Dealers and retailers, hoping to get rich in the time of swine flu, now have to contend with a whole lot of unsold masks
Dealers and retailers, hoping to get rich in the time of swine flu, now have to contend with a whole lot of unsold masks
Chemists in the city who stacked up on masks in the hope of making a killing are now wishing they weren't so greedy.
After the initial swine flu scare that saw panicky people paying more than double for masks, there's a calm that's frightening for retailers and wholesale dealers.
Manjunath, a wholesale distributor of masks, got stock of 10,000 pieces two weeks back and managed to sell around 9,000. "Now, we are struggling to sell the rest as the demand has come down since last week."
And gone are the days of selling masks at Rs 13 a piece. It's back to Rs 6 per piece, says Manjunath.
But it was all about good business when the going was good. For instance, Cash Pharmacy sold thousands of masks. "In a week's time, we sold more than a thousand N 95 masks and we have no count for the ordinary ones," says Sumathi of Cash Pharmacy. But that is definitely the past.
Dead investment
A medical shop owner, who wanted to remain anonymous for obvious reasons,u00a0 said he'd bought masks worth Rs 80,000.
"When there was a demand, I sold maks like anything. But now, it has become difficult to sell. I have unsold stock in the godown which is a dead investment for me now. I hope I will be able to clear the stock as soon as possible," he said.
Srinivas M, who owns a medical store in Hebbal, has pretty much the same story to tell. "It's difficult to sell even one piece now," he says.
Vijay Kumar M of Balaji Medicals, J C Nagar, is one of the luckier ones. When demand was high and people were even prepared to pay Rs 20 for ordinary masks, he sold them for Rs.15.
"But later, I stopped buying, paying so much. I used to order not more than 50 pieces at a time."
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