Homemaker Turns Passion to Business, Earns 75000 Per Month on Home Décor
Deepika Velmurugan from Srirangam sells wooden home decor painted with traditional kolam designs on Instagram, through her brand Home2Cherish.
Growing up in Coimbatore, Deepika Velmurugan was always familiar with the traditional kolam designs that her mother drew every day in front of their door. But she was not aware of the fact that one day she will make a fortune out of them.
Kolam designs are auspicious designs drawn in front of South Indian homes in rice flour. They are intricate designs using dotes and squiggles encircling those lines.
Deepika had pursued her BSc in Costume Design once worked as a designer for a Tirupur-based textile manufacturer. But after her marriage, she had to quit her job and focus on her family. After she had two children, she had a bit of time at her hand and she started drawing kolam designs on wooden furniture. First, it was a personal hobby. She took a wooden cradle separator and drew an intricate kolam design on it. She posted the picture of it on Instagram and the responses she got were enormous.
Deepika realised that people really liked these types of traditional designs and she decided to make a business out of it. Her Instagram handle name is Home2Cherish and now she gets orders from all around the world and has 30,000 followers. She earns a profit of around Rs 75,000 per month, she says.
She uses acrylic colours to paint the kolam design onto the wood and then coats it with wood polish. The woodwork is done by her carpenter, and they mainly use mango wood, teak wood, rubberwood and neem wood. The bestselling articles in Deepika’s business are kolam padis (wooden steps for keeping idols of gods and lamps in pooja rooms) in different sizes and shelves.
The decor items are priced between Rs 1,500 and Rs 20,000 and are made on-demand. They start the production only they receive an order, and Deepika is grateful that the customers graciously wait till the production is finished. Her husband Velmurugan had been extremely supportive of her business and is her support system, says Deepika.
Credits: The Better India
-Staff Reporter
