads of departments have complete ownership of their roles and they do it the way they seem fit within the parameters of the strategy that we have laid for the business each year.

[Angela Thomas]

Very interesting when you come to the part of employment. Yeah. When we are in this podcast, we are talking about scaling.

Scaling with employees means also scaling the costs. And you said that your employees are the biggest asset that you have. And maybe you can give our listeners to this podcast a little strategy.

How did you proceed? How fast were you employing people? And on what kind of forecast that you depended this on?

What kind of forecast of work did you had in order to employ? Or did you only employ when you had already the work there and drove the existing team maybe into always a red zone, as I call it, when they are on the edge of work? How did you do it?

[Vakil Kurshid]

It's a very interesting question and interesting in the sense that it worked differently for us because we started from scratch. So every few months, every year, we evolved in various directions. And by evolving, we also learned a lot of things as to what to do next.

We made some mistakes. We corrected the mistakes. We made more mistakes, but we corrected more for the larger interest of the business.

So it wasn't very conventional approach to scaling up or hiring associates to help us take the business forward. At this point, it's all very streamlined. 28 years down is a long journey.

And one has learned a lot in these 28 years. So right now, it's a process-driven company and not necessarily people-driven company. Obviously, processes and people work hand in hand together.

So there are systems and procedures and everything and budgeting and forecasting and so on and so forth year on year. But when we started, the growth was so exponential that there was no budget because you did not know what was going to happen in the next three months. So it was a very fast growth pattern in the first five to eight years.

Then things come down a bit in the sense that you understand how to hold the reins, where to move faster, where not to move faster. And it's still, even 28 years down, it's learning in progress. This is a very dynamic world with a very dynamic business environment.

And you can never say, I know it all. And if anyone, and it's an advice, a suggestion to people who think that scaling is easy, it is not. And one must not be complacent to say, I can do everything.

It is a step-by-step approach. And you learn that over a period of time.

[Angela Thomas]

Exactly. I wanted to dive deeper a little bit in the further interview regarding the processes and the fast-pass market. But before I wanted to stick a little moment to this employment situation, because you said it's a process-driven company instead of a people-driven company.

But also you said in the beginning, you did a lot of mistakes within the founder and the leading of the company and bringing it up. And it seems to me that you have a very good mistake policy and learn from it. How do you actually implement this on nowadays within your team of passing forward and seeing on the now situation when people do mistakes, how do you handle it?

Do you encourage your...

[Vakil Kurshid]

So we'll talk about mistakes and we'll talk about processes as you have asked me. I definitely said that it is a process-driven company, because if you don't have processes, you do not know what to do next. You do not create that sense of discipline or sense of direction.

But who actually does these policies or processes? It's the people. So if you don't have intelligent, passionate, driven people who create those policies and processes and implement them and foresee them and follow up, it's not going to work.

So it's people first. Coming back to learnings, if a business does not go through mistakes, they will never grow. So we have done our share of mistakes.

And when we say mistakes, they're normally learnings. We learn from our customers, we learn from our business partners, we learn from our vendors, we learn from competition, we learn from inspiration. So there are so many aspects that you combine to be able to say, yes, we are a progressive company.

And that's how I call it.

[Angela Thomas]

Yes, having a good policy around mistakes, I think that's crucially for a company to work and to grow and to work into a growth factor. Leading all of these employees now, what is your ratio actually in terms of, if I'm allowed to ask this question, of having a second and a third leadership level? So for my ratio, always I have or I advise companies that they have like kind of 10 people and then a second layer of management.

Do you have this? And what are the steps that you find out what is the right ratio for you?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Look, ratio is very difficult to describe because it varies from company to company and also business segment to segment. And also, it depends on the structure of the organization that you're talking about. There are privately held companies and there are semi-privately held companies and there are public and government companies and so on and so forth.

So everything works differently. But with us, we already have the second tier and the third tier in place who actually drive the businesses forward. There was a time when we were like 100% involved because we felt that it is our baby, our brand.

We want to nurture it and carve it and set it into a certain direction that we believe the customers would like. And there was a huge role for us at that stage. Now it's like the nurturing part and moving forward for which we have some really passionate team members.

[Angela Thomas]

Very good. That's so good to have passionate team members that actually sign up for your kind of language and for your tone of the company, the tone of voice that you wanted to have. Khurshid, when you come to the processes and to a market in that you operate actually with fashion, basically design and all of these things are changing very fast.

How do you operate in a fast-paced market like Dubai and then on the other hand having also an industry that moves very fast? And how do you get this together without actually being grinded in between those two fast factors? Would you have an explanation on that and maybe an idea of where our listeners can look to?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Interesting question. Angela, we are not that far from the fashion industry. I think we are more fashion than fashion itself because people spend a lot of money for their homes or in their homes.

The largest investment from anyone is buying a home and the second largest investment is doing it up.

[Angela Thomas]

Doing it up and design it.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Yes, absolutely. And especially for those people who fall in the category of premium or luxury, home interiors is very important for them, for their lives. It's a reflection of who they are.

