Billing for your organic store in Lakshadweep
Each group's oil, each size of the jar and each visitor's gift pack, counted and billed.
Tools for a shop that sells what the women's groups make
Orders to suppliers
A page for each women's group, with each lot that came in and each payment made, so the account between you is never a matter of memory.
Your own online shop
A page for the shop with its oils, pickles and jaggery, ready to send to a visitor who has gone home and remembers the taste.
Daily reports
The sales of each group's oil on their own lines, so you can tell which group's jars are asked for by name.
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The coconut behind the oil on the shelf
Coconut is one of the three main occupations on the islands, and an organic shop sells what comes from it.
- The main occupations in Lakshadweep are fishing, coconut cultivation and coir twisting, and tourism is an emerging industry.
A page for each group, a line for each jar
What you owe each group, on one screen, read by the group itself
When a group comes to your door and asks what you still owe, turn the phone to her. She reads her own page herself, line by line, in her own time, and you do not read it out to her or explain it. She leaves knowing, and nobody has to speak for the numbers.
Oil from one group, pickle from another, jaggery from a third: each paid from its own page
A visitor picks the oil, the pickle and the jaggery from different groups. At the month's end each group is paid from its own page, with its lots and their days, and not from a memory of who made what. No group is paid for a good that another group made.
Which group's oil sells first
Keep each group's oil as its own item. The daily reports then show whose bottles go first and whose stay on the shelf, and the next order goes to the group whose jars the customers keep asking for. A group whose jars do not sell can be told why, in numbers, and can try a smaller bottle.
Many hands behind one shelf of oil, pickle and jaggery
Whose oil is on the shelf, and what do you owe for it
The oil, the pickle and the jaggery on your shelf are made by different groups of women, each in her own kitchen. They bring a lot when it is ready, some are paid at once and some when the jars have sold. After a month, three groups have brought goods and two have been paid, and you cannot say who is owed what without opening four notebooks. The notebook has a name crossed out and a number written over it.
The same oil in three sizes, and a visitor who wants a gift
A small bottle goes to a family, a big one goes to a restaurant kitchen, and a visitor wants one of each with a jar of pickle and a block of jaggery in a pack. Every size is a different price, and the gift pack is a sum worked out on the counter, with a customer waiting and a boat to catch. A visitor has a boat to catch, and cannot stand and wait for the sum.
Natural goods that you must be able to speak for
A customer who pays more for natural oil asks which group made it and when it came in. If you cannot say, you lose a little of the trust the price rests on. The shelf is neat, the notebook is not, and a question about one jar becomes a search through everything, with the customer standing at the counter, watching you turn pages and wondering.
Growers whose stall bills and online stock came together
What island organic shop owners ask
Two islands' groups both send me coconut oil. Can I keep the islands apart?
Yes. The two islands' oil sits as separate stock, and the counts show which island's oil is running down faster. The island whose oil goes quicker is the one to ask for more.
A group's oil comes part by part. How do I know the whole lot is in?
Note each part on the group's page with its day and the litres. The stock of the oil goes up with every part, and the page adds up to the whole lot, so you know when the last part is in.
A visitor asks which group made the jar and when it came in. Can I tell her?
Yes. The group's page has every delivery with its day, so you find the day the jar came in on it, and you read the day and the group's name to the visitor. If two groups sent jars in the same week, the page tells her which is which.
Organic certification and the women's groups
A major portion of Lakshadweep's area has been certified to National Programme for Organic Production standards by the certifier INDOCERT since 2011. A shop that sells island goods as natural has a certificate behind the claim, and a customer who asks about it gets a plain answer.
In 2020 an official said organic status could help 150 women self-help groups scale up production of virgin coconut oil, tuna pickle and jaggery for export. Those three goods are what a group brings to a shop's counter, and each group is a supplier with its own lots and its own payments.