Respect vital to innovator
KARAN BILIMORIA came up with his idea to make a premium lager because he was dissatisfied with the traditional, gassy, bottled lagers served by Indian restaurants.
Today Cobra Beer is a household name sold in 6,000 UK restaurants, plus thousands of pubs, bars, clubs and supermarkets and the company has a retail value turnover of £178m.
With a background in accountancy, Lord Bilimoria was able to put together a finance package by relying on wealthy individuals without giving away a sizeable part of his company to venture capitalists.
He admits he knew very little about the marketplace, which was one of the most competitive in the world. Cobra had to square up to some of the biggest and best-known brands in the brewing industry.
Then, as the first container-load arrived on the docks all the way from India back in 1990, the UK economy crashed into recession.
Those early days were incredibly difficult. Lord Bilimoria and Cobra's co-founder Arjun Reddy had no fleet of smart vans to deliver their product and visited their restaurateur clients in a battered old Citroen 2CV.
When many brewers were moving production abroad, Cobra shifted its production to the UK.
The move made financial sense. Shipping the beer from India was taking up too much administration and organisation time. Today it is brewed in five countries and distributed in 50.
Lord Bilimoria is a proud advocate of a socially responsible business model and supports a number of charities, especially those that fight poverty, prostitution and slavery in the developing world.
He once said: "You create an environment where people flourish. You respect them and you treat your customers and staff equally.
“A lot of companies worship their customers and bully their suppliers and employees and make massive profits. Well, I'm sorry that's not my way."
In 2006 he was appointed the Lord Bilimoria of Chelsea. He also holds a number of other positions including founding chairman of the UK-India Business Council and Deputy Lieutenant of Greater London.
