Sai Paper Cups

Our small unit, Sai Paper Cups, is located at Plot No 2-24-103/10 in Laxmi Nara, inside the Andhra Pradeshyana Colony. This is in the Ida Uppal village area, which falls under the Uppal Kalan mandal. We literally just make paper cups for tea and coffee. The unit is a bit small and it's always packed with big rolls of paper and boxes waiting to go out. The machines make a constant humming sound that you get used to after a while. My brother and I manage the whole thing. It gets pretty hot in here because of the machinery, especially in the afternoons. We don’t have an air conditioner, just a couple of big pedestal fans that mostly just move the warm air around. We get our supplies from a distributor in the city and then we turn them into cups to sell to the local tea shops around the colony. Sometimes the paper gets damp if it’s raining hard, and that messes up the machines, so we have to be careful about how we store everything. It’s a very hands-on job. We are usually covered in a bit of paper dust by the time we finish. We don't have a big fancy truck for deliveries. We just load up the back of our old scooter and take the boxes to the shops nearby. It’s a simple way to make a living right here in our own neighborhood.