It's fashion for them. Hence, in our brand communication, we call ourselves home fashion and not necessarily home furniture, home decor, because the kind of people who come into our stores are very well-educated, well-traveled, very worldly. They know exactly what they want to see in their homes.

So to keep that trend, to keep that very dynamic is a huge challenge on our part. We do not believe that we do the conventional approach of home decor that other brands do. We bring in new designs very regularly, very frequently, and that's what we are known for here.

It's a constant evolution of being relevant to the aspirations and expectations of our customer. That keeps us on our toes.

[Angela Thomas]

Very good. And I have also seen that, and especially related to this fast market, in terms of fashion, it changes, it needs to be brought up something new. Did you have a lot of sales out there to actually maybe keep the customer interested, maybe to keep your items in rotation?

And I tell always the people not to define their services or products through process and discounts and so forth. How do you manage to keep your brand identity without losing out on your credibility when it comes to price stability?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Very interesting question, Angela. If you see in the marketplace today, almost every single brand, barring a few high-end luxury brands, very few, and you can name in one, two, three, every other brand in every category have these discounts and promotions month after month after month to lure the customers, to give them better value. Okay, that's one way of attracting customers, but that's the way you actually dilute the brand ethos.

[Angela Thomas]

Very good.

[Vakil Kurshid]

We have taken it upon ourselves several years back that we do not want to go that route. As such, we do just one sale promotion a year, and that is in the DSF. We feel DSF is a festival.

It's a carnival. It is a brand identity that is globally known, and a lot of people come here. And a lot of people come here with certain expectations of bargains and discounts and getting great deals.

Now, we're not into the bargain and deals space necessarily. We believe that it's a little gift from us to the customers during that month. So, for all of our retail, it is one sale a year and nothing more.

We believe that those customers, the discerning customers, who want great value for money, but also want quality, unique designs, do not necessarily buy when it's sales.

[Angela Thomas]

Yes, and I think it only speaks for you as an entrepreneur having exactly that policy, because I think also it avoids scaling, maybe on the outside, but as you say, you actually dilute your company, the profits, and it's not sustainable at all. And if you only attract customers who are triggered by discounts, it is just certainly a customer that will also leave when the discounts are not there. So, I think it's a very good thing.

And I'm very glad that you have this policy. It only speaks, as I said, for you as an entrepreneur. Khurshid, when it comes to your business environment, and I wanted to come back to the structure of the founders, the co-founders that you have, your brothers.

Yeah, you are a family business. And obviously, or maybe you can tell us, I'm just suspecting that you bring in the next generation into the business environment. How you do this, and what difference they bring in terms of scaling or driving the energy of the company?

I'm very interested in that.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Well, obviously, you have to set the legacy path forward. Someone has to take the business into the next, you know, decade, two decades or three. So yes, we have a plan ourselves.

We already have two members of our second generation, my nephews, my brothers, two children in the business. And they bring in new perspective, which we're very open to. Over the years, business has shifted, business approach has shifted, customers likes and dislikes and purchase patterns have shifted, new generations have come in.

And we are in our 28th year. Imagine someone who was 10 years old, when we started, is 38 years old now, or someone who was a student around 20 years old back then, is now our customer, we need to know how they think what they think of home interiors of their homes, their likes and dislikes. And that is what this new generation will bring in.

We're very open to their suggestions, very open to the formulation of a plan that will take the business forward.

[Angela Thomas]

Very good. And I wanted to know what is the aspect of, I bet everybody's talking about that subject of AI, and the young generation, what part they have to bring the subject of AI into your company. If it's a company that is process driven, I bet you'd be a big lover of AI or what is your perspective on it?

[Vakil Kurshid]

You see, there's a lot of hue and cry about AI.

[Angela Thomas]

Yes.

[Vakil Kurshid]

And I don't think people understand exactly much about the way AI is going to help everyone. People are skeptical, but I'm not, I'm very optimist. I believe AI is going to help everyone as we move forward.

AI is an assistant.

[Angela Thomas]

It is.

[Vakil Kurshid]

And you need a different type of assistance as an AI for everything that you do. It's going to assist you, make things faster, make things better. And AI is used in different segments of business differently.

AI in security, AI in policies, AI in art and craft, AI in media. So there's so much that you can actually take advantage of if it is handled properly.

[Angela Thomas]

AI, out of my perspective, is not about getting the next tool implemented. It is actually about the processes in your company. And therefore, I think this is something that you can well create in your company, very good AI driven processes.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Absolutely, Angela. As you know, AI itself is in a very nascent stage. It's early and every week or every month you see new dimensions of AI, new software coming up.

Different companies using it differently. So it's still early days. Yes, of course, as a progressive company, we are ready to embrace the involvement of AI in our different areas in HR, in our marketing, in our finance systems and procedures.

Yes, of course.

