A huge impact and an amazing legacy

Lionel Cashin, former Trade Relations Manager for Mars Confectionery and an instrumental figure in setting up Asian Trader, writes a personal tribute to Ramnikal Solanki CBE: 

Ram, as everyone called him, made a huge impact on everyone who met him and he leaves an amazing legacy.

Over 30 years ago, when I was the Trade Relations Manager for Mars Confectionery I received a phone call from Ram, explaining that he was the editor of a Gujarati speaking newspaper called ‘Garavi Gujarat’. Readers, who were also retailers, were phoning him with questions about confectionery that he couldn’t answer. He invited me to talk about it in his office in Silex Street, where his publishing empire is still based today. We agreed what he should tell them. Ram had delayed publication by a day to include the message, which he had translated into Gujarati. This was widely credited with helping solve the retailers’ problems.

Afterwards he invited me to his home for dinner, a delightful occasion where I met his wife Parvatiben and his sons Kalpesh and Shailesh and his daughters Sadhana and Smita.

The world was a very different place all those years ago. We had seen the arrival of many Indian families in the UK, all seeking to make a success of their lives: many became newsagents and grocery retailers. They replicated their own experience of retailing from their home countries. They placed their shops where people lived, they opened the hours when people wanted to shop, and they stocked whatever anyone wanted to buy. Traditional British shops still closed half day on Wednesday, Saturday afternoon and all day on Sunday, hard to imagine now! Over subsequent talks at dinner at the Solanki home Ram became aware of the problems British manufacturers had in communicating directly with the rapidly increasing number of Asian retailers and he made me aware of the challenges he felt they had in understanding the British retailing environment.

It was out of these talks that the idea crystallised to launch a trade magazine to be called Asian Trader and published in 3 languages, English, Gujarati and Urdu, to establish that vital communication. Ram then established an Asian advisory board with leading members of the business community to provide proper guidance to the magazine. It was a very exciting time.

Ram had the confidence to entrust the managing of Asian Trader magazine to his two (then young!!) sons Kalpesh and Shailesh: their youthful enthusiasm provided the dynamic driving force that helped make the magazine so successful.

The establishment of the annual Asian Trader Awards gave the opportunity to highlight excellence in the Asian trading community to our politicians and industry leaders. Ram was, quite rightly recognised for his innovative work by Her Majesty The Queen.

As aforementioned we live in a very different world today. Ram can take great credit for the leading way he helped to shape it, not only in the world of retailing and wholesaling but also in the vital role of good community relations.

I’m proud to have played a small part in helping him along his journey.