Madhuloka, the leading chain of liquor boutique, was one of the attraction while moving into the present locality. They have a great store featuring all kinds of liquor. They also deliver at your doorstep. Knowing the malayali penchant for liquor, a friend boasted about his flat fetching a great price if he sold as it is closely located to Madhuloka. According to his overly simple reasoning, the door delivery feature coupled the customer friendly store personnel provided a good enough reason for a malayali to invest in this locality!
Madhuloka has everything to enhance your drinking experience. In addition to variety of liquors, they also offer all the necessary accessories like chips, roasted nuts, openers, glasses, cigars and cigarettes. They have everything to enhance the drinking experience but nothing to prevent you from getting into trouble! The display and the lighting scheme at their stores inspire the shoppers to browse their various collection by completely forgetting the original purpose of their visit! I have spent precious time checking out the various labels they offered in their wine section in spite of all these being unaffordable.
As with any growing organization, Madhuloka is moving away from a customer centric model to a corporate one. In the past one week, there were two sour incidents while dealing with Madhuloka. In the first incident, when a delivery order was placed, it was not matching up to the minimum amount. Although, it has almost reached the minimum amount, they were unwilling to send their delivery boy unless another bottle of liquor is purchased! In the second incident, they refused to sell ice cubes unless liquor was purchased!
With a Total Mall and a Spencer Megamall around the corner, what is the differentiating factor for Madhuloka? A couple of months earlier, I would have said “friendly neighborhood liquorstore”! But, not anymore! As more retail outlets are being added under their list of stores, they are becoming less friendly!
As for my friend who was proud to be located closely to Madhuloka can scratch this from his list of nearby attractions and think about something else to promote his flat!
Picture Courtesy: http://bangalore.burrp.com
I lost some good friends becz of booze...hence this subject is not mine...cya buddy
ReplyDeleteWish you and your family a very Happy Holi.
ReplyDeleteA liquor boutique? What will they think of next?
ReplyDeleteI am not a great fan of alcohol, I would rather stay away from such stores :)
@Ramesh - Sorry to hear about your loss.
ReplyDelete@Babli - Thank you and Happy Holi to you too.
@Aparna - The next may be brew your own poison??? :)
I am not a drinker, so I shall not go gaga about the store anyway. We also have a neat one in the local supermarket here, so one does not have to go to the small stores anymore. But it is interesting that many owners of liquor stores ( atleast this was so many years ago) are those who do not drink, since liquor is their source of income.
ReplyDeleteNow that there is nothing called prohibition now, it really does not matter on the location of the liquor shop.
ReplyDeleteI am no great drinker
@Radha- I was surprised to find liquor being sold in a superstore after moving to Bangalore. Hearing what you say, this is a practice in other cities.
ReplyDeleteIt makes perfect sense for the owner for not drinking because he sees the extreme cases everyday! And it makes sense to be in perfect sense to count the collection. :)
@BKC - Location does matter as you can either walk into the store from home or ask them to deliver.
Yeah, bill up Rs. 295 and they charge you Rs. 30 for free delivery... thats bad...
ReplyDeleteBut otherwise luv, you asked for just ice-cubes (and no liquor) at a liquor store!??