[Angela Thomas]

When you grow and scale a company at this size that you have done with your family, with the legacies that you built, certainly as it is a company written by family members, it is also a very important aspect to take along family members, especially partners, especially spouses. And when I see people wanting to scale, I see also often that they fail to take the partner along the process of the growth, not only about the growth of the company, but also about their growth as an entrepreneur. What would you suggest to a young person who's starting to scale to look after, especially in taking along the partner aside or family even?

[Vakil Kurshid]

It's a very subjective matter. I would be lying if I tell you that there's an ABC approach to such things. It depends on the understanding and the chemistry of two people as to how to work together.

But we believe there's room for everything. If you bring in individual expertise in the business, why not? If there's a stronger understanding between the two or between the family, and then why not?

It is great added value.

[Angela Thomas]

Exactly. Yeah. And I think that has to be always maintained.

Otherwise, you just split part on some point when you grow with all the entrepreneurial aspects that you undergo. And then the person next to you that shares every day your own story, then they don't know what is going on, actually. Then they are fighting out, going out the way.

[Vakil Kurshid]

That's what I said. It's very subjective. It works differently for different people, for different families.

But if you take a common denominator out of it, I think it's great if partners work together, understand how to take the businesses forward, understand the inclusiveness of their respective roles and so on.

[Angela Thomas]

Krushit, you are doing a lot of sports, I heard earlier. You're not such a big fan of golf anymore, but you have other sports. You are a big fan of marathons.

That has something to do with training and discipline, I suppose. And what aspect has the sports situation towards the business life that you live? What is your perspective on it?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Angela, you mentioned the word discipline. I think the biggest thing that any sport can bring in a person is discipline. Because when you take up any sport, you need to follow it up.

If you're passionate about it, you need to train, you need to wake up early morning and follow a certain regime. It's all about discipline. And what it does long term, it inculcates certain values in your mind.

And that helps you in your daily life. I think I'm indebted to sport in so many ways, because it gives me a certain perspective every morning. I wake up and I feel that, wow, what a wonderful day it is.

And that is a result of that discipline this brings in.

[Angela Thomas]

I think also when you are running a marathon, specifically, it has this sort of monotony to what a process that you are able to think deep. That's my explanation to it. And if you do sport per se, my belief is if you be flexible in your body, you can also be flexible in your mind and then grow and come to know different aspects of creating a good company.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Well, if not all, but there are many different types of sport that are based on resilience, tenacity, determination, and running endurance races, marathons is one of them. You cannot do that unless you have the tenacity and resilience in you, which you will eventually interpret in your daily lives.

[Angela Thomas]

Very good. Krishit, I wanted to know from you, I'm learning Arabic on a very early stage, but I think that is the changes I can bring to this region and to my business in this region. Sort of also respect, how do you actually predict the development in the whole Arabic MENA region for your business?

What is your plans to operate Marina Home throughout the MENA region?

[Vakil Kurshid]

We have a lot of confidence in this region, as you would perhaps notice with so much geopolitical turmoil going on around the world. This region still stands tall.

[Angela Thomas]

Very, and I'm so proud of it.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Stands strong and has all the fundamentals to move forward in the same manner. So we have a lot of confidence in this region, particularly our home base, which is UAE. We believe the next many years are going to be fruitful for everybody who either start up or scale up or even think of conceptualizing.

There's so much more here when it comes to the diversity of the region, the diversity of the number of people we have, the backgrounds, and most importantly, the infrastructure that has been created by our government here for everyone, welcoming everyone to invest, welcoming everyone to move forward.

[Angela Thomas]

Yeah, I think it's such a benefit to also not think as a human being or an individual or a business owner about politics. Actually, that leaves so much free data space in my brain that I know it is being handled by the government here and it's been handled so well that I can say I'm very proud to be in this region.

[Vakil Kurshid]

Oh, absolutely. So are we. Very fortunate to be in this region.

[Angela Thomas]

Well, thank you, Khurshid. One more last question I have. If it comes to scaling, if you could give one advice to one of our listeners that you don't want them to miss out to listen or to hear, what would you give them on their way when it comes to scaling and grow a business?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Scaling is always risky, but scaling is the only way to move forward. Otherwise, the business is stagnant. You look at the region, you look at the growth pattern, you look at the infrastructure, that would give you half the information as to the preparedness of scaling up.

The other bit is your business plan. How good is your business plan? How passionate are you to move this forward?

But importantly, do you have an equally passionate team that will help you to take this forward? Of course, it requires good business planning, it requires financial planning, it requires a lot of research. All those components are key aspects of anything that you want to take on a success route.

[Angela Thomas]

I think this is something very insightful to leave as a last comment to transport actually the passion that you have as a leader towards your team that you have to take along with you, isn't it?

[Vakil Kurshid]

Absolutely.

[Angela Thomas]

So thank you, Khurshid, for being here and being in the podcast, letting pick your brain a little bit by us and giving our audience a little insight. And we're going to put all of the information that you want our audience to have under the show notes so we can get in contact with you.

[Vakil Kurshid]

It's been an absolute pleasure.

[Angela Thomas]

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much.