Pac-woman We are estimating to double our sales in the coming year. We would soon launch an app as well to reach more widely to our B2C clientele: Aakansha Bhargava
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Aakanksha was born in Kolkata, India into a business family. When she was just 7 years old, the family relocated to Delhi where she graduated from the eminent Hindu College. After completing her MBA from SP Jain, she joined the family business P.M. Relocations (PMR) at the age of 21. Back in those days both the industry and businesses were male-dominated. Sharing her experience, Bhargava mentions, "When I initially joined the business, I was taken as the boss's daughter. However, with time and a few learnings and unlearning on the way I ensured that both I and PMR established ourselves with the right tone and brand story."
PMR has grown in terms of not just providing world-class packing and moving services but creating and positioning itself as a complete relocation ecosystem where all services are available under one roof. Right from immigration to home search, city orientation, school search, utility services, orientation, and departure programs. Bhargava traveled and lived-in different parts of the country to understand the culture and pulse of the city establishing a reliable team and efficient work process. She adds, "Initially a lot of our clients did not take us seriously as I was both young and a woman, however, I have seen this outlook change over the years as the work started speaking for itself and we grew multi-fold. The industry still remains highly unorganized, but we hope we can create a niche for the relocation space."
The past two years have been transitional for the Indian relocation industry. Everything came to a standstill; leaving people to question their fate of working in a heavily impacted industry. Sharing her strategy in these times, Bhargava says, "Being traditionally from a family of mover it was very unlike for us to explore other alternatives such as laptop and desktop movement to ensure business continuity and work from home. However, learning and exploring new avenues amidst the standstill became the only alternative to bounce back much faster. Our brand diversification amidst the pandemic helped us soar through the challenging times. Our major pivotal moment was when we stepped into Door-to-door delivery with our commercial moving services and business continuity services. We were approached by most of our corporate clients to help them with packing and transporting laptops and desktops to the remotest of locations in India amidst the lockdown." PMR is the only Indian relocation company to facilitate domestic relocations, international relocations, and also third country moves (moves where neither the origin nor destination country is India). In the last year alone, they have relocated more than 5000 families Intra-India, 8000 families overseas, and moved over 1,00,000 laptops and desktops for ensuring business continuity.
Talking about expansion, Bhargava says, "We are looking to explore full-fledged pet moving, settling-in services, storage services, baggage services, hotel, and ticketing segments. Currently, we are estimating to double our sales in the coming year. We would soon launch an app as well to reach more widely to our B2C clientele." Bhargava proudly mentions that close to 1/3rd of their employee strength consists of women.