From tong driver to 2000 crore Masala Empire | The Success Story of MDH

If you are a Millennial, then you have definitely come across the MDH advertisements on your television set with an old man advertising about spices instead of any young age model.

 

That old man is no other than MDH Masla owner Mahashay Dharmpal Gulati who is currently the highest-paid CEO in FMCG in India with a salary of more than 25 crores.

Mahashay Dharampal Gulati who is also known as King of Masla is currently 96 years old but still make the visit to his factories, markets, and dealers to ensure quality insurance and smooth management of his company.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBBwjJk_2Os

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History:

Mahashay Dharmapal Gulati was born in 1923 in Sialkot (Pakistan) and completed his education till class 5th. His father Chunni Lal Gulati works in a social organization there only he set up his own Masala company with the name of Mahashian Di Hatti Pvt ltd Deggi Mirch wale.

Soon after class 5th, he joined his father’s business and start learning about in and out of Masala business.

Later on, due to the partition of India-Pakistan and riots his father’s business got totally destroyed and he moved to India.

As time passed he moved to Delhi to his sister’s home and start looking for work to earn some money, but failed to find any job. So, he loaned some money from friends and relatives and start riding tanga within the streets of Delhi, but due to low income, he thought of leaving it and start with his family business.

Rise Of MDH Masla King:

In 1948, he started a small masala store in a hut in Karol Bagh (Delhi). With this, he started to earn good money and within a span of 5 years, he started his second branch in Chandni Chowk (Delhi).

Then in 1954, he started with Roopak Stores India’s first modern Masala Store and later on handed that over to his younger brother Mr. Stapal Gulati. After that Mahashay thought to also get into the manufacturing of spices and started his Masal factory and started to know as Mahashian Di Hatti limited or MDH.

Scaling of MDH:

As MDH started to expand in multiple branches, Masala King used his spice expertise to scale MDH to another level.

MDH currently export spices in more than 100 countries and has more than 60 range of products in about 150 packages. They also improved upon their supply chain while importing spices from India(Karnataka and Rajasthan) and also importing from International farms. Currently, they own more than 15 manufacturing factories.

After setting up the MDH empire from a small shop to a more than 1500 crores empire, he also pushed his arms in philanthropy and set up Mahashay Chunni Lal Charitable trust hospitals and schools in his father’s name for the poor class.

Current MDH Analysis:

In the current market scenario, MDH stood second in the spices market with a market share of 12% and Everest Spices are at the top with a market share of about 13%. Now, Mr. Dharampla Gulati’s son manages the overall operation along with his 6 sisters who all handle distribution.

MDH son switched manual manufacturing to automatic to meet the high demands and today they manufacture 30,00 tonnes of spices powder on a daily basis. After manufacturing spices spread across 30,000 stockists and 4 lacks retail dealers.

Also, in 2016, MDH made revenues of Rs. 924 crore and net profit of Rs. 213 crore and currently MDH is valued at more than Rs. 2000 crore.

In 2018 MDH reported revenue of Rs. 1095 crores and a profit of Rs, 315 crores.

Currently, 96-year-old Mahashay Dharmapal Gulati owns an 80% stake in the company and also recently received the Padma Bhusan award in Trade and Industry from India’s President Shri Ram Nath Kovind.

Update: On 3rd December 2020 Spice King Dharmapal Gulati passes away at the age of 97.

If you want to know more about him get his autobiography from this link.