Royal Hardware Mart

If you've ever been to S.P. Road, you know how crowded it gets. Royal Hardware Mart is at 117/1, V.R.N. Lane, right near the cross. It’s a small shop packed from floor to ceiling with all sorts of hardware. We’ve got bolts, nuts, tools, and things I don't even know the names of sometimes. It’s been in the family for a long time. My uncle used to run it, and now we’re the ones behind the counter. It’s dusty work and our hands are usually dirty by noon. We don't have a computer system to track everything; we just know which shelf has what. People come in looking for very specific sizes of screws or parts for old machines, and we usually find them after a bit of digging. The lane is so narrow that you can barely walk through when someone is unloading a delivery. It gets really hot in the afternoons, so we have a small fan that barely does anything. We don't do any advertising. People just know we’re here because we’ve been here forever. We’re not trying to be the biggest store in Bangalore, just a reliable one where you can get what you need without a fuss. It’s a lot of standing and talking to customers all day. It’s exhausting but we like the community here. If we don't have it, we can usually tell you who does, which people seem to appreciate.