09/08/2020
A Simple Act of Caring
Nashik, May 05, 2020: It was a hot Tuesday afternoon, when Manoj Deshmukh drove in through the wide gates of the Caprihans factory in Nashik. His 27-year-old routine had come to a grinding halt with the Covid-19 pandemic forcing the country into a state of complete lockdown. As soon as manufacturers of essential goods were allowed to partially open their manufacturing units, he was glad to return to familiar territory. To his utter surprise, he was greeted by a security guard wearing a Caprihans face shield. “Where did that come from?” he asked himself, making a mental note to check with Tharun Devasia, his Executive Assistant.
It was business as usual and a bit more, with all the restrictions and paranoia caused by the Corona virus scare and the team worked through the first half, then took a break around lunchtime and walked to the canteen. Again the Caprihans face shield surfaced, this time canteen staff were wearing it. “Hey Ganesh, come here… where did you get this?” Manoj asked the cook. “Sir, Bipin Patil gave it to me, told me not to sneeze on the food, wash my hand many times. How to manage all this and put food on the tables….” Ganesh grumbled and turned his attention to serving food on the neatly stacked steel trays.
“Sir, I’ve called Bipin. He’s on his way,” Tharun, as is often the case, had stayed one step ahead in anticipating Manoj’s request to meet the man behind the mask.
Halfway through lunch Bipin walked in, “Kay Bipin,” Manoj greets him in Marathi “Tell me about the face shield?”
“Sir, it was not easy to return to work, all of us were sharing our apprehensions yesterday, our families are afraid for our safety. But being without work is a still bigger fear and we all know that we are lucky to be part of a company where things are being taken care of in such minute detail,” he said. “I saw a face shield on TV and thought that maybe I can make it with our film,”
Caprihans is a company with decades of manufacturing excellence in PVC film, one of the many products supplied to pharma majors pan India.
Mr Patil fashioned his face shield with a piece of PVC film. He started off by measuring the distance between his ears and then between his forehead and chest. He cut the film according to the measurements, punched holes on either side and used the rubber from a surgical cap as a strap at the back of the head. “I used a foam layer to create a gap between the face and the shield, but it was not comfortable. I searched for another material for the headband and found a piece of an A/C insulation rubber pipe. It was perfect – soft and much more comfortable.”
Excited at having got it just right after several attempts, Bipin looked at the shield in his hand, “Every product has a brand name, this face shield deserved a name too! I took the packaging tape with the Caprihans name and stuck it on the front of the shield. Now it was perfect,” he said, “I gave it to the cook, told him it would protect him and all of us. Wear it and don’t sneeze on the food…”
At a time when morale is as low as the economy, one man refused to give up, found a simple solution… one that turned into a business idea. His concern for his own safety and that of his co-workers drove him to innovate, to reinvent, to find a solution. A product that is now a part of a new range – HEALTHCARE SOLUTION by Caprihans.
For decades, Caprihans has been providing various types of solutions to customers. We keep using our learnings to improve customer experience. It helps us better ourselves, time and again. This unprecedented crisis made us think – what can we do to help with our knowledge and experience? Result: we developed HEALTHCARE SOLUTIONS which will save and protect lives.
Caprihans cares for safety, Caprihans cares for you.
