From cavalry swords to cutlasses, Nautical Mart’s medieval menagerie of replica weapons and armor is quite the spectacle. We spoke with founder Sajid Rasool about how his e-commerce empire began.
Take a look at Nautical Mart now and you're likely to be impressed by the wealth of weaponry in Mr. Rasool's arsenal, but it wasn't always that way. In fact, his up-and-coming e-commerce company started out with the engraving of small brass telescopes. Back in 1991, Mr. Rasool built the business with these nautical items – and others – that he sold domestically in India.
In 1995, he launched their first website – nauticalmart.net – born of his inherent curiosity into how movie props were made, and his love of historical Hollywood epics, bringing in local craftsman to begin constructing medieval armors. Then, in 1996, Nautical Mart received an order of 8,000 medieval armor helmets, and year on year sales grew right into the millennium – as large and small contracts came in, resulting in orders from over 300 different customers worldwide, and over 100 B2C orders a day1.
With the majority of his items made on the premises in India, Mr. Rasool prides himself on the company's ability to use local creativity from within the community. There are 180 full-time employees, and close to 3000 contractors brought in for bespoke projects, all in order to fulfill the weird and wonderful orders that come from his customers2. While Mr. Rasool says that, to succeed “do not copy business but create the business,” he still puts much of his success down to DHL Express.
The 19-year strong relationship is not just testament to DHL Express’ ability to take care of any challenges regarding delivery, however. Mr. Rasool is still in awe of their ability to ship to the UK from the small town of Roorkee, India in just 2 days – as well as DHL Express' expert support and advice to grow his business – and he looks forward to the partnership helping his business achieve greater global visibility in the future3.
If you, like Mr. Rasool, are looking to grow your business globally, take the DHL Express website health check for your business and receive expert advice on how to finely tune your site for global e-commerce. With experts all over the world in local markets, you’ll receive up-to-the-minute advice to sell your products in the right market, so speak to a specialist today
1. https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/159252
2. https://www.nytimes.com/guides/business/how-to-hire-the-right-person
3. https://hbr.org/2007/05/strategies-to-crack-well-guarded-markets
