Embarking on a new journey to promote spices, Spices Board has opened a one of its kind signature stall – Spices India – at Lulu Mall here.
The shop exhibits a wide variety of Indian spices and value-added products and it specially features an assortment of whole spices and a bountiful basket of exclusive spice oils and extracts.
The shop also promotes a line of lifestyle and personal care products such as beauty creams, clearness oils, bathing bars, shower gels and shampoos all flavoured with spices. Gel candles with the fragrance of spices and spice flavoured chocolates are added attractions.
Gift boxes with an array of superior quality spices are also available in the stall.
A. Jayathilak, Chairman, Spices Board, said Spices India stall would also be an info-desk for disseminating knowledge to farmers / growers on schemes of the Board and good agricultural practices. Exporters can collect information regarding export promotion schemes and various value-added products.
He said the stall will be an experiential centre for customers to touch, smell and feel spices and it will educate them on various culinary, neutraceutical and medicinal uses of spices. It will also aid budding entrepreneurs by introducing them to various value-added products of spices which they can manufacture and market.
This is a pilot project and based on its success, the Board has plans to open more such outlets across the country and in overseas markets, he said.
Jayathilak said that Flavourit, an authentic brand for quality Indian spices, is an initiative of the Board to promote finest quality spices across the globe. Flavourit undertakes the branding, packaging marketing and promotion of finest spices collected from individual farmers and collectives to be sold to the general public. Flavourit streamlines the efforts of spice growers working at grassroots with market forces.
Flavourit will help the farmers get a better price for their produce. Since it eliminates middlemen, the collective can demand a fair price for the goods they sell. “We are paying them higher than market prices,” he said.
sajeevkumar.v@thehindu.co.in