“I hail from a middle class family in Karaikudi in Ramanathapuram district. My father, Avichi Chettiar, was the only son in his family. In those days, most Chettiar families successfully ran money-lending businesses. However, my father broke traditions by setting up a shop selling utility items, instead of joining his father’s money lending business in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Tamil was the only language he knew.

Some may call my father a rebel. He broke yet another Chettiar tradition of engaging assistants to do all their work. My father refused to employ assistants and handled the day to day management of his shop all by himself. When he went to Chennai to purchase inventory for the shop, he would hang a board announcing his absence and would remove it on his return. He began displaying boards like ‘Fixed Price’ and ‘Please do not ask for credit’, a first in those days.

Soon, the small utility shop grew into a mini departmental store as my father introduced items like spare parts for cycles, Kodak film, battery cells, toys and also items for confectionary goods and medicines. Customer satisfaction was his ultimate goal. The shop named AV&Sons is still in existence at Kallukatty in Karaikudi.