TAMPA, Fla. -- With their sales down significantly due to ongoing economic crisis, Indian-American owners of grocery stores and gas stations have decided to unite to enhance their collective bargaining power with large manufacturers and suppliers, according to a report in The Pioneer.
"We feel that all these store owners, mostly independents, are not getting the best price for buying their products from the manufacturers. Unity will enhance their bargaining capacity and purchasing power," said Satya Shaw, president of the Asian-American Convenience Store Association (AACSA), at the conclusion of the seventh annual convention of the trade body.
Formed seven years ago in the aftermath of arrest of some 50 Indian-American store owners and their employees in Florida as they were selling some products, which they should not have, because of their ignorance, AASCA today has a nationwide membership of about 10,000 convenience stores and gas station owners, the newspaper reported.
According to unofficial estimates, of the 146,000 convenience stores and gas stations in the United States, about 50% are now run by Indian-Americans.
Since these stores and gas stations are run by individual businessmen with little capital, this sector is not as organized as Indian-American hotel and motel owners are, for example.
"This is an effort to bring them under one platform. Uniting of all the independent store owners and their combined purchasing power would reduce the cost of their products and thus enhance our profits in these tough economic times," Shaw said at the end of the daylong convention held at the India Cultural Center in Tampa, Fla., this past weekend.
Shaw said AACSA has already started talks with major companies and suppliers to give rebates as the convenience stores and gas stations are their major buyers.
How to tackle the economic crisis was one of the major topics of deliberations during the education seminar held for the convenience store and gas station owners, according to the report.
Ronald L. McDonald, an international restaurant business leader, author and philanthropist, said the collective purchasing power "is the only way Indian-American convenience store and gas station owners can gain prominence and increase their business."
McDonald, who authored several popular books, including “McDonald's Franchise Buyer's Guide: How to Buy a Restaurant Franchise,” addressed the convention and gave tips to participating convenience-store and gas-station owners on how to increase their collective bargaining capacity.
Vijay Gandhi, AACSA event chair, said, "As the U.S. experiences one of its most historic periods of economic uncertainty and road to recover, convenience-store owners are confronting many challenges: significant price increases for cigarettes and alcoholic beverages, implementation of stricter government laws and ordinances, restrictive supply- distribution policies, and a steady decrease in consumerism, which all are factors that contribute to small profit margins."
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