M/S Sri Lakshmi Durga General & Sweets

We are sitting right at Shop No.130 in the Kaleswara Rao Market in Vijayawada. This place is a mix of a general store and a sweet shop. It’s a bit of an odd combination, but it works for us. People come in to buy their daily household items and then end up picking up some sweets for their kids on the way out. I start the day early to get the glass cases wiped down and the items arranged. The market is always loud and crowded, especially during the festival seasons. We have all the basic groceries on one side and the sweets on the other. It gets a bit sticky sometimes with the sugar, but we keep cleaning as we go. I don’t use any fancy packaging, just the simple plastic bags or paper boxes. Many of the customers are people who work in the market themselves. We know their preferences by heart. It is a lot of work to manage both sides of the business, but we manage somehow. My son helps with the inventory and the lifting. The light in here isn't the best, but we are used to it. We don't have a website or anything like that. If you are in the market, you just look for the shop number and come in. We’re just local people selling things we think our neighbors will want to buy. It's been our way of life for years now.