Kudumbashree - Success Story of Three Star Event Management Group

Serving food and earning livelihood: Success Story of Three Star Event Management Group

G.V. Raja Sports school located in Thiruvananthapuram was established with the aim to improve the standard of sports in Kerala by bringing in qualitative as well as quantitative advancement in the domain of sports. This is a mixed school with classes from 8th to 12th standards. The current strength of the school is 300 and operates in a residential mode.  Food is served to the all inmates of the hostel in the canteen located in the premises of the school.  ‘3 Star event management group’ is an enterprise registered under Kudumbashree Mission. The group has 3 members, Smt. Preetha, Shri. Manikandan and Shri. Vivek. Staff includes 14 members involved in cooking and cleaning, one driver and a store keeper and all their families belonging to Neighborhood groups (NHGs) of Kudumbashree. Eating is one of life’s pleasure and pride – so cooking and serving good food to others.

How the unit started and evolved?

The canteen was initially run by various catering units. Since the inmates were sports persons, food of high quality needs to be served to cater to their physical work. Earlier there were complaints on the quality and quantity of the food served. It was then that the Sports director approached Kudumbashree Executive Director in this regard. The Thiruvananthapuram District Mission Coordinator approached the Kudumbashree enterprise unit to take up this opportunity. It was on 2nd of July 2018 that the unit commenced its operations.

Main Activities & Turnover are as follows. Bed Coffee is served at 5:30 AM, breakfast from 7:30 AM onwards, lunch from 12:30 AM onwards, tea with snacks from 4:00 PM onwards and Dinner from 7:30 PM is served to all the 300 inmates. The food served includes vegetables, pulses, egg, milk and meat. Daily menu has been fixed by the school authorities themselves, thereby ensuring a variety balanced diet. Rs. 183 is paid per person. The monthly turnover is Rs.16 lakhs and advance amount is given at the beginning of the month for purchasing necessary items.

The members of the unit are all NHG members and hence there is a common understanding among all and works with the aim of winning together. 16 families are being benefited through this enterprise. The quality of food has been certified as good by Food Safety inspector who does inspection regularly. The students have also expressed their satisfaction regarding the food served.

The entrepreneur has emphasized that the payment per person needs to be revised from the current pay of Rs. 183 per person to Rs. 200 per person to earn a sustainable income. This is under the consideration of the sports department. The enterprise has plans to boost up business by adding more members and venturing into new arenas of business like event management for marriages and other functions.

Serving food to students and seeing them eating happily is, as they have said, a moment of happiness they enjoy every day. Success normally comes to those people who devote to their work. Prosperity in life will never come to us when we remain sitting idle. By extending opportunities to many entrepreneurs like that of ‘Three Star Event Management Group’, Kudumbashree Mission is giving wings to the dreams of many.  These women of Kudumbashree Mission prove that there is nothing impossible in the world, if one has decided to work hard to make it succeed.