Jain Cement Agency

Running Jain Cement Agency from Ayad Mahaveer Market keeps us on our toes all day. Being right on the Main Road means there is always noise from the traffic and people shouting across the market. We have been at number 11 for a long time. The shop isn't very large so we have to stack the cement bags carefully to make room for everyone to move. It is heavy work, especially during the busy months when everyone seems to be renovating at once. My hands are usually dry from handling the paper bags and there’s always a thin layer of grey dust on the desk. We get a mix of regulars who have lived in Ayad forever and new people who just moved to this side of town. Sometimes the traffic is so bad that the delivery trucks struggle to pull up, so we end up hauling bags by hand more than we'd like. We don't have a big team or a fancy computer system. We just write things down in the ledger and make sure the count is right. It gets hot in the afternoons when the sun hits the front of the market, but we just keep the fan going and stay busy. It’s a plain business, honestly. We sell cement and that is about it. People come to us because they know we are here every morning when the shutters go up and the market starts moving.